Penn’s Kayla Padilla credits a WNBA coach with helping her rise to stardom

In her third season at Penn, point guard Kayla Padilla is already solidifying her place in the record books. The native of Torrance, Calif., will tell you that her high school coach, Noelle Quinn, deserves a big assist in her basketball career.

Quinn is now the coach of the WNBA’s Seattle Storm. She stepped in as coach of the Bishop Montgomery High girls’ basketball team in 2016, when Padilla was a sophomore. Since then, the two have shared a special bond.

“She’s a big reason I’m the player I am today,” Padilla said. “She helped me throughout my recruiting process and still has been a sounding board in college, [both] basketball-wise and just generally navigating life as a college basketball player and what’s beyond that.”

Padilla has quite the resumé at Penn. Beyond two All-Ivy League honors and one from the Big 5, the two-time captain also has earned five Ivy and four Big 5 weekly awards.

After an 84-60 loss to Harvard on Saturday, Padilla had amassed 1,160 points and 177 three-pointers in her career. She stands 12th in career scoring and third in three-pointers in the Penn record book. Padilla is averaging 16.0 points per game in her senior season.

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Padilla announced in December that she would enter the transfer portal as a graduate transfer after this season. Because the Ivy League does not allow graduate student-athletes, her move was not surprising. The league did not play the 2020-21 season because of the COVID-19 pandemic, but Padilla was still enrolled as a student. She cannot play for an Ivy team after completing eight semesters.

If she had the opportunity to play four years at Penn, she would be on track for 267 three-pointers, the most in program history.

“It means the world to have these honors, and obviously there was so much more I think I could have done, having had my full four years at Penn,” Padilla said. “I’m glad to have left my impact in the short time I’ve had here at the school.”

It’s been five years since Quinn last coached Padilla, but the two remain close. Padilla even chose her number (45) because it was Quinn’s number throughout her career. Quinn played 12 WNBA seasons for five teams (Minnesota, Los Angeles, Washington, Phoenix, and Seattle).

» READ MORE: Kayla Padilla extending impact beyond Penn basketball

“She’s been a big influence, and someone I really look up to, not just as a player but as a person” Padilla said.

Quinn was still a professional basketball player with the Storm while coaching high school hoops. Even with all her work, she found the time to be a mentor for Padilla.

“When your best player is your hardest worker, everyone else falls in line,” Quinn said. “Sometimes star athletes can be a little cocky or don’t know how to talk to other people and just have an air about them that is not great to be around. She was the antithesis of that; everyone loved her.”

Padilla’s decision to announce her eventual transfer so early into the season was not out of a lack of care for the Quakers. Rather, she wanted to “develop relationships” with potential coaches and “not have to make a super-rash decision” without losing focus during the league schedule that started after the new year. She has one year of eligibility remaining, and it’s still up in the air as to where she will end up.

Quinn, however, has hopes she ends up closer to home.

“I would love for her to be back on the West Coast, specifically so she can play in front of family again and [for it to be] easily accessible for me to come and watch,” she said. “But I think she can add value to any team that she goes to.”