Coach Hannah Mentors Next Generation of Women Hoopers at Kelsey Plum and Under Armour’s Dawg Class

By: Dylan Tehada

Last week, Kelsey Plum and Under Armour hosted the second annual Dawg Class at IMG Academy in Florida where they trained and mentored the next generation of elite women’s basketball talent. UPB’s very own and former collegiate teammate of Plum, Coach Hannah Johnson, attended this camp in hopes of leaving her mark on the next generation of women hoopers. Both Plum and Johnson have come a long way since their time playing together at the University of Washington and strive to use their experience and wisdom to shape the future of women’s basketball. 

Plum has become a prominent figure and role model in women’s basketball. After being the number one pick in the 2017 WNBA draft, Plum has left her mark on the league averaging 13.7 points and 4 assists per game over her career and even winning back to back WNBA titles in 2022 and 2023. Plum seeks to use her platform as a WNBA superstar and role model to offer insight as to what the day-to-day training and lifestyle of being a professional women’s basketball player is. For this camp, Plum hand picked 11 elite collegiate hoopers and first year WNBA players to participate and leveraged her network of strength and conditioning coaches, her basketball trainer, and her mental coach to mentor the campers.

Johnson participated in the camp as a coach and mentor and used both her experience as a player development coach and a former collegiate hooper to help these women elevate their game. Being part of this camp was a full circle moment for Johnson as she recounts playing and competing with Plum in college. 

“During the whole weekend, I would just pause for a second and have a moment of gratitude. I used to play with [Plum] and she really challenged me as a player and really helped me a lot, so now being able to be around her as she does kind of the same thing for current student-athletes was just super cool to see,” Johnson said.

While Johnson is no stranger to being around elite caliber talent throughout her hoops career, she found it particularly inspiring to see the hard work and dedication that the athletes in this camp displayed. As a player development coach, Johnson has a keen eye for traits that yield success. During this camp, she not only embraced being around such dedicated athletes, but also found key mutual traits amongst all the campers that she believes to be the key to their success.

“My big takeaways from being in a gym with those types of girls was seeing their discipline, communication, and really using their voice and having that competitive drive,” Johnson said. “You could just tell that each one of these players had those small intangible things that sometimes players don't think about and I think that's what makes them great.”

Now reflecting on the camp, Johnson seeks to continue striving to make her impact on the next generation of women hoopers. She strives to take the lessons from camps such as Plum’s to make a positive, lasting impact on the careers of hoopers at UPB and beyond. Overall, this camp was a memorable learning experience for Johnson and she is excited to watch the careers of these campers unfold.

“The competitive environment was really fun to be around and I learned a lot from each one of them for me to be better as a coach as well,” Johnson said.