Loyola Chicago’s Sister Jean still working on Ohio State scouting report
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Before he sends his Loyola Chicago team onto the PPG Paints Arena hardwood Friday to face Ohio State in the first round of the NCAA Tournament, coach Drew Valentine will step aside for a moment.
Sister Jean Dolores Schmidt, college basketball’s most celebrated team chaplain, will have a few choice words for her beloved Ramblers.
Not only will she pray for good fortune and safe, injury-free passage through the game’s 40 minutes (more, if necessary), she’ll also offer a scouting report on the opponent.
But don’t ask her to reveal what she’s learned. Not yet, anyway.
“I have to do a little more scouting. I’ve done some. I have to do more,” she said, confessing she is a voracious reader of box scores. “They’ll hear from me, don’t worry.”
She said her message to the players will be simple:
“I tell them they have to play with their mind and their hearts, their hands and their feet,” she said.
Feet, Sister Jean?
“You have to get those fast breaks,” she said.
Sister Jean became the face of the Loyola team during its Final Four run in 2018 as a No. 11 seed. She scoffs at her fame that includes a recent mention by Jimmy Fallon on “The Tonight Show.”
Las Vegas bookmakers also are taking bets on what will be the greater number: Sister Jean’s age (102) or the lowest-scoring game in this year’s tournament.
Don’t be so sure about betting against Sister Jean. UCLA defeated Michigan, 51-49, in last season’s Elite 8.
A devout member of the Sisters of Charity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, she said fame hasn’t changed her.
“I’m still the same Sister Jean that I was before all this popped up,” she said. “This really didn’t start until we were on the road, and we were becoming Cinderella.
“When I woke up in Dallas (during Loyola’s run to the Sweet 16 last year), I said, ‘This is not a dream. This is the real thing. Get up, girl, and get going.’
“It’s not going to my head. I try all the time to make people happy, to be happy myself. If I make people happy and it’s good for my congregation what I do, good for Loyola what I do, then I’ll do it.”
She never turns down a request, although a friend once told her the school would benefit if she charged money for photos.
Sister Jean made her first visit to Pittsburgh on Wednesday when she accompanied the team to its hotel. Practices for all eight teams playing in the first round will be from 11 a.m. to 6:20 p.m. Thursday at PPG Paints Arena.
“I never realized how big it is,” she said of Pittsburgh. “All of a sudden, you come out of that big tunnel, and there we were. Seeing all those hotels looks like the hotels in Chicago.”
With the game played Friday, Sister Jean said she may try the fish fry at the Church of the Epiphany, next door to PPG Paints Arena. She also may have the opportunity to return next year when Loyola joins Duquesne in the Atlantic 10. Although she said, logically, “They should call it the Atlantic 14. There are 14 teams there.”
During her conference call Wednesday with reporters, everyone asked, “How are you doing, Sister Jean?”
Her response: “Great. I’m great every day.”
Her secret to a long life: “I have the genes from my father’s side of the family. He had six sisters and two brothers, and they all lived to be 90, 93, 95 years old,” she said.
“I eat well, I sleep well and, hopefully, I play well. And I have a good time, too.”