BATON ROUGE, La. – The LSU women’s basketball trio of Flau’jae Johnson, Mikaylah Williams, and MiLaysia Fulwiley were named to the Naismith Trophy Women’s College Player of the Year Watch List Top 50 on Thursday.
Named in honor of Dr. James Naismith, the first Naismith trophy was awarded in 1969 to UCLA’s Lew Alcindor, later known as Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. The trophy has become one of the most prestigious national honors awarded each year to top basketball players in the nation. The Naismith Women’s Player of the Year Award was first given to Anne Donovan of Old Dominion University in 1983.
LSU’s current assistant coach and former player Seimone Augustus is the lone Tiger to earn the Naismith Trophy. She was awarded the trophy in 2005 and 2006.
Johnson enters her fourth and final season in Baton Rouge as one of the top returning guards in the country. Johnson is coming off a strong junior campaign after being an integral part to the Tigers’ third-straight Elite Eight appearance. Last season, she averaged 18.6 points, 5.5 rebounds and 2.5 assists per game. Johnson closed the year strong against UCLA, putting up a career high 28 points.
The 2023 SEC Freshman of the Year, Johnson was a critical piece as a starter on LSU’s first National Championship team in Mulkey’s second season.
Williams is entering her third season at LSU after averaging 17.2 points, 4.4 rebounds and 3.3 assists in her sophomore year. Williams is one the purest scorers on the women’s basketball scene with the ability to impact the game from anywhere on the court, offensively and defensively.
Williams, who was named the 2024 SEC Freshman of the Year, made the jump in her second season to First Team All-SEC. She had 11 games last season with at least 20 points and two with at least 30 points. Williams made a turnaround jumper at the buzzer to force overtime against Stanford and hit two threes in overtime to propel LSU to the win, finishing with 32 points in the SEC/ACC Challenge. She drained seven threes, including one in the final minute to put the game on ice, to finish with 37 points against Oklahoma and hit the knockout three in the final minute at Kentucky to help complete a 16-point comeback victory.
Fulwiley, a game-changing 5-10 guard joined the LSU program in the offseason as one of the nation’s most creative offensive players. In her two seasons at South Carolina, she came off the bench in all but three of her 77 games with the Gamecocks, averaging 11.7 points, 2.9 rebounds, 2.1 assists and 1.6 steals. Fulwiley was a crucial piece to two-straight national championship appearances with one national title in hand from her freshman season.
Fulwiley came to LSU as the SEC Sixth Woman of the Year after helping her previous program to an SEC Championship and an NCAA Championship appearance against the University of Connecticut. In her freshman year, Fulwiley was on the 2024 SEC All-Freshman team and was the MVP of the SEC Tournament.
Each year the club’s board publishes the Naismith watch list that is composed of the top 50 players to watch in men’s and women’s college basketball. The organization will release a mid-season list of 30 Naismith candidates. At the end of the season, the Naismith Trophy is awarded to the player of the year in men’s and women’s college basketball.
A national voting academy of leading basketball coaches, administrators and journalists narrows the group down to four finalists based on player performance throughout the season. The final four Naismith finalists will make up the ballot and the player of the year is voted on by the group.