BROOKLYN, N.Y. — New York Liberty guard Marine Johannès could see how great of a seal forward Jonquel Jones was about to create even before Jones had a foot in the paint at Barclays Center.
Johannès whipped the ball to Jones, and Jones took a step into the restricted area and finished the layup. Jones began to run back the other way, but Phoenix Mercury head coach Vanessa Nygaard called a timeout. The Liberty had a 7-0 lead with 8:41 remaining in the first quarter.
As the Liberty’s starters approached the bench, Jones made sure her teammate got some props for the basket. “What a pass, my man,” Jones said.
The pass forced Jones to speed up her roll into the post. Typically, Jones turns her back for a moment and then opens back up to be able to receive the ball when she has advantageous positioning,
but that goes flying out the window when receiving a pass from the Liberty’s third-year player from France. Jones has to pay close attention to Johannès at all times and be ready for the unexpected.
“The first assist she had and she kind of just slung it,” Jones said following the Liberty’s 89-71 win over the Mercury. “And I was like, ‘Oh shit.’ I grabbed it and got a layup. It was just, it came so quickly.”
Johannès has been characterized as someone who plays with flair, spice, verve, swagger and even a little bit of magic. In addition to her crafty whip, no-look passes and behind-the-back passes, she sometimes hits threes and mid-range jumpers on one leg.
She has mastered how to finish at the rim with one hand, often looking like the Statue of Liberty, the namesake of the team she plays for. Sometimes she even finishes with a hesitation that makes her look like she’s pitching a softball underhand.
The expectation for someone who plays the game with such swagger is that they have innate confidence or an outgoing personality that takes up a lot of space. That’s not Johannès.
The 28-year-old from Lisieux, France, a city in the countryside about 135 miles northwest of Paris, maintains a quiet, almost withdrawn disposition.
That was something that took a lot of her Liberty teammates aback. While teammate Sabrina Ionescu continues to perfect how she celebrates 3-pointers, a “3-point celly” isn’t something that comes from Johannès.
Jocelyn Willoughby and rookie Nyara Sabally have both observed how Johannès can be so mellow and trot back so casually after she creates something that makes the bench and the home crowd roar.
Las Vegas Aces head coach Becky Hammon likened Johannès to “lightning in a bottle.”
“Even to this day, it catches me off guard when she does certain things and has no reaction to it,” Willoughby said. “But we’re all just like, ‘Woah, that was elite.’”
How has this rising superstar continued to find herself in a foreign country where she’s still learning the language? What is it about Johannès and her personality that makes her unlike any of the top players in the world?
The first impression she made
When Johannès first arrived in New York in 2019, the Liberty were in a period of uncertainty. They didn’t play at the Barclays Center yet and were struggling to determine the direction of the franchise.
The new general manager, Jonathan Kolb, was trying to understand what he had before imposing his stamp on the organization. But he signed Johannès in his first transaction as general manager.
The chance he took on Johannès, who came to the Liberty after playing for France in EuroBasket that season, paid dividends immediately.
In her first home WNBA game, she did not miss a shot against the Los Angeles Sparks, shooting 6-for-6, and she repeated the feat less than a month later against the Chicago Sky.
“I think fans realized that she’s a keeper,” Kolb told The Next. “For me, the best part of the Marine experience is watching or hearing from people that watch her for the first time.”
That first impression she made has stayed with fans. Before the Liberty’s home opener this season, a little kid watched pregame warmups with her family. When it was time to leave the courtside seating, the girl hopped along in a circa 2019 Johannès Liberty jersey.
“We love [Johannès],” the girl’s dad told The Next. “Every time we’re here, she bangs off seven or eight threes.”
Johannès had not arrived in New York yet because she was still playing in the French League, but the family couldn’t wait for her arrival.
But what if Johannès hadn’t chosen New York? According to Liberty head coach Sandy Brondello, Johannès was down to two WNBA teams before signing with New York.
Brondello’s Mercury were agonizingly close to getting her rights. To this day, Johannès says her decision came down to two factors: New York was a much easier plane ride for friends and family than Phoenix, and she had familiarity with the Liberty’s roster.
She’d be joining her French national team teammate Bria Hartley and her French club teammate Nayo Raincock-Ekunwe in New York.
Brondello’s chance to work with the budding superstar was delayed a few years, but it wasn’t denied.
Her return to the WNBA
Following the 2019 season, the Liberty and Kolb embarked on some pretty drastic changes. They moved to Barclays Center, hired a new head coach, drafted Ionescu, played the 2020 season in a bubble, and then fired that head coach following the 2021 season.
In all that time, Johannès didn’t return to the WNBA. The COVID-19 pandemic made it incredibly difficult for overseas travel in 2020, and the Olympics and EuroBasket kept her with the French national team in 2021.
But when Brondello was hired in January 2022, she knew that the Liberty could try to lure Johannès back to the United States.
When Brondello and the Australian Opals found themselves at the same World Cup qualifier as the French Les Bleues, Brondello tracked down Johannès and made sure no one else was around.
Johannès was nervous to speak to the person who would become her coach, but her pal on Les Bleues and four-year WNBA veteran Gabby Williams reassured her that Brondello was “pretty cool.
” Brondello picked up on how shy the French guard was, and Johannès wasn’t completely sold on returning to New York.
Who would she know there given that the entire roster, with the exception of Rebecca Allen at the time, had turned over?
Brondello sold Johannès by telling her how much of a fan she was of her game and how she and her staff could improve Johannès’ game. The pitch worked.
“I’m a huge fan of Marine,” Brondello said. “I just think the way she plays, her creativity. I think everyone should get a chance to watch it. And she’s great and she’s gonna keep growing bigger and better for us.”
Still, Johannès was a bit nervous. It had been over two years since she stepped foot in New York. Her English was a work in progress. How would she find comfort outside of Brondello?
When Stefanie Dolson signed a two-year deal with the Liberty in 2022, a mutual friend asked her to watch out for Johannès. On the first night Dolson met Johannès, her observation was that the French guard didn’t really speak much.
But then they went to a bar and had a nice time. Something about Dolson allowed Johannès to feel comfortable enough to open up.
“I think that I’m a pretty open person,” Dolson told The Next. “I’m pretty transparent, and I’m an open book. I think I make people feel comfortable.
Probably that and I think we both have [a] very similar sense of humor, the way that we have jokes, make jokes. And I think she learned that quickly, so she felt a little bit more comfortable.”
Dolson and Johannès have garnered a reputation online as a comedic duo. Dolson describes their brand of humor as “childish,” with Johannès sometimes being much more of a goofball than Dolson.
Their antics were on full display after practice on June 17. With a game the next day, the players lined up to compete to make a halfcourt shot, as they do prior to each game. Who was going to win the money that comes with making the shot?
An attempt from Jones hit a ceiling lamp high above the practice court. But after many players’ attempts, Dolson hit one. She followed the make with a celebratory dance, got high-fives from Ionescu and Sabally, and curtsied.
But the prize money wasn’t hers yet. Other players, including Johannès, were still in the running.
Johannès then hit her halfcourt shot, potentially offsetting Dolson’s triumph. Dolson chased Johannès around the court, tugging on her practice shirt, while Johannès stifled a laugh. Rather than try to break the tie, they opted to split the money and take each other out to lunch, which is common in their friendship.
“Her and Stef together, they’re amazing,” Brondello said about Johannès. “She’s quiet around the big group. But I think in small groups, I think she’s quite a character. I think she’s quite funny.”
https://www.youtube.com/embed/vDItfW2eLIQ?feature=oembedFor more, here’s Part 2.
Johannès’ brand of clowning around also includes expressive facial expressions that sometimes say much more than her actual words. In fact, she is so expressive that a Twitter account called “Out of Context Marine Johannès” captures some of her goofiest moments.
How Johannès has improved under Brondello and her staff
Even with the clowning, Johannès doesn’t let that interrupt the work that has to be done. Liberty assistant coach Zack O’Brien noticed how she’s always up for a challenge. When she’s pushed outside her comfort zone on the court, she buys in and accepts the discomfort.
In 2022, the Liberty were incredibly thin when it came to reliable wing and perimeter defense. Betnijah Laney was rehabbing her knee for most of the season and Allen endured multiple concussions.
The Liberty were running out of options and turned to Johannès. Her ability to buy into what the coaches needed stood out to O’Brien and showed the type of player and person Johannès is.
“We threw a ton at her defensively and really had these high expectations, and she met them and she’s been great on that end,” he said. “There’s still room for improvement.
But I think from someone that can be that devastating offensively, to also be able to be that solid on defense is something that really jumped off the page.”
She still is a work in progress on defense, but when she focuses and puts her mind toward stopping someone, she can.
Against the Dallas Wings this season, the Liberty initially struggled to stop guard Arike Ogunbowale, as the game plan was to focus on wing Satou Sabally instead.
Brondello went to Johannès to see if she could pressure Ogunbowale, but Johannès also struggled early, allowing two of Ogunbowale’s four makes in the first half.
However, according to O’Brien, she spoke to the coaches and her teammates at halftime about how she could disrupt Ogunbowale in the second half. After shooting 4-for-8 in the first half, Ogunbowale shot 3-for-12 in the second.
One play in the fourth quarter showed exactly what Johannès’ mindset and approach was.
