Angel Reese gave Flau’jae Johnson the cold shoulder during their first meeting as opponents in the WNBA. It was sad.
The former LSU teammates are not friends.
This latest WNBA drama dates back to 2023. Reese missed multiple games during her senior year of college basketball, which led to a heated exchange that involved her mother and the mother of Johnson.
Angel Reese did not shake Flau’jae Johnson’s hand.
Flau’jae Johnson was drafted No. 8 overall by the Storm during the WNBA Draft in April. Seattle has not been very good.
The Storm entered the weekend at 4-15 through its first 19 games. It hosted the Dream for game No. 20 on Saturday. Angel Reese was traded to Atlanta from Chicago in early April. This was her first game against Seattle this season.
Therefore, it was the first game of the season between Johnson and Reese. They played together at LSU in 2022-23 and 2023-24. The Tigers won a national title in their first season together.
As former teammates, Johnson tried to show love to Reese after their first meeting as opponents in the WNBA. The former went up to the latter with 1:20 remaining in the fourth quarter as she checked out of the game. The Storm led the Dream by 14 points.
Reese completely ignored Johnson. Johnson gave her a look like “oh, okay…”
Flau'jae Johnson tried to give her former LSU teammate Angel Reese a handshake with more than a minute left in the game.
— ESPN (@espn) June 28, 2026
Friday's matchup was their first meeting as opponents in the WNBA. pic.twitter.com/68ZosBObKl
Awkward!
Johnson finished with 24 points, 11 rebounds and four assists. Reese finished with 17 points, nine rebounds and two steals. Seattle went on to win the game by 15 points to move to 5-15. Atlanta dropped to 12-7.
Why the snub?
One might think that two former teammates who won a national title together in college would be thrilled to see each other. That, obviously, was not the case.
First and foremost, Angel Reese is a notorious sore loser. She often displays a bad attitude. This is nothing new.
To go even deeper, she and Flau’jae Johnson are not friends. Johnson spoke about her rift with Reese and revealed what caused their relationship to fall apart during their last year together during an interview in 2025.
“Yeah, it was a lot of media, it was a lot of locker room stuff. You know what I’m saying? Stuff that go on behind the scenes. But it happens. It happens … Sometimes stuff happens. You wish it don’t happen, but it do.”
The beef likely stems from an incident in 2023. Johnson’s mom claimed that Reese carried a horrendous GPA while at LSU, which led to a heated back-and-forth on the internet. LSU had a lot of drama in the locker room that season. They didn’t get along.
And then there was the in-game shenanigans on Saturday. Johnson scored on Reese during the Storm’s win over the Dream and stepped right in front of her with a little bit of a stare down.
FlauJae and Angel Reese 😂 . Big 4 was going crazy #wnba #flaujae #angelreese pic.twitter.com/GISVikdyXd
— BunnyMonè (@BunnyMoneCeo) June 28, 2026
I would imagine that gesture was the proverbial icing on the cake for Reese not to shake Johnson’s hand in the fourth quarter. The preexisting tension reached a boiling point when Johnson got up in her face. Still not a good look…