Laura Winter

Classroom

Winter was selected as one of Notre Dame softball’s 12 BIG EAST Conference Academic All-Stars in 2013. Student-athletes in good academic standing and with a grade point average of 3.0 or higher for a given academic year were eligible for the honor. Winter is on track to graduate with a degree in information technology from Notre Dame’s top ranked Mendoza College of Business. She has also participated in the University’s cutting edge Rosenthal Leadership Academy over the past two years. The program offers workshops for student-athletes to impart skills, insights and strategies necessary to create and sustain effective leadership.

Character

Winter has served as the Notre Dame ace and leader in the circle over the past two seasons, throwing 260 or more innings as both a sophomore and a junior. She has also been directly responsible for more than half of Notre Dame’s victories in each of her first three years as a member of the Irish (25 of 46 wins in 2011; 29 of 40 wins in 2012; 29 of 43 wins in 2013). “Laura highly values her teammates and what they think of her,” Notre Dame head coach Deanna Gumpf says. “She is a leader on the field and encourages her teammates to never be satisfied. Having Laura back this year is huge because of the success she has had in the past. Keeping her healthy is important, and the experience she brings to the team is something you have to have to get to the level that we need to. With her experiences and on-field success, she is right where she needs to be to help get us where we need to go.”

Community

Winter has participated in a variety of community service initiatives since enrolling at Notre Dame in the fall of 2010, including Fighting Irish Fight for Life (which pairs student-athletes with patients in the pediatric Hematology/Oncology unit South Bend’s Memorial Hospital), the Irish Experience, ROC Your Body, the athletic department’s annual Pediatric Christmas Party, Bike for Hospice and Smash MS. Two projects unique to the Notre Dame softball team that she has been involved with were a charity game against the Wounded Warrior Amputee Softball Team in the fall of 2013, and the team’s annual Strikeout Cancer initiative that focuses on raising money for children with pediatric cancer. The Irish have raised nearly $80,000 during the first three seasons of the annual Strikeout Cancer festivities, including more than $40,000 in one weekend in 2013.

Competition

Winter enters her senior season ranked in the top 10 all-time of 12 different Irish statistical categories, including a program-best 9.20 career strikeout-to-walk ratio. She ranks second in walks per 7.0 innings (0.87), third in strikeouts per 7.0 innings (7.97), fourth in wins (83) and strikeouts (810), fifth in complete games (71) and innings pitched (711.0), and sixth in appearances (128), games started (105) and slugging percentage (.577) in the Notre Dame record book. Offensively, Winter tied the program’s single-season home run record with 17 in 2013, adding a career-best .338 batting average and 52 RBI at the plate. Her 2013 pitching totals of 31 complete games, 268.1 innings pitched and 9.27 strikeout-to-walk ratio (tied for second), 29 wins and 306 strikeouts (third), 28 complete games (fifth) and 7.99 strikeouts per 7.0 innings (10th) all ranked in the top 10 all-time for an individual Notre Dame campaign. Winter was the first player in program history to win both the Louisville Slugger/NFCA Division I National and USA Softball National Collegiate Player of the Week awards, and she became the only Notre Dame player to ever win conference pitcher (2012) and player of the year (2013) honors after taking home BIG EAST Player of the Year accolades last season. Winter was also named to the NFCA Great Lakes all-region first team, and was named to the all-BIG EAST first team squad for the third consecutive year as a junior.