Three Notre Dame women's basketball players land on preseason watch lists
Notre Dame has some of the best women’s basketball players in the country. This week was confirmation of that. Three projected starters, when healthy, landed on national preseason watch lists.
Sophomore Olivia Miles is being monitored for the Nancy Lieberman Award (given annually to the top point guard in the nation), sophomore Sonia Citron is being looked at for the Ann Meyers Drysdale Shooting Guard of the Year award and senior forward Maddy Westbeld is on the radar for the Katrina McClain Power Forward of the Year award.
Citron and Westbeld started all 33 games for Notre Dame last season. Miles started 28. She missed the final five games of the year with a knee injury. The subsequent surgery from that major blow will likely keep her out of Nov. 6’s season opener vs. South Carolina in Paris, France. Citron and Westbeld should still be slated as starters.
Even though Citron is up for a shooting guard award, she was playing the No. 3 spot in a practice open to the media earlier this month. Five-star freshman Hannah Hidalgo and Fordham graduate student transfer Anna DeWolfe were in the Notre Dame backcourt. Neither have played a game in an Irish uniform, but they both could start in their first career appearance in Blue and Gold.
Head coach Niele Ivey‘s other options if Miles is not healthy enough to give it a go as a starter are sophomore guard KK Bransford and Cassandre Prosper. Bransford started 12 of 33 games as a freshman. Prosper arrived on campus early in the winter and came off the bench for 22 games as an early enrollee.
Bransford and Prosper are role players with the way the Irish roster is currently constructed. Citron and Westbeld — and, obviously, Miles when she is ready to get back on the floor — are critical contributors. Their names are being tossed around in the preseason for good reason. They were the only players to average at least 10.0 points per game for Notre Dame last year in a season that ended in the Sweet 16 for the second consecutive March Madness run.
It’ll be interesting to see what Hidalgo and DeWolfe bring to the Irish guard positions in the meantime. Citron got her feet wet as a primary ball handler last spring too. Ivey has a large collection of guards that can bring the ball up the floor, which is something she was missing last season when Miles was injured.
