Kelsey Plum and Under Armour are Empowering Women’s College Hoopers through the Dawg Class Mentorship Program

After playing in her last higher game overly versus Mississippi State in the 2017 NCAA Sweet 16, Kelsey Plum didn’t have much time to get ready for the WNBA. She was selected as the No. 1 pick in the WNBA Draft on April 13, and had exactly six days surpassing she had to be in San Antonio. Training zany was scheduled to start on the 23rd, but she still had a lot to do, like flying when to Seattle so she could pack her tons and finish taking classes.

“In reality, looking when now [and] having hindsight, I wasn’t prepared,” Plum tells SLAM over Zoom when asked well-nigh her transition from higher to the pros. “I wasn’t prepared mentally, physically, spiritually, emotionally, for the next level.”

The Washington Husky suddenly found herself having to wastefulness her training with all of the other responsibilities that come with now stuff a professional athlete, like signing with an wage-earner and getting an endorsement deal. “Not to mention, the WNBA itself is like a variegated sport,” Plum adds. “The wake up undeniability that I had was so brutal.”

The culmination of all of this, specifically the “lack of information and resources” provided to her that could have given Plum, and really any higher student-athlete, valuable insight on what to expect at the pro level, played a toll on her mental health. She says it took her “four or five years” to finger increasingly well-appointed in the WNBA, and it’s that wits that inspired her to want to empower and support the next generation of women’s higher basketball players.

“That’s one of the big reasons why Under Armour and I just meshed,” she says. “I was like, listen this is really important to me. I want to make an impact. I want to be worldly-wise to leave the game largest than I left it. And I felt like this is missing in the women’s game. In the NBA, there’s a lot of help transitioning. From the organ side, from the combine side. These guys are prepped from teenagers all the way to rhadamanthine NBA players. And I felt like, you know what? We don’t have that on the women’s side, and why not take a swing at it?”

Plum and UA are launching a first-of-its-kind mentorship program, the Dawg Class, that will requite nine women’s basketball players, all personally selected by Plum, the opportunity to participate in a three-day wits and learn directly from the Las Vegas Aces star and WNBA champion. The zany will full-length on-court drills meant to help refine their skills, as well as sessions on training and recovery.

Plum knows firsthand how important it is to be physically ready for the WNBA: “We kind of lifted weights in college, but I didn’t know,” she recalls. “Then you get into the League and Sylvia Fowles just gives it a little love tap and you go four feet. And I’m like, Wow, these are grown women. My soul is not prepared for this.”

Players will moreover have the endangerment to learn increasingly well-nigh media training, mental health, finance, nutrition and how to express their personal style. The program is meant to truly prepare them for what’s superiority while giving them all the tools needed to navigate that transition.

“I finger like if we can reservation some of these women a little bit earlier, like junior going into senior year or sophomore or freshman, and [give them] a better, full understanding of the process. [Like], what it’s gonna be like, how is Draft night gonna be, how [to] pick your wage-earner or if you once have, what should you be looking for?

[There’s also] a lot of variegated things mentally. If in higher when you miss some shots and you’re not performing at your best, a lot of times you’re the weightier option that they have. And they’re gonna alimony letting you try. Whereas in the pros, there’s an All-American sitting on the seat waiting for you to mess up so they can go in and play great. This is a whole new reality that mentally, a lot of people aren’t prepared for. So a lot of these variegated things we’re gonna try to wade at zany and just requite them a largest idea of how a pro trains and how a pro approaches the game.”

The very name of the program is a reflection of what’s important to Plum, from having a dawg-mentality to creating a polity that continues to empower sexuality athletes, plane without the zany concludes. “I kind of started with this idea of the Dawg Class and the dawg-mentality is really a mentality that anyone can have. It’s a lot worthier than sport, but in particular, just the way you tideway life. A lot of times we’re given tough tasks and there’s a lot of nonflexible things to overcome, but having that mentality is showing up every day, unceasingly ready to wade the day and just not taking no for an answer. And I think that dawg-mentality kind of resonates within me and kind of how I was raised.

I think that there’s a lot of people, particularly women, that share that. And so I’m proud to partner with Under Armour to bring this to the forefront and requite other people the opportunity that I didn’t have.”

When asked what translating she’d requite the next generation of standouts when it comes to navigating the higher landscape today—from the NIL era to social media—Plum harps on that idea of polity and towers increasingly connection between higher players and professional athletes. “It’s kind of nonflexible to sum up in like one little answer, but what I would say is seek advice. I think just considering you’re in higher right now, if you do have aspirations, you want to play professionally, expressly in the WNBA, find someone in the WNBA that you resonate with and seek them out. I had a relationship with Sue Bird, but I should have been a little bit increasingly like, ‘Hey Sue, help me.’ Whether [you are] a little bit timid or you don’t really know if that’s appropriate, I would just say have no fear considering they’re gonna be worldly-wise to tell you the weightier translating that you need.”

Learn increasingly well-nigh the Under Armour Dawg Class here.

Photos via Under Armour.

The post Kelsey Plum and Under Armour are Empowering Women’s Higher Hoopers through the Dawg Class Mentorship Program appeared first on SLAM.