Former Penn soccer assistant coach Melissa Phillips has gone around the world to Angel City FC

Three and a half years ago, Melissa Phillips’ home bench was on a patch of grass wedged between the Schuylkill Expressway and a web of train tracks. It was an unglamorous place to spend the latest chapter of her life as a college coach, five seasons as a Penn women’s team assistant.

But now the California native got a chance to work in the most glamorous city of all, Los Angeles. Last month, the NWSL’s Angel City FC hired her to be its top assistant. And if that’s a story on its own, the story of how she got there is even more compelling.

In the spring of 2020, just before the pandemic struck, Phillips left Penn to become an assistant coach with London City Lionesses, a team in English women’s soccer’s second division. Eight months later, she was promoted to the team’s top job.

This opened a whole new set of doors. Not only was Phillips in charge of a pro team for the first time, but she led the Lionesses’ fight for promotion to the top flight. Along the way, she faced some of the biggest women’s teams in the world in England’s cup tournaments. And she matched wits with elite managers such as Chelsea’s Emma Hayes, Arsenal’s Jonas Eidevall, and Tottenham’s Juan Carlos Amorós — who’s now the new boss of Gotham FC.

“It was brilliant to learn from them from afar, and as close as I could be connected through their staffs,” Phillips told The Inquirer, her voice flavored with a distinct English lilt. “I always tell James [Clarke-Reed, her partner] at home, after the match, when the manager comes on and gives their postmatch thoughts, I’m like, ‘Quiet, quiet, I need to hear this.’ That’s probably my favorite part, is just being immersed within such a rich football culture and what you pick up from that.”

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Yet this all might not have happened if not for a nudge from a behind-the-scenes Union assistant.

Jay Cooney, the Union’s video analytics chief, knows a whole lot of people in men’s and women’s soccer. Before working for the Union, he was an assistant coach at Sky Blue FC (what’s now Gotham FC), and, before that, he was a longtime assistant for Stanford’s women’s team.

One of Cooney’s colleagues there was Nicole van Dyke. Before she got to Stanford, she was the head coach at Cal State Bakersfield, and, before that, Cal State Stanislaus. Phillips played for van Dyke at Stanislaus, then joined van Dyke’s staff at Bakersfield. When van Dyke moved to Stanford, Phillips got Bakersfield’s top job. And when van Dyke took over at Penn in early 2015, she brought Phillips to Philadelphia.

They still talk often.

“Nicole is one of my best friends and my mentor,” Phillips said. “She’s someone who I share ambitions with and I share values with … And she’s somebody who has always asked for more from me, to be a little bit better in every area that I can be, and to really ask me to challenge myself to become the best coach that I can be.”

» READ MORE: How Jay Cooney and Nicole van Dyke helped Stanford build the U.S. women’s soccer team dynasty

In January 2018, Philly hosted the United Soccer Coaches convention. Cooney knew of Clarke-Reed from the soccer stats world, and set him and Phillips up to go out for dinner.

It turned out to be more than just dinner. Clarke-Reed and Phillips fell for each other. He moved to the U.S. for a while, consulting for teams, including the Union. Then they moved back to England together when Phillips got the chance in London.

She used her college soccer connections to help the Lionesses build a squad of England natives who played at U.S. colleges and Americans with European passports who could move to England easily.

Her signings included Downingtown-born goalkeeper Shae Yanez, who after a rookie year with the NWSL’s Washington Spirit moved to Spain and got a Spanish passport. Yanez joined London City in August 2020 and still is there.

In the midst of a season where the Lionesses are is in first place, Phillips got the call from Los Angeles.

She didn’t know Angel City manager Freya Coombe well, but she knew Coombe’s track record with Angel City and Gotham before then. Assistant Becki Tweed worked for Gotham and the U.S. under-20 women’s team, and general manager Angela Hucles Mangano won two Olympic golds as a U.S. player.

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“It was a difficult decision, I think one that I absolutely couldn’t turn down,” Phillips said. “It’s an incredible amount of leadership to learn from at this organization.”

The chance to go home didn’t hurt either.

“The opportunity to have another experience at the highest level, working in the NWSL, was really exciting to me,” Phillips said. “Obviously, being that it’s my home is helpful, because I don’t think I would have left the project that I was at in London City for very many places.”

It will be a different experience from any before, and not just because of the weather. In three years, Phillips has risen from coaching collegians to lower-league pros to Angel City’s world stars: Christen Press, Ali Riley, and many more. The team also has a marquee teenage prospect in No. 1 draft pick Alyssa Thompson.

“It’s evolving your identity as a coach and a leader at every new destination or stop that you’re at,” Phillips said.

She hasn’t forgotten her roots, including “the culture that we built in the championship team at Penn.” She knows that plenty of things that worked in the Ivy League won’t work in the pros, but she also believes that core principles transcend level.

“It’s just about getting to know people at their core, who they are, how they want to be communicated with, how you get the best out of them, what motivates them, and really trying to set that environment for them to thrive in,” Phillips said. “It is a people business.”