It was a historic 12 months for the WNBA in 2024 with viewership skyrocketing, the emergence of latest stars like Caitlin Clark resulting in better attendance and merchandise purchases and social media engagement flourishing.
There’s little doubt the addition of latest stars within the league like Clark, Angel Reese and others, mixed with perennial All-Stars like A’ja Wilson and Breanna Stewart, strengthened ladies’s basketball.
However for one WNBA prospect, the recognition of the sport this 12 months is simply “the tip of the iceberg.”
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Flau’jae Johnson of the LSU Tigers earlier than a recreation in opposition to the Northwestern State Demons on the Pete Maravich Meeting Middle Nov. 9, 2024, in Baton Rouge. (Kristen Younger/LSU/Getty Photos)
“Now that the WNBA has lastly gotten its spark and that is the primary 12 months that it actually popped off, it’s solely going to get greater from right here,” LSU star Flau’jae Johnson informed Fox Information Digital whereas discussing her NIL partnership with the Unmatched basketball league co-founded by Stewart and Napheesa Collier.
“There’s going to be extra stars, extra storylines, extra basketball gamers, extra groups. That’s probably the most thrilling half is that the league remains to be rising. It hasn’t even hit that peak but.”
Johnson is uncommon on the subject of faculty athletes in at the moment’s NIL house. She prides herself on being probably the most marketable gamers along with her budding rap profession alongside along with her social media affect.
However make no mistake, this can be a lady who wakes up at 5 a.m. to get pictures as much as begin her day. And he or she is aware of that two years from now, when she’s eligible for the WNBA Draft, she will probably be there ready to affix the professionals.
CAITLIN CLARK RESPONSIBLE FOR MORE THAN QUARTER OF WNBA REVENUE WHILE MAKING LESS THAN $80K, EXPERT SAYS
And when she does, Johnson desires to be making historical past.
“It’s a lot that’s going to return with this. There’s going to be first-time, million-dollar contracts. There’s going to be first-time this and first-time that. There’s going to be a lot extra historical past damaged,” she mentioned excitedly.
Johnson believes the 2023 NCAA ladies’s basketball nationwide championship was a turning level for the game. It was a recreation through which she helped the Tigers beat Clark’s Iowa Hawkeyes.
Johnson is the most recent instance of stars being born earlier than they even attain the professionals.
Angel Reese, proper, and Flau’jae Johnson of the LSU Girl Tigers react after a 79-72 victory over the Virginia Tech Hokies throughout a 2023 NCAA Event Ultimate 4 recreation at American Airways Middle March 31, 2023, in Dallas, Texas. (Tom Pennington/Getty Photos)
“I feel faculty basketball actually took it by the roof if you happen to ask me. If it wasn’t for the surge that 12 months that we received the nationwide championship, it wouldn’t be a factor. It could be a factor, however it wouldn’t be as large because it was now,” Johnson mentioned.
“That got here from faculty, and it led to the professionals with Caitlin and Angel going to the league. And it’s solely going to maintain doing that.”
Together with Johnson, take UConn’s Paige Bueckers. She additionally has an NIL partnership with Unmatched, and a few consider she will have the identical impact as Clark on the WNBA. She is going to doubtless go No. 1 general to the Dallas Wings within the 2025 Draft.
And whereas they could be thought-about the “subsequent era,” they’re already having an influence on these coming after them.
“It type of hit me yesterday,” Johnson mentioned after her newest recreation. “Considered one of my followers tagged me in a TikTok, and a woman had a giant [number] 4 iced-out chain, and she or he got here to our recreation for her birthday. I’m like, ‘That’s a very powerful day in your life. Your birthday.’
“We performed a horrible group, blew them out by 100 factors. She was so completely satisfied, and we had been capable of work together and all of that. However that simply goes to point out, like, she took her time to try this. My presence was worthwhile sufficient to her. So, I really feel like I’ve to do extra in that house.”
Johnson has dipped her toes in nearly each house she will, which requires a powerful work ethic to verify she may also help lead the Tigers to a different nationwide championship.
LSU Tigers ladies’s basketball participant Flau’jae Johnson speaks throughout “The Cash Sport” world premiere at Pete Maravich Meeting Middle Sept. 4, 2024, in Baton Rouge. (LSU Athletics/College Photos by way of Getty Photos)
However to say the long run is vivid for ladies’s basketball can be an understatement. Johnson mentioned there may be lastly respect for a way nice these ladies may be on the hardwood.
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“It is at all times been there,” Johnson mentioned of stars within the WNBA. “Stewie’s at all times been. Sue Chook’s at all times been there. It’s just like the time is now, and as soon as the time is now, you place all of the assets, you place all of the investments in it to make it greater and higher for the subsequent era. All the women are going to do is get higher. They’re going to be extra assured watching all the women in entrance of them.”
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