GREENVILLE, S.C. — Louisiana State University is so aware of Frauja Johnson’s identity that her bearded dragon is buried on campus.
It’s a heartbreaking time leading up to a special freshman season. She’ll never forget exactly where she left Four, the pet named after her jersey number, to rest. She never came back to see it either, although she remembered that he was always behind her.
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Eventually, she brought back another bearded dragon, much to the chagrin of her teammates who preferred fur to scales. Johnson named him “Champ,” an ode to the year that ended with LSU’s first national championship.
She wanted to repeat this throughout the year and add to the legacy of the school she never left. Johnson is one of the few players to stay with his program for all four years, with a slew of players flooding the transfer portal each year on name, image and likeness (NIL) offers. Second-seeded LSU will host No. 15 seed Jacksonville in the first round of the NCAA tournament on Friday. The Tigers are in the Sacramento 1 region with No. 1 seed UCLA.
Flau’jae Johnson and Kim Mulkey are seniors at LSU. (Photo by Tyler Kaufman/Getty Images)
(Tyler Kaufman via Getty Images)
This will be Johnson’s final game in an LSU uniform, whether she reaches her peak or falls to the regional finals for the third straight season — a feat that is just perfect for repeating, even if it’s not there yet.
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“March is always a good month,” Johnson, a 5-foot-10 guard, said during the SEC tournament. “I love March. The thing is, that’s when everyone is most focused and you can only rely on your job.”
There is a reason behind confidence. This season, Johnson began daily morning film studies with associate head coach Bob Stuckey, watching film of recent games, old games and upcoming opponents. We used to go on three dates a week. The WNBA first-round draft prospect suited up for the extra training surrounding rap, as well as an NIL commitment detailed in a plan that seemed “ridiculous.”
Kate Koval, a transfer from Notre Dame, remembers initially showing up to the gymnasium campus for shooting practice, only to find Johnson already working out. MiLayshia Fulwiley, who played three times for Johnson’s LSU team before transferring from South Carolina, initially discovered from a distance how her grit and drive inspired her teammates.
“Sometimes, when we’re tired and everyone doesn’t want to do the extra work, she’ll do it, and that prompts other people to do the same,” Fulwili said. “She’s an incredible leader; an incredible player.”
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Izzy Besselman, the only other member of the 2023 national championship team still on the roster, has the most experience in how to push his teammates since arriving on campus with Johnson.
“Seeing her work so hard motivated me and everyone else in the locker room,” Beselman told Yahoo Sports after LSU’s quarterfinal win over Oklahoma State. “This is a good man who deserves respect.”
The next afternoon, the atmosphere in the postgame locker room went from lively to dead silent. Beselman, Johnson and junior Mikayla Williams — LSU’s longest-tenured player — sat in the front corner row after another loss to South Carolina. The Gamecocks extended their win streak against LSU to 19 straight games, meaning they have never beaten this powerhouse. Johnson and Besserman will leave a Tigers team that has never been to an SEC tournament championship game or won a conference regular-season title.
Johnson got lost in the statistics, while Williams talked about the discipline, focus and attention to detail they need in the final game of the season. It has to start with them, the veterans. Especially national champion Johnson.
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“This team runs on energy,” Johnson said. “When you don’t have energy, you can’t win. Coach [Kim] Mulkey shared something that really stuck with me, so I had to lock in. But I have nothing to say. “
At the press conference table down the hall, Kim Mulkey expressed similar sentiments about the performance of Johnson, who averaged 13.8 points per game on 1-for-8 shooting after a season in which he shot 45.8 percent from the field. It was one of the worst games of her career, contributing 5 assists but only 2 rebounds and 3 turnovers. According to CBB Analytics, LSU is one of the best second-chance scoring teams, but has only scored seven points compared to their five-game average of 18.4 points. They couldn’t get to the free throw line or force turnovers.
“You’re not going to have a great shooting night all the time,” Mulkey said. “So go contribute in other ways.”
Johnson told Yahoo Sports’ Hoops 360 earlier this year that playing for Markey won’t be easy. Most people know this, or at least have some level of confidence. She is the only person in college basketball history, men’s or women’s, to win a national championship as a player, assistant coach and head coach. She won four championships as a head coach, including three at Baylor University, making her the first in women’s basketball to win in two programs. The nine-time Hall of Famer has a direct and hard-edged style of “tough love” that has been polarizing throughout her career.
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Yet that’s exactly why Johnson never considered leaving.
“Going into the transfer portal, it might be easier to go to a team with a bad record and a 30-point average,” Johnson said. “I can do it. I did it in high school. You know what I’m saying? College is no different. But I want to play with All-American players. I want to play with a tough coach that wins championships. I want to play with people so I can learn how to be efficient. I want to play in positions that are not conducive to me and still come out on top. More importantly to me, I like doing the hard things.”
Johnson is eager to develop. She’s shooting at a higher percentage, is a sharper three-point shooter than she was during her freshman season, and has improved both her assist and turnover rates. The senior is better at creating her own shots, averaging five unassisted field goals per 40 minutes compared to 2.9 as a freshman, which boosted her scoring average.
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While she is well known on the basketball court, she is equally popular off it. Johnson attended Louisiana State University as a rising rapper and later signed with Jay Z’s Roc Nation label. Her track was played during the LSU game, and fans and opponents alike took note of the flexibility at halftime. As the first-generation face of the NIL era, she actively leads all first-level female basketball players with 4.12 million fans. According to Opendorse, it ranks fourth if male players are included. In December 2024, she signed an NIL deal with Unrivaled, the 3×3 league founded by Breanna Stewart and Napheesa Collier, with the intention of competing after she exhausted her college eligibility.
Many people around LSU know more about her contributions to the community that aren’t spread over her YouTube or Instagram. Last week, she was named the inaugural Kay Yow Servant Leader of the Year for her leadership, service and overall impact in supporting women and families facing cancer.
The national star pledged to donate $1 for every LSU student in attendance to benefit the Kay Yow Cancer Fund, hosted a back-to-school giveaway, made a personal donation to mobile mammography in her hometown of Savannah, Georgia, and provided additional support to families in a variety of other financial ways.
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“She competes at the highest level, but more importantly, she leads with her heart,” Kay Yow Cancer Foundation CEO Jenny Palmateer said in a statement. “She knows her platform is bigger than basketball, and she uses it to make a real difference.”
Mulkey said she believes Johnson is one of LSU’s best athletes, in part because of her philanthropy but also because of her contributions to the program’s growth.
“She took a risk at LSU when we had to sell something?” Mulkey said on senior night. “We just got here and she was the first McDonald’s All-American I signed at LSU. The story about Flau’jae is all of those things I just mentioned, but the greatest story to me is that she stayed at LSU for four years and was going to graduate. When you think about college sports now, people don’t do that anymore. She loved LSU, and in return, LSU embraced her and loved her.”
Teammates see it as loyalty to those who helped her grow.
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“Her coming back just shows the fans that LSU will always have a place in her heart,” Besselman said.
Johnson would often annoy Besselman by asking her to open a basket in the room, only to see an unexpected surprise: a bearded dragon. That’s how Besselman best describes her friend’s goofiness and joy, a character trait people at LSU appreciate even if they’d rather not involve reptiles.
Johnson is considering taking the champion to the gym as teammates bring their dogs to practice. With so much travel coming up, she’s thinking aloud about setting up a mobile reptile habitat. Whatever happens in Johnson’s favorite month, they’ll soon be leaving LSU and hitting the road.
