How A’ja Wilson overcame racism, depression to become basketball legend

A’ja Wilson's parents, Eva and Roscoe Wilson, withdrew her from Hopkins School while she was in the fourth grade and transferred her to a private school called Heathwood Hall in Columbia, South Carolina.

The school was predominantly white, and she quickly became part of an inseparable clique. When she was six, one of her best friends was organising a sleepover during her birthday party. Excitement gleamed in A’ja's eyes until her best friend informed her that she could attend but had to sleep outside the house because her father hated black people. It was the most humiliating and agitating experience of her childhood. She ended up absconding the party and tearfully confided the racial reckoning to her parents.

That year was utterly arduous to A’ja, racism contaminated her character and she turned to a self-conscious, introverted and withdrawn student for the first time in her life. Her memoir, Dear Black Girls: How to be true to you, is an insightful book about the incessant challenges of black sisterhood.

It was written to mitigate the exasperating dehumanisation of black women and to motivate and caution black girls about lurking prejudice.

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A’ja reiterates how every black girl, at some point in her life, has had her own version of ‘the Birthday Party’. She states that as black girls develop into women and advance into tertiary education, and eventually begin their occupations, they experience a plethora of subtle negative, direct and indirect versions of racism, and they never stop having them.

A’ja articulates and elaborates the feeling of having your feet swept under a rug and not being heard, seen or taken seriously. When black women finally raise their voices in defiance of inhospitality, they are labelled loud, angry, difficult, petulant and ghetto.

A’ja’s childhood was dominated by traumatic experiences. South Carolina was a southern state where slavery-affiliated confederate flag was still flown in every corner, including the state building. Residents had proudly refused to deviate from flying a triggering symbol of hate, prejudice and subjugation.

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As she grew older, A’ja’s breathing complications worsened; she couldn't walk and chew gum at the same time and was diagnosed with asthma. Since the first grade, she had the desire to become an author, but her indolence in class regressed her reading and writing. She was a slow learner and rarely understood instructions. She had to reread a paragraph repeatedly to decipher its meaning and was always the last one to turn in her quiz. At 16, she was diagnosed with dyslexia.

Her father Roscoe, a basketball fanatic, had played professionally in the South of France in the late 1970s. He started coaching her at 13 and repeatedly informed her she wasn't good at the game. At 16, shortly after being diagnosed with dyslexia, A’ja was baffled by an invitation to the US Basketball Junior National Team try-outs in Colorado Springs. She was the youngest amongst all her competitors who were 18 years and older and were well established high school stars, including Breanna Stewart and Kelsey Plum.

A’ja was unexpectedly selected and she joined the Junior National Team. Imposter syndrome subsequently emerged, and she was literally threatening to quit basketball. There was an undeserving fear and overbearing pressure from the success that was lurking as she ignored her undiagnosed depression that was oppressing her thoughts.

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She received her first college recruitment letter in the postal mail, from the University of Carolina. She consequently received more recruitment letters from the University of Hawaii, the University of Connecticut famous for its sporting success, and the University of North Carolina. ESPN reporters flooded Heathwood Hall high school. Suddenly, A’ja became the centre of attraction.

After profound introspection, A’ja chose UNC because of one reason: Coach Dawn Staley. Dawn was an imperious, detail-oriented Philadelphia native. An African American who had won three Olympic gold medals as a player, she had been selected six times for the WNBA's all-star team and had won the illustrious Naismith award as player and coach.

Dawn was the complete personification of a reputable coach and understood the distress that black female players faced. She referred A’ja to a psychiatrist to help her cope with her demystifying depression and their connection briskly evolved to a bond of twin cohorts in their quest for a collegiate championship.

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South Carolina had never won the South-Eastern Conference women's college basketball competition and had never made it to the Final Four before A’ja's arrival. They made their first Final Four in her first year, and fans started packing the Colonial Life Arena and broke attendance records. A’ja subsequently led the University of South Carolina to the national college championships known as the NCAA Basketball Championship in 2017.

At 22, after four years with the University of Carolina, A’ja became the number one pick in WNBA Draft Night in 2018 in New York City and was contracted by the Las Vegas Aces. She went on to dominate the league and was named the WNBA's regular season Most Valuable Player in 2020 and 2022. In 2023, she led the Aces to the WNBA championship, winning the Playoff MVP in the process.

In 2024, she won the Tokyo 2020 Olympic prize, then she led the US Basketball team to a Paris 2024 gold medal victory. A’ja has become the first ever WNBA player to score 1,000 points in a single season, a feat she achieved on September 12, 2024, to stake her claim as the greatest basketball player in history. In a moment of clarity, she was honoured with an idyllic bronze statue outside the Colonial Life Arena at the University of South Carolina to commemorate her achievements.

The writer is a novelist, Big Brother Africa 2 Kenyan representative and founder of Jeff's Fitness Centre (@jeffbibbrother).