Oct. 24, 2016
By Leigh Torbin
Perhaps the top point guard in the nation as she enters her senior year at Notre Dame, Lindsay Allen took the first step towards receiving formal recognition as such by the end of the year as she was one of 20 players named on Monday to the watch list for the Nancy Lieberman Award.
In both 2015 and 2016, Allen was a finalist for the accolade, presented annually by the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame to the country’s best point guard. Allen will have ample opportunity to stake a claim to the honor this winter as she goes head-to-head against five other watch list members during the regular season alone (Connecticut’s Kia Nurse, DePaul’s Jessica January, Duke’s Lexie Brown, Miami’s Adrienne Motley and Syracuse’s Alexis Peterson). The Irish could also face Washington and Kelsey Plum depending on how the Preseason WNIT’s 16-team bracket progresses.
Allen would become the second Irish recipient of the Award, joining Skylar Diggins who claimed the honor in both 2012 and 2013.
Allen claimed honorable mention All-America honors in 2015-16 after dishing out 5.8 assists per game with a 2.52 assist/turnover ratio. Allen led the ACC in assists for the second straight season and, in 2016, was one of four players in Power Five conferences to rank in the top 20 nationally for both assists and assist/turnover ratio. Allen is second among all active players nationally in career assists (559) and fourth in career assists per game (4.99).
Allen enters the season with a school-record streak of 112 consecutive starts, having yet to miss one in her three-year Notre Dame career. She has served as a team captain for each of the past two seasons and has helped guide the Irish to 106-6 record over her playing career, including three ACC regular season titles, three ACC Tournament championships and a pair of NCAA Final Four appearances.
The Irish open their 2016-17 season on Nov. 11 when they play host to Central Michigan in the opening round of the Preseason WNIT.
–ND–
Leigh Torbin, athletics communications associate director at the University of Notre Dame, has been part of the Fighting Irish athletics communications team since 2013 and coordinates all media efforts for Notre Dame’s women’s basketball and men’s golf teams. A native of Framingham, Massachusetts, Torbin graduated from the University of Massachusetts in 1998 with a bachelor’s degree in sports management. He has previously worked full-time on the athletic communications staffs at Vanderbilt, Florida, Connecticut and UCF.