South Carolina women's basketball: Dawn Staley talks Ashlyn Watkins' return and whether she will play
South Carolina junior forward Ashlyn Watkins returned to practice this week. Now the question is when she will return to game action.
Watkins was all smiles during the portion of practice the media saw on Friday. She laughed in frustration when she was out-jumped by one of the Highlighters and tipped a rebound in for an own basket.
“She looks great,” Dawn Staley said. “The Highlighters might throw a little rust comment at her, but she looks natural.”
Watkins was arrested on August 31 and was immediately suspended from team activities. Her charges were later dismissed after she completed a pretrial intervention program. On Wednesday Watkins was reinstated.
Media was only present for 5-10 minutes at the end of practice so it wasn’t possible to see how much Watkins did, but Staley said it has been a seamless return to the court.
“Ashlyn is back. We welcome her back. We’re going to let her get acclimated to being back on the team and we look forward to having our entire team back in the fold,” she said. Later she added, “We’re at our very best when we’ve got our full roster, especially healthy. It feels good. It feels natural. It doesn’t feel unnatural to us. It feels like we’re complete now.”
Watkins, a junior forward who was second-team All-SEC last season and averaged 9.2 points and 7.4 rebounds, declined to speak to the media on Friday. However, the rest of the players welcomed her back.
“It’s amazing,” Raven Johnson said. “Her presence is just so big, the stuff she does. We need her.”
Staley didn’t give a timeline for Watkins’ acclimation period. She said the biggest adjustment has been getting back into the routine of the season.
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“Now she’s here,” Staley said. “Now she’s got to get acclimated to being here, doing 12:30 to 3:30, her schedule’s probably a little bit off, just getting back to her normal routine.”
Staley stopped short of confirming that Watkins will play on Sunday.
“If she’s out here, she’s going to play,” Staley said. “Ashlyn won’t start, I can tell you that.”
Watkins was charged with felony assault and kidnapping stemming from an altercation with her girlfriend. Although Staley emphasized that the charges were dismissed, she did not downplay the seriousness of the situation.
“The charges have been dismissed, on their way to expungement,” she said. “Is it a hard thing for a young person to deal with? Absolutely. It was hard for all the young people that were involved in the altercation. It’s hard for our university and our athletics department, hard for even the solicitor’s office. It’s hard for her lawyer. It’s hard for everybody. I imagine that this isn’t the first time it has happened on any campus, so you deal with it You deal with it head on, just like Ashlyn did, and now she finds herself back. We’re not going to keep reliving it. We’re going to keep getting better and making better decisions.
There will be blowback from opposing fans, Staley and Watkins know. It is the cost of making a serious mistake, but Staley believes Watkins has the mindset and support system to get through it.
“Ashlyn will be who she is,” Staley said. “She’s created some really good habits. You saw her make a terrible mistake that if she could do it all over again she wouldn’t do it again. She’s got teammates, she’s got coaches, she’s got a support system, she’s got family. People are gonna be people and she’s going to ignore them, obviously. If it gets to her to a point, then I’m going to take up for her, because that’s what we’re supposed to do.”
