Before the Bayou, the national championship and the viral you-can't-see-me moment that shocked/excited/surprised the world, Angel Reese was just Angel. She still is, but when the entire world has watched, criticized and built an entire narrative around not just who you are but what you're about, that tends to get forgotten.
But if you knew the real Angel, and knew of the stories from her childhood growing up in Baltimore, MD—how the Black women in her life (her mother and grandmother, specifically) have always championed her—then you'd understand why she is who she is today. Unapologetic. Bold. Someone who, to quote her former teammate Flau'jae Johnson, wears a crown that is heavy, but still keeps her head up.
It goes back to her childhood and the time she spent at her grandma's house.
Before that gold crown sat atop her head, it was Grandma who would do Angel's hair, even when she hated it. It's a feeling that every Black girl knows all too well. Your mama, grandmama or auntie tells you it's time to get your hair combed, you plop down on the floor, sit in between their legs and fight through the pain of the bristle brush working through each coil.
Angel remembers these moments with her grandma vividly: how she would brush through her hair and lay her edges. Grandma would put mascara on her and do her nails before basketball games, too. It sounds simple, but to Black women, these memories are significant. They end up shaping who you eventually become.
It was Grandma who would always tell her: Never let anybody see your mascara run. And when a young Angel, who was the tallest in her class, thought her height was “a bad thing,” it was Grandma who'd remind her: You stand out for a reason.
“Now I understand, and now I get it,” Angel says while on set for her SLAM 250 cover. “I'm 6-3 and, like, I stand out and I stand up to the world. I am who I am, and now I get what she was saying to me when I was younger.”
Reese was a five-star standout in high school, ranked the No. 2 player in the class of 2020 by ESPNW and already amassing viral highlights online that displayed her elite game and competitive fire (tbt the SLAM Summer Classic Vol. 2). Originally committed to Maryland where she played for two seasons, Reese transferred to LSU for her junior season and emerged as a bona fide star. A dynamic, double-double dropping powerhouse—she averaged 18.6 points and 13.4 boards this past season—she won a national championship in 2023 and was named the NCAA Tournament's Most Outstanding Player.
While the world has praised her, she's also become the subject of think pieces, hate comments, headlines and endless commentary about everything else about her, from her demeanor and attitude to her modeling campaigns and more.
Even through it all, Reese has embodied the same words Grandma would tell her: You stand out for a reason. She's an inspiration for young girls, especially Black girls, who want to not only drop buckets like her but be as confident and successful as she is. Reese is also a businesswoman who has been able to market herself and build an audience, from numerous NIL endorsements and major partnerships with brands like Reebok, Beats and Mielle, to magazine covers like this one and appearances in music videos with Latto and Cardi B.
“I've always been a girly girl,” Reese says. “So, posting on Instagram pictures of me just being cute with my friends or just having a good time. I love taking pictures, I always knew I wanted to be a model…I embrace who I am. Just being able to be comfortable within my skin and I think a lot of people on the outside are looking at me, like, I can do the same thing. I can be girly. And that's how I got the name “Bayou Barbie.” Being able to be the Barbie, the lashes, the nails, the edges and all. Being able to do both is just something that I kind of push—that you can do both.”
If she had to give advice to the players who are coming up after her—phenoms like USC's Juju Watkins, South Carolina's MiLaysia Fulwiley and even Johnson—she'd encourage them to keep being themselves. They stand out for a reason, too. “The advice I would probably give is just stay true to yourself. Be you, do something that makes you different from everybody else."
“I mean, me, I talk trash and I'm a girly girl, on and off the court. But when I get on the court, I'm a dog and I'm super competitive. So I think everybody brings that different [element] for the game. I mean, Flau'jae is a rapper, but off the court, on the court, she's still a killer. Juju, she's just so smooth and a killer out of L.A. I love players that just do so many different things and [are] versatile; I think that's also so different with women right now—being able to do both.”
The WNBA is a chance for Angel to not only reintroduce herself, but to move past the narratives that have followed her through her collegiate career.
“Being able to start over, I mean, I think I've done a great job implementing who I am to the world as a college player, but I don't want to just be a college player,” she says. “I want to be a great player and I want to be a great player at every single level. I've won championships everywhere and at each level. So I want to go into the League and win a championship and do whatever it takes to win the championship because I feel like I'm a winner.”
And yet, the question that looms over not just Angel but her entire draft class—which includes Caitlin Clark, Cameron Brink and Kamilla Cardoso, to name a few—is whether they can handle the transition from college to the W.
As women's basketball continues to reach new levels of popularity, fandom, attendance and viewership, with that comes a distinction that needs to be made for (new) fans, specifically the ones who A) don't know their WNBA history, B) haven't been tuning in, and C) only know of the names we've mentioned so far in this article.
There's college, and then there's the WNBA, which is an entirely different league with new levels of competitiveness and star power. We're talking greats who have not just experience, but elite skill sets and knowledge of the game. If you've been listening, then you know that WNBA stars have just been keeping it real about the transition from college to the pros.
Last March, Las Vegas Aces two-time champion Kelsey Plum told WSLAM that “the WNBA itself is like a different sport. The wake-up call that I had was so brutal.”
Recently, when asked about what the League will have in store for today's college stars, Diana Taurasi told ESPN that “reality is coming. We all went through it. You look superhuman playing against 18-year-olds, but you're going to come with some grown women that have been playing professional basketball for a long time.”
Reese is very much aware of this. She's embracing the opportunity ahead but knows that it's going to be an adjustment. When asked about her quote to Vogue this past April that she wants to “start at the bottom,” she elaborates: “I think it's going to be a learning curve, obviously. It's a big transition from high school to college and now college to the pros. These are grown women. These are businesswomen. Women that are playing, they have kids, families and everything going on. So, I know I'mma be fighting for my life out there. I respect all the vets, and I'm just excited to learn and grow.""
Reese is also one of the many young players who have made a point to show the utmost respect to the women who have come before her. She grew up admiring and idolizing women's hoops: even her own mother, Angel Webb Reese, was a star at University of Maryland, Baltimore County, played overseas in Luxembourg and was inducted into the UMBC Athletics Hall of Fame.
Reese tells us her mom hooped alongside legendary two-time WNBA champion Taj McWilliams-Franklin and would take her to Minnesota Lynx games growing up. “I have a picture with Seimone Augustus, [too]. It's crazy, I was like, what—in the third or fourth grade when she was in the League? I went to LSU and she went to LSU as well. It's crazy, a full circle moment. I've always admired so many different players.”
She also connected with W greats long before the fame, including A'ja Wilson, whom Reese says gave advice during her time at Maryland and earlier this year. She's also met up with Lisa Leslie (“She was one of the women in the League who wore her lipstick, had her nails and her hair cute.”) and Sheryl Swoopes.
“I never probably would have thought, like, being able to play against some of my idols and players that I really, really look up to and I've always been inspired by,” Reese admits. “It's going to be fun. Obviously, I can't look at them as that anymore. I kind of have to look at it as just the other team or teammates possibly, too. I'm excited for it.”
By the time you're reading this, it's been over a month since Reese was selected No. 7 overall by the Chicago Sky. She was at the draft with her family—including Grandma, who looked stunning in an all-white suit and pearls. It's a dream come true for Reese, and now, the chance at a new beginning in a new city on a team that's reached the mountaintop before (the Sky won their first, and only, title back in 2021) and is on the rebuild under new head coach Teresa Weatherspoon.
“I'm excited to go into the WNBA and [be] able to be the player that I am—a big guard, a point forward, defensively and offensively,” Reese says. “I'm excited to just grow my game and keep continuing to watch and just learn and grow…Being able to [shoot] mid-range, threes, being able to get the rebound and bring [it] coast to coast and playing defense on 1 through 5. I love defense and I love passing.”
Reese has a new nickname, too. Rip her out the plastic, because the Chi Barbie has arrived. And she's got a message for Sky fans, too. “Angel Reese is coming to be a competitor, a leader, a winner, and doing whatever it takes to win and to help the community, on the court and off the court.”
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