'She's even more explosive': JuJu Watkins is back and maybe better than ever

• Kendra AndrewsNov 2, 2026, 07:00 AM ET

LOS ANGELES -- Practice was supposed to end 30 minutes ago, but JuJu Watkins and her USC teammates kept sprinting from baseline to baseline as they scrimmaged. Next came passing drills, then shooting drills, then working on setting screens.

Any time someone messed up, turned over the ball or missed their mark, the drill started over. But through all the yelling, whistles and chaos, Watkins couldn't stop smiling.

"I'm just happy to be out there," she told ESPN after the mid-October practice.

Nineteen months after suffering a torn ACL in the second round of the 2025 NCAA tournament, Watkins is back on the court with the Trojans for her senior year and is set to play her first game Monday against UNLV at T-Mobile Arena in USC's season opener.

As a freshman, Watkins took college basketball by storm, leading the Pac-12 in scoring and earning All-America honors. The next season, she was the consensus national player of the year and the Big Ten's top scorer; she guided the Trojans to a No. 1 seed. They finished 31-4 and lost in the Elite Eight, two games after Watkins' injury.

Last season, as Watkins redshirted while she continued to rehab her knee, USC went 18-14 and settled for a .500 record in the Big Ten and a second-round exit in the NCAA tournament as a 9-seed.

But as Watkins returns, so do the expectations -- for her and the Trojans, who haven't won a women's basketball national championship since 1984. Since she arrived on USC's campus as the nation's No. 1 recruit, Watkins hasn't gone a day without feeling that weight. The face of the Trojans became the face of college basketball -- and it didn't diminish even with a year away from the court. The pressure is persistent, whether from opponents' defenses or from herself. And now, as USC opens the season ranked third in the nation, Watkins -- likely the No. 1 pick in April's draft if she declares for the WNBA -- feels the pressure not only to return to her pre-injury form, but better than ever.

"I feel like her impact on us is probably more palpable than ever before," USC coach Lindsay Gottlieb told ESPN. "I know when I had her freshman and sophomore year, well, shoot, you got a player like that, you are going to be in conversations to be great. But now it feels more."

Watkins believes she's more ready to weather all of it after being forced to take a break from basketball for a year and a half, and that allowed her plenty of time for reflection.

"I think my injury let me reset and remind myself why I do what I do and why I love it so much," Watkins said. "These days [my why] is a lot of knowing I've gone through such a long period of not being able to do what I love and just being present in the moment and grateful for how far I've come.

"The pressures will always be there. I pray that the pressure gets even higher because that's a privilege."

IN MARCH 2025, Bobby and Sari Watkins navigated the tunnels of the Galen Center frantically looking for their daughter. On the court moments earlier, JuJu had crumpled to the ground, grabbing her right knee and yelling in pain.

Her parents watched her being carried into the nearest tunnel, and they had to get to her.

They were ushered into one of the training rooms, where Watkins was lying on a table. Before long, a group of trainers surrounded her with the dreaded news: An MRI would be done to assess other damage, but Watkins had torn her ACL.

"She just broke down," Sari Watkins told ESPN. "As her mom, [I] had to be extremely present. Here is your kid that has worked so hard to get where she's at, and I couldn't imagine what she was going through."

The following days were full of frustration and grief but also of family dinners and watch parties as USC played in the NCAA tournament. Watkins had surgery soon after. That was when she told herself it was time to change her mindset.

"I was like, 'OK, stop all of this,'" Watkins said. "Stop all of the sob stories, stop feeling sorry for yourself."

Watkins' first instinct was to attack physical therapy, but her medical staff reminded her she couldn't rush the process. Recovery became much more mental than physical. The hardest part, Watkins said, was feeling healthy but not being cleared to increase her workload.

"You want to be able to do something, and then you want more. I was very greedy throughout the process," Watkins said. "When can I do this? When can I do this?"

In September 2025, Watkins announced on social media that she would sit out her junior season. Still unable to return to the court, she lived in the weight room. During Gottlieb's early-morning workouts on the road last season, she often ran into Watkins in the hotel gym.

"She was going through these leg raises and core workouts as if she was prepping for her national championship game," Gottlieb said. "I'm not saying there was ever a time [before her injury] where she mailed it in, but I'm not sure she was as intentional about the weight room as she's become. This attention to detail with her body and refueling and her recovery ... it has made her better."

Watkins said her basketball IQ and ability to make reads in real time improved from watching games on the bench or on TV. But the biggest change in her game has come in her shooting. When she first got back on the court toward the end of last season, Watkins was limited to catch-and-shoot motions, so she spent weeks hitting jump shot after jump shot. A player who loves to create offense off the dribble, Watkins said her rehab helped her become a better catch-and-shoot threat.

"This injury forced me to be stationary and start back all the way to the fundamentals of how I first started learning to play and shoot," Watkins said.

"She has always been a good shooter, but I think there is more precision there now," Gottlieb added.

By March, Watkins was playing 2-on-2 with practice players. When the Trojans began their eight-week summer training in late July, she was back practicing with the team with no restrictions. Gottlieb described the moment as "freeing."

"To me, she seems bouncier and stronger," Gottlieb said. "She was already an elite athlete, but she's even more explosive in some ways. ... What I've seen from JuJu more is better tempo control. More manipulation of the game."

WATKINS IS USED to big wins, so celebrating such a small moment last November felt a little silly. But she let herself enjoy it: Watkins wanted to go out, so she got in her car and drove around Los Angeles. It was the first time in eight months that she could drive herself.

"That was a big thing for me because I finally had my freedom back," Watkins said. "It was very gradual and definitely a humbling experience, just because it was such a long process. There were a lot of small wins along the way."

Appreciating the smaller moments in the past year-plus shifted Watkins' mindset and helped her prepare for her senior year (she has one more year of eligibility remaining after the 2026-27 season). She has the same goals but a deeper appreciation for the work and steps along the process.

"My intent is always the same," Watkins said. "I have these national championship dreams, these really big goals that, of course, you have to take it one day at a time. But I'm constantly reminding myself of the details and the things I need to do to accomplish that. So I guess actually it's pretty similar -- my rehab journey and how I approach basketball."

Watkins has been preaching the need to embrace the process to her teammates as well.

"She really harps on me to give myself grace," sophomore Jazzy Davidson told ESPN. "She tells me to slow down. When I have the ball in my hands, she says to take a beat, take a deep breath."

"We're winners. We want to win, and we're all willing to do whatever it takes." 2026 Freshman of the Year Jazzy Davidson joins SportsCenter to discuss the lofty expectations for a stacked USC basketball team 👀 https://t.co/AmgXBeSsQC

— espnW (@espnW) October 31, 2026

Davidson committed to USC in fall 2024 -- six months before Watkins' injury. As soon as Davidson picked USC, Gottlieb knew the two could be a dynamic duo. She also knew Watkins would be the best teacher for Davidson, who was named national freshman of the year last season.

"JuJu had something she could offer Jazzy that no one else could," Gottlieb said. "No one else knew what it was like to take on that burden -- carrying all of that weight as a freshman."

"JuJu is a winner, and all great players want to play with other great players," Davidson said. "When I was going through my recruiting process, the thought of playing with her was a huge factor."

Gottlieb has seen Watkins' leadership grow over the past three years. Watkins' maturity, especially for a woman in her early 20s, stands out the most. "There are a lot of transitions that happen between 17, when I first met her, and 21," Gottlieb said.

But Watkins also underwent a shift in prominence, blossoming into one of the best women's basketball players in the country and a celebrity, signing a contract with Nike in 2024 that was one of the most lucrative shoe deals in women's basketball at the time. Watkins became some athletes' favorite athlete. She could change the trajectory for an entire program's success and other players' careers.

"Everyone in this program has chosen to come here knowing who JuJu is," Gottlieb said. "Early on, it's, oh, there's a highly touted recruit I'll get to play with, but they didn't know what that would look like. Now, you have people who are intentional about being your teammate. ...

"The players we have understand how good JuJu is but also know how good they are. Making that work could lead to championships."

THE LAST TIME USC won a title was 1984. Across the country that same spring, Michael Jordan played his last game for the University of North Carolina. That summer, he starred on the world stage at the Olympics and was drafted No. 3 by the Chicago Bulls, a franchise hungry for a star. Shortly after stepping on an NBA court, Jordan had reshaped the intersection between sports and pop culture. And by the All-Star Game in 1985, he was the league's main attraction.

Gottlieb believes Watkins will have the same impact on the WNBA.

"I don't want to overstate it; I think the W is going to get the exact person that they need," she said. "JuJu is going to inject just a next level of excitement and basketball greatness."

Watkins faces a decision in the next six months. Will she return for another year at USC, or declare for the WNBA draft, where she is projected to be the No. 1 pick?

She hasn't made up her mind yet -- or, at least, she doesn't want to share where she is in the process. She's focused on winning a national title for the Trojans, something she says "naturally" has more pressure on it as she approaches the end of her collegiate career.

"I'm just locked in on making sure I am as prepared as possible; my teammates and team are prepared for the season," Watkins said. "Do the work so that when March comes around, we are one of the last teams."

Watkins' basketball-first mindset is what Gottlieb said will make her the ideal WNBA player and centerpiece for any franchise. She will bring a superstar marketing opportunity, but more importantly, she is dedicated to her craft.

"She is a hooper first, who has become famous because of her magnetism in basketball," Gottlieb said.

"My goals don't change. I want to have an impact on the game," Watkins said. "Be able to inspire people wherever I go, whether that's [at USC] or [in the WNBA]. Being able to bring myself -- everything I stand for, everything I am -- and my game to the W, that's my only goal."

The WNBA has experienced a seismic shift in viewership, attendance and mainstream attention over the past several years. Younger players such as Angel Reese, Caitlin Clark and Paige Bueckers have played major roles in bringing their fans and talent from college to the pros to give the league an influx of superstars.

Gottlieb envisions Watkins having an even bigger impact.

"She has an ability to kind of take the league to the next plateau in the way that Michael Jordan did for the NBA," Gottlieb said. "It doesn't mean that Magic Johnson wasn't great and Larry Bird and all the people that came before. ... But all of a sudden, it hit a new plateau. I do think JuJu has the ability to galvanize a city that way, but also a league that way."