{"id":380450,"date":"2026-06-30T09:33:01","date_gmt":"2026-06-30T09:33:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/380450\/"},"modified":"2026-06-30T09:33:01","modified_gmt":"2026-06-30T09:33:01","slug":"feeling-back-like-myself-juju-watkins-returns-to-practice-at-usc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/380450\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Feeling back like myself.’ JuJu Watkins returns to practice at USC"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

She\u2019d been out for more than a year, her long, arduous recovery from a season-ending knee injury<\/a> kept almost completely under wraps. But as JuJu Watkins<\/a> took her place in front of a microphone for the first time since returning to practice this summer, the USC<\/a> superstar barely could contain her gratitude.<\/p>\n

Asked Monday what the best part about being back has been so far, a big smile crept across Watkins\u2019 face.<\/p>\n

\u201cHonestly everything,\u201d Watkins said. \u201cLike I don\u2019t even know, the smallest stuff just gets me excited.\u201d<\/p>\n

Watkins\u2019 return is a momentous mile marker for a Trojans team that has serious national title aspirations this season. Her status remains uncertain, and reporters in attendance Monday were told not to inquire further about Watkins\u2019 recovery timeline. But she did say she\u2019s already been able to scrimmage during USC\u2019s summer practice and that she\u2019s \u201cfeeling back like myself.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just been a long time coming,\u201d Watkins said. \u201cI\u2019ve just been working out and grinding every day so that I could be in position, so to see all of that hard work pay off right now, it\u2019s really fulfilling.\u201d<\/p>\n

Watkins was a two-time consensus All-American and the Associated Press player of the year in 2025, when her knee buckled that March during a breakaway in the second round of the NCAA tournament. The injury, a torn anterior cruciate ligament, not only derailed a possible title run that season, but also upended the Trojans\u2019 trajectory for the next one.<\/p>\n

Facing one of the toughest schedules in the nation, USC missed Watkins dearly. The Trojans finished their frustrating season without her 18-14 before losing in the NCAA tournament\u2019s round of 32.<\/p>\n

As she sat out, Watkins said she struggled to keep still. Patience didn\u2019t come naturally. She found herself leaning on others, she said, like Dallas Wings point guard Paige Bueckers, who went through her own ACL recovery.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe was constantly checking up on me, sending me texts, encouraging me,\u201d Watkins said of Bueckers. \u2018I really appreciated that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Coaches suggested she pour that energy into her teammates. So she took solace in doing the little things, like arranging the locker room chairs beforegames.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust to watch her take something that was so difficult and pour herself into everything that went into last year was something I\u2019ll never forget,\u201d coach Lindsay Gottlieb said. \u201cI really do take a lot of inspiration from it.\u201d<\/p>\n

The silver lining, coming out of a season without their superstar, was the emergence of freshman Jazzy Davidson, who came to USC to play alongside Watkins. Instead, she ended up winning freshman of the year and becoming a rising star in her own right.<\/p>\n

This month, Watkins and Davidson finally were able to take the floor together, just as Gottlieb had envisioned. She\u2019d waited quite a while for that pairing, she reminded reporters Monday. But Davidson, she thinks, will be all the better for having survived her freshman season without Watkins.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou just come back with a different level of confidence,\u201d Gottlieb said. \u201cI hope she brings with her every experience she had because who had more experience than Jazzy in terms of a freshman year where she handled so much?\u201d<\/p>\n

Now, with Watkins back and Davidson set to take another step forward, there won\u2019t be so much pressure on the Trojans\u2019 newest top recruit.<\/p>\n

Saniyah Hall marks the third straight No. 1 overall prospect to sign with Gottlieb and USC, but she steps into a decidedly different scenario than the other two did. In addition to Watkins and Davidson, the Trojans also brought in two other top freshmen in Sitaya Fagan and Sara Okeke, as well as two priority portal additions in Ryann Bennett and Pania Davis.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith the talent that\u2019s on the team,\u201d Hall said, \u201cI think it could be something that\u2019s very special.\u201d<\/p>\n

That starts with Watkins, who, in spite of a year away, apparently hasn\u2019t skipped a beat in her return.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel like she\u2019s back like she never left,\u201d guard Kennedy Smith said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"She\u2019d been out for more than a year, her long, arduous recovery from a season-ending knee injury kept…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":380451,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[73614,9576,63206,65626,48,52,51,47,50,49,1024,153806,278,34158,427,153807,23138,3533,153805,153804,72],"class_list":["post-380450","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-davidson","tag-experience","tag-gottlieb","tag-juju-watkins-return","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-monday","tag-saniyah-hall","tag-season","tag-second-round","tag-team","tag-third-straight-no","tag-trojans","tag-usc","tag-usc-superstar","tag-watkins","tag-year"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/380450","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=380450"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/380450\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/380451"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=380450"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=380450"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=380450"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}