Lucy Olsen helps coach her former Lady Runnin’ Rebels: ‘She’s a great role model’

Lucy Olsen isn’t used to being on the bench.

The Lady Runnin’ Rebels’ class of 2026 isn’t used to sitting next to one of the best college women’s basketball players.

They’re figuring it out together.

Before she heads off to Iowa for her senior year, Olsen is spending the spring working with her former grassroots program as an assistant coach for its sophomore team.

“I love her so much, I just respect her a lot as a person and a player,” said George School’s Sylvie Harrington, who plans to attend Germantown Academy next year. “She’s a great role model for us at practice. Just seeing the way she plays and trying to add it into our game, it’s unlike anything else to have her as an assistant coach.”

Olsen was on the bench last weekend at the Hoop Group’s New Jersey showcase in Pitman. She provided in-game feedback and a postgame pep talk while sharing smiles with whoever was on the bench next to her.

It was her first tournament with the team, though she’s been coming to practices all spring.

“I had to get to know them because it’s hard to coach people when you don’t know their personalities at all,” Olsen said. “I was more trying to get to know them, they were trying to get to know me, but yeah, it’s been fun.

“I helped out a little bit last year, but I never went to tournaments. I’m excited, this is more of a coaching role. I want to be a coach in the future, it’s a good experience to have.”

For the group of 16-year-olds, who get to spend time with the nation’s third-leading scorer, it’s a dream come true.

» READ MORE: Lucy Olsen is heading from Villanova to Iowa, following Caitlin Clark’s footsteps

“The first time I met her I asked for her picture, so I was very wide-eyed, but now I’ve gotten used to it,” Harrington said. “For her to sit next to me on the bench and talk to me and give personal advice is so cool.

“It’s great having someone who’s at the Division I level and has been so successful,” said Gwynedd Mercy Academy’s Bailey Balkir. “Also having a female on the bench, it’s nice to have someone to talk to and she’s younger, so she gets how stressful the games can be.”

Olsen starred for the Rebels during her years at Spring-Ford, though her under-17 season in 2020 was canceled because of the pandemic. She committed to Villanova as a senior, when she led Spring-Ford to the 2021 PIAA 6A state final.

She scored 1,504 points in a Wildcats uniform over the last three seasons, first with Maddy Siegrist as the top outlet and then as a dominant scorer in her own right this past season, averaging 23.3 points.

She’s transferring to Iowa this year, hoping to help fill a hole left by Caitlin Clark.

And the Rebels are seeing up close what makes her so good.

“She can see things before it happens — when to slip a screen, when to cut to the basket,” Harrington said. “She’s given me some personal advice, she tells me I go too fast when I see the play before it happens, my body and mind aren’t in the same place; she said to slow down, let the defense react to me, then I can make them react.”

For Olsen, who’s helping head coach Bill McDonough Jr., son of Rebels founder and director Bill McDonough, with the under-16 group, coaching is a chance to do something she hasn’t done much of: watch from the sidelines.

She averaged 36.2 minutes of 35 games played this year. She’s used to being on the court. Sitting on the bench in a sweatshirt is a new feeling.

“I kept twitching — I want to be in there, I want to go get that ball,” she said, laughing. “It’s different because I can’t control it, it’s more giving tips, seeing it from a different perspective.”

During games, Olsen spends her time talking to the girl next to her on the bench, pointing out things on the court to correct or notice, like who’s left-handed, where to exploit gaps in the defense, or where a turnover could be forced, she said.

Afterward, she debriefed the players in huddle before they went their separate ways to fuel up for another game later that afternoon.

“It was just the small things,” Olsen said. “You can’t focus on everything at once but just the tiny things, like we lost the game because we couldn’t break their press. It’s a pretty new group, a lot of them haven’t played together, and it’s early in the season but we’ve got to learn to trust each other.”

» READ MORE: Lucy Olsen headlines Big 5 women’s basketball award winners

Olsen will work with the Rebels for another month, which includes the May live recruiting period in Atlantic City. She’ll head to Iowa in June to start summer classes and practices.

The Rebels players are certainly hoping to get their hands on some Iowa swag before the 2024-25 season gets underway, though Olsen laughed when she heard that, saying she’s also waiting for her first piece of Hawkeyes gear.

“We’re going to have to watch a lot of Iowa games now,” Balkir said.

This story was produced as part of a partnership between The Inquirer and City of Basketball Love, a nonprofit news organization that covers high school and college basketball in the Philadelphia area while also helping mentor the next generation of sportswriters. This collaboration will help boost coverage of the city’s vibrant amateur basketball scene, from the high school ranks up through the Big 5 and beyond.