By Joseph Staszewski
Sydney Zambrotta has kept her college recruitment a mystery for much of her high school career. It was a family decision and kept prospective programs from being influenced by the other schools that were recruiting her.
The highly sought-after Christ the King guard kept her suitors private, never officially naming the schools that had offered her scholarships or shown interest until recently. Zambrotta is down to her final five now in Louisville, Minnesota, Miami, South Carolina and Pittsburgh.
“Now that everyone knows my top five I think it is fine the way it is,” she said.
She has already taken an official visit to Minnesota and plans on checking out Louisville and Miami in late August. The 5-foot-9 Zambrotta isn’t feeling the pressure just yet. While she could make decision as early as September, her final pick could come later.
“I’m not at a point where I have to make a decision,” she said. “I’m still taking the visits.”
Zambrotta solidified her standing as one of the nation’s top prospects playing with New Heights this spring and summer. A strong performance at the Boo Williams tournament in Virginia convinced a few schools that were on the fence to make her an offer.
“I got some schools back and I did well from there on,” Zambrotta said. “I knew I had to play really well to get the schools I like.”
Already an excellent spot-up shooter, she has been working hard on her pull-up jumper. It’s the main missing piece in Zambrotta’s offensive game, along with the need to get to the basket a little more quickly. She averaged 23.4 points per game for a Royals team that won the Brooklyn/Queens title and lost in the state Federation Class AA title game.
Zambrotta was slowed by a foot injury early in the season before playing her best basketball in the playoffs. She picked things up defensively and took over games in key moments. Zambrotta had 32 points, six rebounds and took two key offensive fouls late in a CHSAA state final victory over rival Archbishop Molloy. She knows she needs to play with that kind of intensity more consistently moving forward.
“Toward the end of the season, I stepped up,” she said.
She will need to do so again if the Royals are going to erase the memory of falling just one win shy of the program’s first state Federation title since 2010. Zambrotta hopes to achieve that goal before heading off to the college of her choice.
“It was heartbreaking to lose that,” Zambrotta said. “But we knew we had this last season to go out and leave a mark.”
