Has Iowa found Caitlin Clark's replacement? Yes and no (2024)

IOWA CITY, Iowa — In the practice facility where Caitlin Clark’s famous intensity was on display nearly every day for four years, Lucy Olsen runs through the same drills with the same amount of effort while showcasing a little more joy and a much larger smile.

It’s a slight difference in optics between Clark, who currently leads the WNBA in assists as a rookie, and Olsen, who is replacing her world-renowned predecessor as Iowa’s point guard after three stellar seasons at Villanova. But there’s little difference in competitive fire, which Olsen’s smile conceals and her new teammates embrace every time she takes the court.

“You can tell she just loves basketball,” said senior guard Sydney Affolter, one of two returning starters from the Hawkeyes’ national runner-up squad. “She loves to be here. She loves getting after it. But she’s so hard-working. In scrimmage, she’ll push you and not take it easy on anyone.

“She’s definitely lighthearted, but she can be mean on the floor.”

Olsen, who stands 5 foot 10, finished third in Division I in scoring last season, her 23.3 points per game trailing only Clark (31.6) and USC’s JuJu Watkins (27.1). For the second consecutive season, Olsen will be following up the nation’s leading scorer; her former Wildcats teammate Maddy Siegrist topped the charts in 2022-23. Perhaps Olsen’s vivacious personality shielded her from outside pressure at Villanova. At Iowa, which sold out every home game for Clark’s record-breaking performances, the expectations will dwarf what she faced in Philadelphia.

The nation’s third-leading scorer, Lucy Olsen, is headed to Iowa City❗️

Villanova ➡️ Iowa ✍️

2023-24 Stats :

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▪ 23.3 ppg
▪ 4.8 rpg
▪ 3.8 apg

🔟 Thirty-point games l 1️⃣ Forty-point game

🎥: novawbb pic.twitter.com/wtdakQrojO

— Posther Hoops (@postherhoops) April 18, 2024

The prospect of following someone as popular or accomplished as Clark could push many possible replacements away from a place like Iowa. Yet Olsen appears unaffected by stepping in for the NCAA’s all-time leading scorer and the back-to-back consensus national player of the year. In fact, Olsen has put any whiff of a comparison out of the discussion. It’s not relevant to her.

“I’m not going to be a Caitlin Clark,” Olsen said. “There’s not going to be another Caitlin Clark. She’s amazing, and she’s done such great things here. I think she’s definitely paved the way to how hard you should work, what expectations there are and what type of program this is.

“I think it’s more just pressure internally of, all right, do the best you can and if you do that, then there’s nothing else you can give.”

Assistant coach Abby Emmert Stamp felt pressure when she picked up Olsen and her parents for their official visit on April 16, one day after the WNBA Draft. Through preliminary video conversations with Olsen and her family, the connection seemed obvious. Olsen’s floor game fit perfectly with what Iowa wants from a point guard, and Stamp believed she was the best player available nationally.

With former coach Lisa Bluder and current head coach Jan Jensen bleary-eyed after Clark’s WNBA selection, Stamp dealt with a range of issues on Olsen’s visit that she described as “a comedy of errors.” From trying to find an umbrella in a downpour to having a meeting canceled to driving to a closed restaurant to not finding a parking spot before introducing Olsen to football coach Kirk Ferentz, every step of the visit included some aggravation. But Olsen and her family kept a great attitude through the ordeal, which put Stamp at ease.

“They just were so warm and happy and fun,” Stamp said. “It just was that instant connection. It felt like we were hanging out with friends and people that I had known for a long time.

“You could just get that feel … she’s just egoless. She’s one of the top players in the country, everybody’s after her in the portal and she’s just down to earth.”

Olsen watched Iowa throughout the season and was captivated by the Hawkeyes’ offense, which led the nation at 91 points per game. After what she called “speed dating” through initial transfer portal conversations with coaches, one visit was all it took for Olsen to select Iowa. That Bluder and Jensen left New York at 4 a.m. to participate in the visit showed Olsen how serious the staff was.

“I felt very wanted, and I think that’s something you need to have from a program,” Olsen said. “I didn’t want to go somewhere where they just wanted me for a year. They seemed like they genuinely wanted me and liked me as a person.”

Even when Bluder retired after 24 years as head coach and Jensen took over, Olsen never wavered in her decision. Every Iowa player stuck around, and all of the prospects remained committed. Nothing changed culturally, and the system stayed intact.

Iowa’s holdovers greeted Olsen warmly when she arrived for workouts; she lives with fellow guard Taylor McCabe. They’ve been regulars on the subdued Iowa City summer social scene, which has built team chemistry faster than expected.

“She came in super bubbly,” McCabe said. “She’s super open to getting to know everything and try everything, and she wants to see every fun spot around town. So we’ve done a lot of exploring this summer, and I can’t wait for her to experience her first Midwest winter because she already had her first tornado experience and that was a treat.”

The team-building has fostered stronger on-court relationships. Olsen said she and Affolter often ran into each other during their initial workouts because they had similar mindsets. Through side conversations and on-floor repetition, Iowa’s motion offense is running more crisply.

Olsen was a pass-first point guard at Villanova, and her forte was the midrange game, which Stamp said no Iowa guard has executed with efficiency since 2020 Big Ten player of the year Kathleen Doyle. But Olsen wants to improve her 3-point shooting percentage (29.4 percent in 2023-24) and works on it daily.

“She just didn’t have a lot of attempts at it,” Stamp said. “A lot of what she was doing at Villanova, she was creating her own shot. So early on we worked on using screens, coming off screens with pace, always having your hands and feet ready and just getting her to think a little bit more shot-first. I think for her, more than anything, is just that mindset of the catch-and-shoot 3 a little bit more within our offense.”

Nobody in Big Ten history was more productive on catch-and-shoot 3-pointers than Clark, and Olsen will have plenty of opportunities to improve her perimeter shooting. Although unfair, the other comparisons with her predecessor also are inevitable. It’s not anything Jensen, Stamp or anyone else has discussed with Olsen. They have just encouraged her to be vocal with her teammates and not stray from what has made her successful. That Olsen does so with a perpetual smile led to her own RayGun T-shirt that reads, “Basketball is Fun.”

“That’s it,” Stamp said. “That’s simple. That’s how we play, and that’s how we want to play now.”

“She’s going to be herself,” Affolter said. “She’s not trying to be anyone she’s not, so that’s exciting to see. We don’t expect her to do what Caitlin did, and we don’t want her to do what Caitlin did. This is obviously a new team and a new era. She’s been great, and she’s been killing it.”

(Photo of Lucy Olsen: Scott Dochterman / The Athletic)

Scott Dochterman is a staff writer for The Athletic covering the Iowa Hawkeyes. He previously covered Iowa athletics for the Cedar Rapids Gazette and Land of 10. Scott also worked as an adjunct professor teaching sports journalism at the University of Iowa.