Notre Dame Women To Sign Second Graduate Transfer
BlueandGold.com learned Tuesday evening that the Notre Dame women’s basketball program is planning to add a second graduate transfer this week — 5-8 point guard Marta Sniezek of Stanford.
Earlier this spring, the Irish landed former North Carolina guard Destinee Walker, who Fighting Irish head coach Muffet McGraw said will have more of a shooting role, whereas Sniezek is more of a natural point guard.
After Walker had signed, McGraw confirmed that she and her staff were looking to sign an experienced point guard as well from the graduate transfer ranks to provide leadership on an extremely youth-laden team.
A two-time Gatorade Player of the Year for the Washington, D.C., area at National Cathedral, Sniezek was ranked the No. 38 player in the country in 2015 by ESPN HoopGurlz and was a Parade All-American. As a freshman, she scored 11 points on 5-of-8 shooting (1 of 2 from three-point range) and handed out four assists in a Sweet 16 upset of Notre Dame in Lexington, Ky.
A year later, Sniezek and the Cardinal upset the Irish in the Elite Eight where she dished out eight assists and had zero turnovers.
As a junior in 2017-18, she averaged 5.5 points, 4.3 assists and 3.5 rebounds per game in 32 starts, and the Pac-12 coaches named her to the honorable mention all-league defensive team.
“The things she does, you can’t teach,” Stanford’s Naismith Hall of Fame head coach Tara VanDerveer told The San Jose Mercury News in Sniezek’s freshman year. “Her sense, her passes, her understanding of where other people are on the floor is something you learn as a kindergartner.”
Like Walker, who missed virtually all of the past two seasons with a torn ACL and then a hip injury, Sniezek was sidelined this past campaign while recovering from ulnar collateral ligament surgery, and also had torn ligaments in her right thumb. The McLean, Va., native also was the 2015 Gatorade Soccer Player of the Year for the Washington, D.C., area and was an NSCAA High School Soccer All-American.
She has eight siblings in her family, including six older brothers, one of whom, John Paul, played football at the Naval Academy. Sniezek also took on a leadership role in the household while her mother was recovering from a bone marrow transplant.
An official announcement is expected to be made by the university later today regarding her enrollment.
Interestingly, the first graduate transfer under McGraw also was a Stanford point guard, Lili Thompson in 2017. Thompson started the first two months before tearing her ACL on Dec. 31 for the eventual national champs.
Sniezek now gives the Irish 10 scholarship players for the 2019-20 lineup, which is top-heavy with guards, after losing the entire starting lineup to graduation and the WNBA Draft. The breakdown is as follows:
Grad transfers — Walker and Sniezek, with Walker actually having two years of eligibility remaining.
Senior — Kaitlin Cole. The former walk-on, who was sidelined in 2018-19 because of a torn ACL, was awarded a scholarship this spring.
Junior — Mikayla Vaughn. At 6-3, the team’s main low-post figure. She is the top returning scorer from last year’s team with 125 points (3.3 points per game).
Sophomores — Guards Abby Prohaska, Jordan Nixon and Katlyn Gilbert, and forward Danielle Cosgrove.
Prohaska played the most minutes (549) among all the returning players. Nixon this week was named to the 2019 USA Basketball Women’s U19 World Cup Team that will travel overseas much of July. Gilbert was medically redshirted last season following shoulder surgery.
The 6-4 Cosgrove is the team’s tallest player but primarily a stretch four, with 35 of her 48 shot attempts last year coming beyond the three-point line.
Freshmen — Forward Sam Brunelle and guard Anaya Peoples. Brunelle, also a stretch four, was deemed a consensus top-5 recruit, while Peoples ranked as high as No. 8 by Prospects Nation and starred in the McDonald’s All-American game with 11 points, eight rebounds, three steals and three blocked shots.
Because the roster is top-heavy in the backcourt, McGraw said she will employ primarily a four-guard look with a Princeton-based motion offense.
----
• Talk about it inside Rockne’s Roundtable
• Subscribe to our podcast on iTunes
• Learn more about our print and digital publication, Blue & Gold Illustrated.
• Follow us on Twitter: @BGINews, @BGI_LouSomogyi, @BGI_CoachD, @Rivals_Singer, @EJHollandBGI and @BGI_DMcKinney
• Like us on Facebook.