City of Basketball Love

By Andrew Robinson (@ADRobinson3)
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If anything, it wouldn’t have seemed right if Joanie Quinn had gone anywhere else.

The Cardinal O’Hara junior guard, fresh off a breakout high school season and early into a strong start with her Comets GUAA team, figured to have more options coming her way in the next few months. No potential offer could possibly bring the same kind of ties and connections her first one did.

Quinn didn’t need to wait any more, those ties binding her to La Salle as she announced her commitment to the A-10 program.

“I got the offer in February, but I definitely wanted to wait until our season at O’Hara was over just to see what else was out there,” Quinn said. “I visited early in May and just loved it there, everything about it was great.”

It was almost too fitting that La Salle was Quinn’s first Division I offer and eventually the one she would go with. Explorers coach Mountain MacGillivray liked what he saw, but he’s also known Quinn for a long time as he and Quinn’s mom Joan are friends back to their own high school days.

That’s not the only connection either. Quinn’s aunt, Ann Gallagher-Till, played at La Salle following her career at O’Hara and when Joanie announced her offer, she did so with a photo of her standing next to a framed picture of her aunt in her Explorers days.

“She was the first person that I called after I committed,” Quinn said. “It was beautiful to share that moment with her.”

As if all that wasn’t enough, a few O’Hara alums on a different track helped sell La Salle. Quinn said she talked with the Mancini sisters — twins El and Liz along with younger sister Christine — standout distance runners at O’Hara who all currently compete for La Salle, and they had all positive things to say about the student-athlete experience.

Academically, it was a really strong fit as well. Quinn, who took four AP classes this year, is aiming to study political science or English literature and on her campus visit met with the head of La Salle’s honors program, finding it checked all the boxes there too.

The Explorers had their best finish in MacGillivray’s tenure with a 17-14 record in 2022-23 that ended in the first round of the A-10 tournament. 

“They’re definitely on the come up, so I’m excited to get there and hopefully compete for an A-10 championship,” Quinn said. “I think he’s done a really great job in growing the program, and I’m just really excited to help continue to try and do that.”

As for Quinn, this past season proved to be an eye-opener for a lot of people as she moved into O’Hara’s starting lineup, put up 11.8 points, 2.8 assists and 3.0 steals per game and earned First Team All-PCL honors. Playing as a combo guard, the junior shined as an all-around player, shooting well from the perimeter and setting up teammates while also showing a knack for clutch plays

Her step-back, game-winning three in double overtime against West Chester Rustin hit all net to end one of the best regular season games of the year locally and it was Quinn who drew the game-winning charge that handed PCL champion Lansdale Catholic its lone loss in league play. During last year’s PCL and PIAA championship season, Quinn filled a role as a valuable reserve player and earned her keep in practice, saying she always wanted to guard All-PCL Sydni Scott because it would make her a better player.

What put Quinn in those positions wasn’t luck, but a lot of unseen preparation that didn’t make her breakout season seem all that surprising.

“There’s no talent without hard work, that’s always been my motto,” Quinn said. “My goal is to be the most hard-working girl out there.

“I really liked the pressure, I don’t know, it was just fun to be in the environment where you dream of it as a little kid. You think back to where you practice those step-backs ‘and the crowd goes wild’ is in your mind.”

From the moment the fire to compete was lit as a fifth grader in a CYO championship game, Joanie Quinn has only been about playing one way. Thanks to some strong connections, La Salle made sure it would be the one to benefit from it.

“I just want to play as hard as I can for as long as I can,” Quinn said.co