VSC Cavan Eagles<\/a> guard has played all six league games for her club, who have made an impressive 5-1 start to the Domino\u2019s Women\u2019s Super League.<\/p>\n18-year-old Donnelly, of Cleveland Rockets, played for Ireland\u2019s U18\u2019s and U20\u2019s at FIBA Youth EuroBasket tournaments last summer and has also previously represented Ireland at U16 level.<\/p>\n
Two uncapped players included<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a privilege for me to be in the position to select these 13 people to represent their country in November\u201d said Ireland head coach, Thomas Garlepp.<\/p>\n
The staff and I \u201cbelieve this team will play tough and together through a challenging stretch of games\u201d added Garlepp.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs coach, my hope is simply that the athletes grow each day and enjoy this opportunity to show Europe what we are about.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ireland face Iceland in their opening Group A fixture of FIBA Women\u2019s EuroBasket 2029 Pre-Qualifiers on November 11th at the National Basketball Arena.<\/p>\n
Indeed, the side, have away fixtures against Azerbaijan and Switzerland on November 14th and 17th respectively.<\/p>\n
Three of the squad are plying their trade in the British Super League. Ella O\u2019Donnell joined Manchester Basketball this season after her four-year stint with Quinnipiac.<\/p>\n
O\u2019Donnell has helped herself to 36 points across five championship games so far this season. Lucy Coogan, is also in her first season with Essex Rebels after finishing up with Caldwell University.<\/p>\n
Coogan picked up 39 points and 14 rebounds in her opening five games. Completing the trio is forward Maura Fitzpatrick, who is in her second season with Caledonia Gladiators.<\/p>\n
Indeed, Sarah Hickey has been one of the form players in the Domino\u2019s Women\u2019s Super League. Hickey is the league\u2019s fourth highest scorer with 134 points from her six games, averaging 22.3 points.<\/p>\n
Katie Williamson has also been posting strong numbers domestically for FloMAX Liffey Celtics with a 16.5 points per game average.<\/p>\n
Whereas, Edel Thornton has also played all six domestic games this season, averaging 16 points.<\/p>\n
Also included in the squad are Caitlin Gloeckner (Cleveland Rockets), Emer Dunne (Career Decisions UCC Glanmire), Hazel Finn (Trinity Meteors), Michelle Clarke (Killester) and Enya Maguire, who is playing with Croatian club KK Studio Zagreb.<\/p>\n
Ireland senior women\u2019s squad<\/p>\n
Edel Thornton (Gurranabraher Credit Union Brunell), Ella O\u2019Donnell (Manchester Basketball, England), Emer Dunne (Career Decisions UCC Glanmire), Enya Maguire (KK Studio Zagreb, Croatia), Hazel Finn (Trinity Meteors), Katie Williamson (FloMAX Liffey Celtics), Lucy Coogan (Essex Rebels, England), Maura Fitzpatrick (Caledonia Gladiators), Michelle Clarke (Killester), Sarah Hickey (SETU Waterford Wildcats), Aoibheann Donnelly (Cleveland Rockets), Caitlin Gloeckner (Cleveland Rockets), Katie O\u2019Sullivan (VSC Cavan Eagles)<\/p>\n
FIBA Women’s EuroBasket 2029 Pre-Qualifiers Round 1 Fixtures<\/p>\n
Wednesday 11th November 2026 – Ireland v Iceland – 19:00 – National Basketball Arena<\/p>\n
Saturday 14th November 2026 – Azerbaijan v Ireland, 1000, National Gymnastics Arena<\/p>\n
Tuesday 17th November 2026 –\u00a0Switzerland v Ireland \u2013 18:00 Saint-L\u00e9onard<\/p>\n
Wednesday 10th February 2027 –\u00a0Iceland v Ireland – 20:30 – Asvellir, Hafnarfjordur<\/p>\n
Saturday 13th February 2027 – Ireland v Azerbaijan 14:30 – National Basketball Arena<\/p>\n
Tuesday 16th February 2027 –\u00a0Ireland v Switzerland \u2013 19:00 – National Basketball Arena<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cavan Eagles Katie O\u2019Sullivan is in line for a first Ireland senior cap. New Ireland women\u2019s head coach…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":672897,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[15218,61,60,43],"class_list":["post-672896","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-cavan","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/672896","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=672896"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/672896\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/672897"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=672896"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=672896"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=672896"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}