Basketball has long been Shauna Snyder's life

High school basketball fans on the West Side probably remember the name Shauna Snyder.

Of course her basketball coach at Cibola High School, Doug Dorame – returning to the Cougars’ lair as its athletic director next month – remembers her.

“She was the Gatorade Player of the Year (in 2002-03),” Dorame recalled. “First of all, she’s just a great human being.”

In her senior season, “We lost to Mayfield that year in state,” Dorame recalled.

So did Snyder – it was the only time in her high school or college career in which she fouled out.

“They called three over-the-backs,” she said. “I got two fouls right off the bat.”

Dorame also remembered a rare win, also in Snyder’s final season, vs. the powerful Gallup Bengals: “We beat Gallup in Gallup – and Shauna was the reason. She was the 5A player of the year.”

In 2016, she was inducted into the Cibola Sports Hall of Fame.

Today, this “great human being” is an assistant coach to two-time NBA champion player Cliff Levingston, the head coach of the new Santa Ana Thunder.

Women entering what had once been the men’s bastion – the NFL, MLB, NBA, etc. – is no longer breaking news or unique. Snyder says she can shoot better form behind the arc than the Thunder players, and they’ve quickly realized her value to the team, which plays its home games at Bernalillo High School.

“I think they’re slowly getting to know me a little bit more,” Snyder says of the Thunder. “I’m a modest person, not one to throw out all my accolades.”

“She plays a big role for me,” Levingston said. “She has a basketball mind; she sees things on a basketball court that, if these guys could see them, they would be so much better.

“She understands basketball, and she knows how to teach it,” he said. “That’s what I like about her; I can trust her and she can lead – run a practice, run a game.

“She’s gonna be more valuable to me as she learns how I do things and how the men’s pro game is.

“I found her. I talked to peple; they said, ‘There’s a female who can really coach and she plays at a high level.’ After talking to her, I saw her basketball IQ, her love for the game. And I want people who understand and love the game.”

More than 20 years ago and impressed with her skills as a freshman, Dorame said he had a good team full of upperclassmen and decided, “It was more important (for Snyder) to play every minute with the JV. She developed as a player and got to play for coach Frank Dooley.”

Dooley, she said, “was a big part of my success in high school.”

The next three seasons, which included some memorable battles with 1-5A foe Rio Rancho, Snyder was a three-year starter, and “She led the state in scoring as a senior,” recalled Dorame. No wonder more than 20 colleges sought her services, and she’d once thought Colorado University was where she’d end up; UNM coach Don Flanagan “was not recruiting in-state then.”

After finishing her Cougars career as a thousand-point scorer, Snyder whittled down that long list of college suitors to Providence College (2003-07). As a 5-10 forward there, she played in 94 games, averaging 11.1 points per game – and etching her name into those record books as a thousand-point scorer in her career.

Looking back, Snyder remembered, “As a young child, I was always in sports; I was a very competitive individual. I had 15 cousins, all like in the same age group. … My sports were primarily basketball and softball.”

She played as a freshman and sophomore for the Cibola softball team, coached by Gene Victor. Before that, she was a Sundancers player. Once committed to Providence, she stayed focused on hoops, although she had to again understand her role – and wait for more opportunities on the floor after her freshman year.

“I knew where I was meant to be,” she said, although homesickness was a “shock” for her on the East Coast, where she said, “I went from geen chile to clam chowder. … After my freshman year, I adjusted real well,” although she admitted, “The classroom was very much a struggle, coming from an APS background – just the level of education at that time (and going to a prestigious college).”

Having an opportunity to play in the Big East Conference, when UConn dominated women’s basketball, and Notre Dame, not to mention being on national TV, and even playing in Madison Square Garden, remain career highlights.

“We were a part of UConn’s 72-game winning streak,” she joked. “We lost, you know, about three times in that, but you always had the feeling you could win.”

Initially, she was an education major, then she switched to management. Coaching “just kinda was a niche that I didn’t tap into – I wanted to be a player as long as I could; I played overseas (Bonn, Germany) and then I sat home and didn’t get picked up that one year. I was 22 years old.

“It was a point in my life, where (I thought), ‘What do I want to do?’ I knew I didn’t want to any corporate desk job; that just doesn’t fit my personality.”

She became a certified trainer, expecting to find a role as a college strength coach.

“I came back home as a retired player, if you will, and got into personal training.”

Ain’t no mountain high enough

Snyder welcomes all challenges, although she didn’t say she’d try to climb Mt. Everest.

That said, some of her days are spent up in the clouds: She’s a licensed pilot, and a pilot trainer.

“I went to flight school in 2018,” she said. “I think that’s the way I’ve always been in my life: I want to be in complete control. I would never want to be in the back of the plane, wondering, ‘What the heck are they doing up there?’

“That’s just my personality: If he can fly a plane, I can fly a plane – and I can probably fly it better than you.”

That “challenge” came after 15 years as a trainer.

“Once I got the ball rolling, and it got really real, I sold my house on the West Side and went to Mesa, Ariz., and got all my certificates within 11 months.”

Being a pilot, which she loves, won’t surpass her love for basketball.

“I’ll never forget these experiences, but when I sit in (the pilot seat), my heart is completely fulfilled in that position.”

Flash ahead to a few months ago, and the advent of the Santa Ana Thunder. Head coach Cliff Levingston wanted to have this new TBL team run by as many local people as possible, and he landed Snyder.

Kevin Banks, vice president of sales & community affairs for the team -- the brother of former Lobo star Willie Banks -- saw Snyder coaching in action at Johnson Center and told her about the Thunder, connecting her with Levingston.

“(Banks) said you’re going to write out the whole plan and run the whole tryout, and then (Levingston) is going to determine if he wants to ask me to coach. ‘All right, let’s go,’” she remembers thinking. “I stepped up and he said I really went out of my way to do the extra stuff … That’s just how I always operate, especially if it has something to do with something that I truly love.”

So far, she’s learned she can shoot better from behind the arc, but she’s going to be working with the players’ mindsets to help that facet, keeping the morale up through missed shots and losses.

“I’m all about building this culture of positivity and good lifting vibes. If you’re a bad apple, I’m going to call you out,” she said. “I’m going to sit you aside, and take them out of the practice area, and talk to them personally. … I like to pick the players apart on that emotional side, or vibe, not so much of ‘You gotta be coming off the screen’ and stuff like that.

“Myself, being there as a female, is very important for the squad,” she said. “I’m up to the challenge; I think that’s what (Levingston) saw in me.

“I’ve experienced a lot, and now I know where I want to go,” she concluded, with her 40^th birthday closing in Aug. 23. “My next challenge would be to see how far my basketball career as a coach would be.”