I don’t get to write about the Atlanta Dream a lot, but their name does make for some easy headline fun.
Dream Season! A Dream Deterred! Broken Dreams! And when Caitlin Clark and Indiana come to town, you’ve got a literal Fever Dream.
Anyway … you can see where I’m going with this.
Quick links: Jalen Johnson out for season | UGA 71, South Carolina 60 | Notre Dame 71, Tech 68
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LIVING THE DREAM
Credit: Mark J. Terrill/AP
Credit: Mark J. Terrill/AP
More people than ever follow the WNBA. And if you’re not one of them, now might be a good time to get plugged in.
Because the Atlanta Dream just pulled off a massive — and intriguing — free agent signing: Brittney Griner.
📰 Griner, of course, crossed into the wider cultural consciousness in 2020, when she began kneeling during pregame national anthem performances to protest police killings and racial injustice.
While playing overseas in early 2022, law enforcement at a Russian airport arrested Griner after finding vape cartridges with cannabis oil in her bags.
She stayed in prison for 10 months, until the Biden administration negotiated a prisoner swap involving a Russian arms dealer.
SUGIURA: Will exciting Griner signing work?
⭐️ She happens to be a darn good basketball player, too. If an aging one. A 34-year-old center, Griner won an NCAA title at Baylor before the Phoenix Mercury made her the No. 1 overall draft pick in 2013.
She’s a two-time WNBA Defensive Player of the Year and has made 10 All-Star teams — including two after her imprisonment. She’s also a three-time Olympic gold medalist.
💭 The Dream, meanwhile, hope signing Griner can push them further into the postseason. The squad managed a playoff berth during an injury-plagued 2024 season but quickly fell to the top-seeded New York Liberty.
Then they fired head coach Tanisha Wright and brought in Karl Smesko, who accumulated the NCAA’s third-highest winning percentage during a two-decade stint at Florida Gulf Coast.
We reached out to the team, and they can’t comment until after Feb. 1 — the first day the Griner deal can become official.
But adding her to a strong young core (and a fan base that’s bought out season tickets for two straight years now) makes a lot of sense.
⚓️ And Griner confirmed the news in an Instagram video shot on a fishing boat with a few of her soon-to-be teammates.
“Honestly, what led me to that decision ultimately was the team, the players as individuals, and then also my family,” Griner said. “So I’m thrilled for this chapter.”
Join the party!
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ANOTHER LOST SEASON?
Credit: Jason Getz/AJC
Credit: Jason Getz/AJC
A 100-96 home loss to the Rockets marked the Hawks' sixth straight (keep scrolling for Trae Young’s thoughts on the officiating).
🚨 Even worse news broke just a short while ago: Star forward Jalen Johnson will reportedly miss the rest of the season after tearing his left labrum. As columnist Michael Cunningham writes, that’s an enormous blow in a season already full of them.
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ELSEWHERE ON THE HARDWOOD …
🙂 Georgia men’s basketball stopped its own losing streak at four, besting South Carolina 71-60 at home. Dakota Leffew scored 14 in his first start for the Bulldogs.
😦 The Georgia Tech men squandered a nearly gamelong lead with a five-minute scoreless streak, falling 71-68 at Notre Dame. Nait George led the Jackets with 20 points.
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QUARTERBACK CONSOLATION
The AJC’s D. Orlando Ledbetter is hunkered down in Mobile, Alabama, for this week’s Senior Bowl practices, and he’s got some hindsight-y good news for Falcons fans: If Atlanta hadn’t selected Michael Penix Jr. in 2024, it’d be pretty hard up to find a quarterback of the future in 2025’s draft class.
“I think there’s some good guys,” Senior Bowl headman Jim Nagy said. “I think there’s some guys that the league is still trying to figure out for different reasons. It’s certainly not last year.”
🏈 Ex-Alabama quarterback Jalen Milroe, meanwhile, says his predraft approach is “only worrying about myself, how I can be better, looking for the best fit for myself.
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SOCCER STUFF
️⚽️ Home Depot is linking up with U.S. Soccer for a four-year sponsorship deal. The deal was announced at the national training center that’s under construction in Fayette County.
️⚽️ Atlanta United says it won’t participate in this year’s U.S. Open Cup but will give it a go during the Leagues Cup.
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SIR LUCIOUS LEAD FOOT
Credit: Miguel Martinez/AJC
Credit: Miguel Martinez/AJC
I offer (in)sincere apologies for mentioning Outkast in a sports newsletter two days in a row, but: Big Boi’s on tap to drive the pace car ahead of February‘s Ambetter Health 400 at Atlanta Motor Speedway.
🏁 The rapper will join the ranks of other esteemed race-starting dignitaries, like Olympic rugby star Spiff Sedrick, country singer Blanco Brown and ex-UGA running back D’Andre Swift.
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PREP NOTES
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PHOTO OF THE DAY
Credit: Daniel Varnado for the AJC
Credit: Daniel Varnado for the AJC
Georgia Tech long snapper Henry Freer hugged supporters after the Yellow Jackets‘ December loss to Vanderbilt in the Birmingham Bowl. Freer — the first active Ph.D. student to play football at Tech — just became an academic All-American.
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QUOTE OF THE DAY
I'm trying to save my money. I got plenty, but I'm saving it as much as I can. So these, these refs are not worth my money, but we do need some new ones.
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Thanks for reading to the very bottom of Sports Daily. Questions, comments, ideas? Contact me at tyler.estep@ajc.com.
Until next time.
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