The Washington Wizards walked away with three picks they believe can be assets in the 2025-26 season and beyond, as well as two future second-round picks, when all was said and done in the 2025 NBA Draft.
And, with the first of those three picks, the Wiz got a player in Tre Johnson that, Will Dawkins admitted, was near the top of their board all along and a pleasant surprise to see available at No. 6.
One of the things the Wizards loved most about Johnson? That he’s a student of the game who is always learning.
“He’s a pure hooper; he’s like a lot of teenagers who like to hang out and play video games and things of that nature, but he's singularly focused on basketball. We had him over for dinner and were talking about a play that happened in a Mystics game where a player went under a screen and then came back around to isolate on the other side, and he was like, ‘yeah, I've seen that a couple of times in some other WNBA games, they're starting to do that,’” Dawkins said. “That’s when you realize that this dude, like, he gets it. He really loves basketball, he watches it and studies it, and that was kind of one of those things where it’s like, okay, the IQ is there, but so is the passion to get better and watch all types of basketball.”
Johnson himself told ESPN that the Wizards, when they brought him in for a visit, showed him tape of some of his worst moments, which stuck with him and made him want to improve even more – and yes, that’s both intentional and telling from the Wizards.
“He’s got to stop sharing house secrets like that,” Dawkins laughed, “buth guys come in, we try to make sure that they know exactly who we are, so we can learn who they are. And with that, they spend time with everybody in the organization. from our player pathways and enrichment teams all the way to our analytic teams, and they do film sessions with the coaches, but also spend some time with us in the front office, and we watch film with them. We explain what we like, and the real question marks we have, and it’s really just learning how they are willing to take accountability, how much humility they have, and how much they're willing to push and work on those things. The way he was able to show us how he learned and show us the things he saw, I think it motivated him the next day to kind of fight in some of those areas, and I like how he accepted the challenge.”
Listen to Dawkins’ entire visit with The Junkies above!