3-2-1 Notre Dame Observations, Questions & Prediction: Muffet And Niele
It was a bittersweet moment last Aug. 5 when Niele Ivey, the point guard for Muffet McGraw’s first national championship team in 2001 and a treasured assistant since 2007, took a position with the coaching staff of the NBA’s Memphis Grizzlies.
On one hand, it was difficult to say goodbye. On the other …
“Hopefully, one day she can take all that she’s learned and bring it back to our program,” McGraw said a little more than a week after Ivey’s departure.
The wheels may have already been in motion back then for a transition from McGraw to Ivey, and it took only nine months for the keys to be handed over to her.
After 33 years at the helm, McGraw announced her retirement on Wednesday afternoon (April 22), and minutes later Notre Dame revealed that Ivey would be the successor.
Here is our three observations, two questions and one prediction take:
3 Observations
1. The future on-campus statue of McGraw should have her in her familiar, classic, sideline crouch, hand on chin, somewhat emulating Auguste Rodin’s “The Thinker” sculpture.
Notre Dame Stadium has five national title coaches surrounding it, so it’s only fitting the two-time national champion McGraw, who also had seven other Final Four appearances to earn induction into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame, join Moose Krause (also in the Naismith Hall) as the next figure outside the Joyce Center.
In the spring of 1987 when McGraw was one of the final hires of the late Gene Corrigan,, women’s basketball had the feel of a glorified club sport on campus while posting an 0-18 record all time versus ranked teams in its first decade of varsity existence. Her ultimate objective at the time was to someday have a sellout crowd in attendance — and it came to fruition 14 years later versus Connecticut (Jan. 15, 2001) en route to her first national title. It’s been routinely packed in the last decade.
Her impact on the program that was imbued with a Fighting Irish sprit will be everlasting not only because of her longevity, production and nation-wide respect, but by achieving her peak years in the final one-third of her career despite numerous setbacks.
Frank Leahy, Ara Parseghian and Lou Holtz coached a combined 33 years at Notre Dame — 11 apiece — the same number that McGraw served. However, she was more like the Jesse Harper/Knute Rockne of the women’s basketball program in the way she built and cultivated it.
2. The timing was right for a departure for a number of reasons.
Deep down, I sensed she felt it would have been best to bid adieu after the 2018-19 campaign with the five starters drafted among the first 19 picks in the WNBA Draft. They had led a march to the 2018 national title and were one-point runners-up in 2019.
“But when I looked ahead to what we had coming back, I knew that it was going to be a challenging season, and I thought, ‘Where is the honor in that if I leave now?’” she said. “I really wasn’t ready anyway, so I put in for one more year.”
The year became even more taxing than anticipated with myriad health setbacks among several players that helped result in a 13-18 finish. McGraw went through the five stages of death and dying — from a purely athletic standpoint — that author Elizabeth Kubler-Ross famously wrote about: denial, anger, bargaining, sadness, and then finally acceptance.
However, three players did make the ACC All-Freshman team — Sam Brunelle, Anaya Peoples (despite shoulder surgery in January) and Katlyn Gilbert — and a five-person incoming class that ESPN HoopGurlz ranked No. 3 is slated to arrive.
“Now looking ahead to know we have a great recruiting class coming in. … I feel like I’m leaving the program in a good place,” McGraw said.
Be that as it may, the recruiting had begun to slip since 2017 by the immense standards set in the last decade, when the Irish had a run of seven Final Fours in nine years.
During that time, Skylar Diggins, Jewell Loyd, Brianna Turner, Jessica Shepard, Arike Ogunbowale, Jackie Young were all rated as top-five players by at least one recruiting service — and that is not including McDonald’s All-Americans such as Kayla McBride, Lindsay Allen, Kathryn Westbeld and Marina Mabrey, plus Canada native, national team member and top-10 WNBA pick Natalie Achonwa.
Over the past four recruiting cycles, Brunelle was the only one in that top-five category.
McGraw, who turns 65 in December, has expressed her displeasure with the way the transfer portal in the women’s game has grown, and that can indirectly translate on to the recruiting circuit as well, especially as one grows older.
That brings us to ...
3. Ivey has been the head coach in waiting for a while.
The new boss turns 43 in September and should be entering her coaching prime, even though she’s never run her own team. The positive is she had a significant hand at signing the aforementioned talent at Notre Dame the past decade.
It is often a daunting and thankless task to replace a legend. Hunk Anderson, Terry Brennan and Bob Davie all experienced it while succeeding Rockne, Leahy and Holtz.
Even Dan Devine, who won a national title in 1977, could never quite escape the enormous shadow of Parseghian, and stepped down after a sixth year.
Yet if anyone is primed to handle it, it is Ivey, who was an immense piece in all the successes experienced by McGraw, first as a star point guard and then as a cherished assistant.
There were three C’s involved in the hiring of Ivey: Continuity, comparison and charisma.
Like McGraw, Notre Dame director of athletics Jack Swarbrick sensed that Ivey would be soon “coming home.”
“We had talked to Niele about the possibility of this happening and so we were able to move pretty rapidly once Coach made her decision,” Swarbrick said. “Finding someone who understood [the program], the ability to build on what we have. That was the No. 1 factor.”
At the same time, Swarbrick and McGraw thought it would be beneficial for Ivey to learn elsewhere as well in her professional development.
“Getting away for a year just having a comparison is valuable,” Swarbrick said.
When asked to describe Ivey in just one word, McGraw replied “charismatic.”
“She is just somebody people are attracted to,” McGraw said. “She’s got a smile that lights up the gym. She is so fun to be around, and yet she can flip the switch and be serious and intense as anyone in the gym.”
2 Questions
1. Does McGraw want to enter politics or even succeed Swarbrick as the director of athletics?
McGraw does consider herself an activist who loves to be deeply involved in the community (she will be in her fifth food drive later this week), and she would like to join the Washington Speakers Bureau to further her passion of empowering women.
“I’ve found that I’ve turned into a real activist, and I’m really doing that,” she said.
As for running for office …
“I think I’m a little too honest for politics,” she said.
Swarbrick outlined three areas where he wants to keep McGraw aligned with the university:
• Educationally because of her teaching skills, and providing her the platforms to teach.
• Nurturing younger coaches in their development.
• Continuing to represent the school publicly.
Succeeding Swarbrick would be at the bottom of the totem pole.
“Absolutely not,” she said. "That’s one of the toughest jobs out there — that and head football coach at Notre Dame. There’s so much pressure and there are so many different things you have to manage.
“… [Swarbrick] has been a great leader for Notre Dame. I wouldn’t even want to try.”
2. Did the COVID-19 pandemic aid McGraw’s decision to step down?
Yes, because extra time provides a chance to listen to one’s heart.
“It was a big part of it,” McGraw admitted. “You don’t want to make a big decision like this coming off a season — whether it’s a high or a low point — you want to give it some time to reflect.
“This was a great opportunity for me to sit back and say, ‘What’s life without basketball going to look like?’ And I thought it looked really good. I felt really good about this solitude.
“I think people were wondering was I climbing the walls, what was I doing at home, was I driving [husband] Matt crazy? We really enjoyed this time, and it gave me a great chance to reflect and say, ‘What’s really important?’
“Things like this happen and tomorrow is promised to no one. What is your life going to look like down the road? We want to continue to enjoy it. I’m excited about knowing that I can handle not having basketball in my life.”
A common thread among the great coaches is the sport must consume every aspect of their life: If you can live without it — that’s a negative sign. It often means the competitive fire in the belly is becoming an ember.
Some continue to crave it no matter what the age. For others like McGraw, after 40 years in the business, there comes a time to write a new chapter in one’s life.
1 Prediction
Notre Dame should be improved and hopefully healthy and together enough to return to the NCAA Tournament next season — but it will take at least a couple more years of landing the big-time top-five to top-10 talent to get back to the 2011-19 level.
By the third year for Brunelle, Peoples and Gilbert (the 2021-22 season), Notre Dame could get back to Sweet 16 or even top-10 level. How much farther it can go beyond that will depend on the initial classes Ivey and Co., will be able to attract.
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