LOS ANGELES — USC coach Lindsay Gottlieb and her star participant, JuJu Watkins, had been invited to the annual Los Angeles Dodgers Basis Blue Diamond Gala in Might. In a who’s-who world of L.A. glitterati, Gottlieb was astounded by how many individuals flocked to Watkins. Dodgers supervisor Dave Roberts and proprietor Mark Walter wished to fulfill her. Magic Johnson and his spouse, Cookie, came to visit. A bit of Los Angeles Lakers personnel had been , too.
“In all places I’m turning, these followers and these individuals which can be right here go, ‘JuJu! JuJu!’” Gottlieb stated. “She’s as recognizable with (her) bun (coiffure) as any of the Dodgers and was the largest star. I got here again and I stated to my employees and the administration right here, this was subsequent degree. Amongst L.A., she is type of the star amongst the celebrities.”
Watkins was coming off a historic first season that noticed her set the NCAA file for factors by a freshman and lead the Trojans to their first convention title in a decade and first Elite Eight look in 30 years. Her bun turned well-known in its personal proper, and a nationwide AT&T industrial throughout final season’s March Insanity featured NBA famous person Joel Embiid, amongst others, making an attempt out the look.
Watkins had already introduced USC basketball again from relative obscurity. The promise of what she might be and what which means for this system and town is evolving in actual time because the Trojans begin the NCAA Match as a No. 1 seed, internet hosting the primary two rounds on their residence court docket.
The sophomore sensation and the individuals round her have been getting ready for this risk earlier than she began faculty. Watkins signed with Klutch Sports activities Group as a junior in highschool and has been constructing her model portfolio ever since. As a Los Angeles native, it has at all times been a part of the plan to make use of her affect to raise her neighborhood — a earlier partnership with Lids allowed her to design a hat that highlighted her neighborhood of Watts — and selecting to attend USC allowed her to stay in the identical highlight.
“L.A. is only a excellent spot so far as alternative and relationships,” Watkins stated. “I really feel like L.A. performs an enormous half in my legacy and what I do on and off the court docket.”
The town is drawn to Watkins. The Trojans averaged 1,037 followers at residence video games in 2022-23, per knowledge from the NCAA. Throughout Watkins’ freshman season, that quantity spiked to 4,279 and additional elevated to five,932 throughout the 2024-25 common season. Along with former USC gamers, Watkins has introduced out a variety of celebrities to the Galen Heart. Actors, musicians and different influential stars, together with Sanaa Lathan, Leslie Jones, Vanessa Bryant, Flea, Snoop Dogg and Michael B. Jordan, have cheered from USC courtside seats.
In anticipation of the additional consideration, this system reached out to get a way of what was to return, contacting the Massive Ten and Iowa, together with former Hawkeyes head coach Lisa Bluder, earlier than the season started.
Caitlin Clark had been the talisman for ladies’s basketball followers throughout her senior season at Iowa, drawing historic crowds and TV scores en path to breaking a number of scoring data. The Hawkeyes’ run to back-to-back nationwide title video games culminated within the highest-rated nationwide championship recreation of all time, outdoing the lads’s closing the subsequent day.
When Clark turned professional alongside former LSU star Angel Reese, and with UConn star Paige Bueckers getting into her closing faculty season, Watkins turned the pure inheritor obvious to fill the famous person vacuum, each within the Massive Ten and nationally.
In consequence, USC up to date its safety protocols, including a wristband coverage to manage the particular crowds permitted to remain within the enviornment after video games. The Massive Ten helped deal with pregame and postgame protocols on the street, and Bluder shared particulars about preserve privateness at accommodations. Watkins’ agent, Jade-Li English, added that safety is a selected matter of curiosity given how recognizable Watkins is in her residence metropolis — with or with out her bun.
JuJu Watkins indicators her autograph for considered one of her many bun-copying followers. (Katelyn Mulcahy / Getty Photographs)
When the Trojans went on the street this season for his or her inaugural Massive Ten marketing campaign, each faculty (aside from Iowa, which offered out each residence recreation) noticed an uptick in attendance. The JuJu Bump produced a median attendance improve of 75 p.c, punctuated by Rutgers almost tripling its common crowd when USC visited. Throughout the nation, mothers and dads in Watkins jerseys introduced their daughters carrying their hair in buns to video games.
“It was exhausting to foretell this till you’re dwelling in it in actual time,” Gottlieb stated. “All of us had a imaginative and prescient for her serving to to actually develop this program, however I believe that the gravitational pull within the change within the fan assist is admittedly fairly outstanding.”
That Watkins’ arrival into faculty basketball has coincided with an total growth for the game has solely enhanced her recognition and her alternatives. Her portfolio is intensive, with 16 present nationwide advertising and marketing offers, together with Nike, State Farm, Gatorade and Fanatics. Her picture is inescapable whether or not strolling round Los Angeles — the place she has a three-building-wide Nike billboard in downtown — or turning on the tv.
“We’re capable of align JuJu with manufacturers which can be leaders of their respective industries and align with manufacturers which have a pure synergy with girls’s basketball,” Klutch Sports activities senior vp of athlete technique Brittany McCallum stated. “All of those companions have tv placements, TV broadcasts throughout the NCAA Match. So these partnerships leverage nationwide TV visibility, permitting for JuJu to be part of a bigger cultural second, whereas additionally amplifying the model’s presence throughout some of the watched occasions in girls’s sports activities.”
Watkins stated her collaboration with Funko Pop was considered one of her favorites, as she helped with the main points of its bun and eyelashes being as near her likeness as doable. She signed a minimum of 30 of them throughout USC’s Choice Sunday celebration. Her advert spot with Chipotle was one other standout because it included all the Trojans roster.
However the partnership with Nike has actually opened doorways for Watkins. McCallum stated her 19-year-old shopper was over the moon and “fully caught off guard” when she discovered she could be showing in a Tremendous Bowl industrial.
“Seeing these moments and the facility behind what Nike is placing behind girls’s sports activities proper now has been actually particular to her and possibly one thing that wasn’t within the playing cards however positively aligns on the place the ladies’s recreation is true now,” McCallum stated. “And JuJu may be very grateful to be part of the motion.”
The JuJu Watkins rise doesn’t occur with out her corresponding basketball success. She adopted up her freshman marketing campaign with one other first-team All-American season, becoming a member of Notre Dame’s Hannah Hidalgo because the third and fourth gamers to earn first-team honors as freshmen and sophomores. She led USC to its first convention regular-season title in additional than three many years.
With all the added consideration, the main focus stays on basketball. She doesn’t do pregame interviews, preferring to remain within the zone. Gottlieb says Watkins goes exhausting in each rep in each follow, accepting challenges on each ends of the ground. After coping with cramping throughout her freshman season, Watkins put further emphasis on hydration this season to negate that problem.
Snoop Dogg in da home! He’s carrying a JuJu Watkins match.
Michael B. Jordan can also be in attendance for the USC vs. Notre Dame recreation. pic.twitter.com/FAlD6NCc4A
— Isabel Gonzalez (@cisabelg) November 23, 2024
Regardless that her star flip has been choreographed, and the expectation was for her to succeed, she is reaching heights that had been unattainable to foretell.
Gottlieb joked that her personal identification is now outlined via Watkins. At a USA Basketball occasion, she was understanding within the lodge health club with Daybreak Staley and the household of one of many U-17 gamers. The younger boy within the household excitedly informed his dad, there’s Daybreak Staley, earlier than turning round and noticing, there’s JuJu Watkins’ coach! On the 2024 Remaining 4, a father requested Gottlieb for an image along with his daughter as a result of she was an enormous Watkins fan, excited to merely get an image with somebody in Watkins’ orbit. Gottlieb felt compelled to level out that she’d be the one within the image, not JuJu.
Los Angeles Lakers head coach JJ Redick attended the regular-season finale between USC and UCLA. Afterward, he stated, “JuJu Watkins is considered one of one, she’s unimaginable. First time seeing her play in particular person, however clearly I’ve watched her earlier than. She lived as much as the hype.”
The hype practice is unprecedented at this level, The place it leads is anybody’s guess.
(Illustration: Kelsea Petersen/ The Athletic; Images of Angel Reese, JuJu Watkins and Caitlin Clark: Harry How / Getty Photographs, Brian Fluharty / Getty Photographs, Eakin Howard / Getty Photographs)
