Raven Johnson couldn’t stop herself. One viewing of South Carolina’s loss to Iowa in the Final Four last spring would lead to another. And another. And another.
The image of Hawkeyes star Caitlin Clark waving Johnson off when the Gamecocks guard had the ball at the top of the key, as if to say “no threat,” became seared into Johnson’s mind. It hurt in ways that left Johnson wondering if she even wanted to do this anymore.
And still, she couldn’t hit pause. Or delete.
“People were like ‘Can you stop watching that game?’” Johnson said yesterday. “And I was like ‘I can’t, I just can’t.’”
It wasn’t until senior Laeticia Amihere basically staged an intervention that Johnson found the strength to move on.
“I don’t even know how she got in my room,” Johnson said. “I thought I locked the door. But she got me closer to God … She’s really the one that really helped me get over that hump.”
A year later, Johnson believes she’s a different player. One eager for a chance at redemption on Sunday when the unbeaten Gamecocks face Clark and the Hawkeyes in the NCAA championship.
Looking back, Johnson doesn’t see all those viewings of the biggest loss of her still burgeoning career as some form of punishment. She has reframed those dark days. They weren’t torture, even if it might have felt like it at the time amid all the tears. She was growing, even if she wasn’t aware of it.
“I think I was learning from the game, learning what I could have done better, what the team could have done better,” Johnson said. “Looking at how they scouted us. Looking at how they played me. Looking at how they played my team.”
Johnson doesn’t blame Clark for giving her an ocean of space to let it fly, knowing she likely wouldn’t. It’s what Johnson would have done if the player she was guarding made just 24% of her 3-pointers, as she did as a freshman.
It didn’t matter that Johnson actually played well that night, scoring 13 points and…
Read the full article here
