From Player to Coach: Finding a New Way to Love the Game
Four Former NCAA Athletes Support the Next Generation
Summary
- Four former athletes—Sieracki, Carens, Hickey, and D’Aloise—found their way into coaching through injuries, transitions, and a desire to stay connected to the game they love.
- Their playing backgrounds help them build trust, foster team culture, and support athletes from both tactical and personal perspectives.
- The shift from teammate to coach is emotionally complex, but their shared goal of giving back makes the transition meaningful and lasting.
Across college athletics, when the final whistle blows on an athlete’s career, it is not uncommon for players to choose to swap their jerseys for clipboards, moving from the field or court to the sideline. These coaches know what it means to wear the uniform, the pride of wearing a school on their chest.
At the University of Virginia, Swarthmore College, University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Mississippi State University, four former standouts —Lizzy Sieracki, Maddy Carens, Annemarie Hickey, and Alyssa D’Aloise— stepped into coaching roles at their alma mater.
The Why: Coaching is a Discovery
For Sieracki, D’Aloise, Carens, and Hickey, the path to coaching was varied — sidelined seasons, the transfer portal, title runs — these experiences fueled a new way to channel their passion.
When Lizzy Sieracki tore her ACL for the second time during her senior season at UVA, she discovered her passion for coaching by stepping into a coach-like role while on injury reserve.
“I came to my coaches and basically said I needed to be as involved with the team as possible just to help me mentally deal with the side of my injury,” Sieracki explained. “I realized I absolutely loved being able to contribute to the game in that way,” Sieracki added.
She would come back from the injury and play two more seasons for the Cavaliers, where she was a standout on the backline.
Sieracki transitioned to the coaching staff directly following her graduation, prior to the 2022-23 academic year, and is now entering her fourth year on staff. Her multi-faceted experience as a player enhances her team-first mentality as a coach.
“Part of the role of being an assistant coach is doing what is needed to help the other coaches be that much more successful,” Sieracki emphasized.
For some, coaching isn’t discovered until after their playing days come to a close. When Carens tore her ACL playing post-college rec league soccer, continuing to play soccer was no longer an option.
While she was recovering, her head coach at Swarthmore college, Todd Anckaitis, approached her about coaching.
“Playing at Swarthmore was the best decision I could have ever made for myself — I wouldn’t want to coach anywhere else. It’s because of the incredible experience I had playing at Swarthmore that I decided to coach.” Carens explained.
For Carens, coaching isn't about building a long term career. Her passion is fueled solely by the desire to stay close to a game and program she loves.
Whereas Carens found coaching through an unexpected setback after college, Alyssa D’Aloise discovered it through a pivotal change during her collegiate career. Using the transfer portal, D’Aloise found a place where she could thrive on and off the soccer field: Mississippi State.
D’Aloise’s teammates and staff instilled a lot of trust in her, appointing her captain all three of her years at Mississippi State, where she was often a metaphorical bridge between the players and staff.
“Starkville, MS. has been a place that has given me the relationships that I think I was missing from my hometown,” D’Aloise explained. “I have been blessed with so many things outside of just soccer,” D’Aloise added.
D'Aloise currently has a hybrid role—- she is not just a member of the staff, but also the director of operations for the program. In addition to her vital role behind the scenes, her fellow coaches will often utilize her as someone who can still see the game through the players eyes.
“I know how much those people helped me, and now it is my turn to help these kids,” D’Aloise explained. “Every day I think, what can I do so they walk away thinking, ‘that was the best thing I’ve ever done in my life, that was the best decision of my life’”
Annemarie Hickey’s story stretches farther back. As a senior, Hickey captained a team that went from missing the NCAA tournament to playing for a national title.
“When you have coaches that are all bought into you…they cared about me as a whole person, and not just a volleyball player, and that is what I want to do as a coach,” Hickey explained.
She returned to Wisconsin to coach in 2017, and after spending eight years on the Wisconsin staff, Hickey now coaches at LOVB, where she is a part of the movement to bring pro-volleyball to America.
“Now, when I ask young girls, ‘Who’s your favorite athlete?’ They're telling me people like Lauren Carlini or Sarah Franklin. I couldn’t do that when I was little, and that right there is the most important thing,” Hickey articulates.
From rebuilding a college program to shaping a professional league, Hickey is truly leaving volleyball better than she found it.
The Shift: Player to Coach
These four coaches are the epitome of servant leadership. They coach to give back to programs that shaped them, and to guide athletes through the same highs and lows they once faced.
However, their purpose does not eliminate the difficult transition that these coaches went through.
“You go from everything being about you as a player, to now it’s the role reversal.” Hickey accurately articulated.
Although rewarding, in the blink of an eye, coaches go from being in the huddle, to leading it; in the game, to on the sidelines — so close to the game, yet so far.
These coaches are the same women who went to battle for their team and teammates. A lot of their mindset is still in the players' shoes, and that is part of what makes their roles so unique and special.
However, D’Aloise candidly vocalized some of the realities of the adjustment.
“To be completely honest, when I first got on staff, a lot of my thought process was: please sub me in,” D’Aloise explained.
The playing-to-coaching shift is one aspect of the transition, but arguably more complex is going from teammate to coach. These coaches have gone through some of their best and worst days alongside their teammates, and are now coaches to some of those same teammates.
It is a fine line to walk, as Sieracki formulated.
“Finding a happy medium of making sure they still feel connected and seen, but you are also that much more focused on their on-field development.” Sieracki said.
To brush off this shift as natural or easy would be naive, and if anything, it is this learning curve that makes it so rewarding to truly experience both sides of a sport and program.
For these four coaches, that “final whistle” wasn’t the end of a game at all, but rather the start of a new one… the start of a new way to love the game.
Their stories are a reminder that while seasons and careers end, callings and passions endure. And sometimes, the answer isn’t to hang up the uniform, but rather to help someone else wear it.