Look closely at A’ja Wilson’s feet every time she sprints out of the tunnel for the Las Vegas Aces. You’ll learn something about her heritage and personality every time.
It’s a time-honored game day tradition at Michelob Ultra Arena. Approximately an hour before tipoff, all eyes are on the four-time MVP as she shows her speed en route to an early warm-up session on the court.
After Wilson’s A’One signature shoe was unveiled by Nike in February 2025, her pre-game routine became the perfect opportunity to see the 29-year-old sport a new colorway for nearly every game of a season that saw her lead the Aces to a third WNBA championship in four years.
Sometimes it was her standard released colors buzzing by. Other times, Wilson wore Player Exclusives (also referred to as PEs), made solely for her to wear.
In both the NBA and the WNBA, players use their PEs to express themselves through custom designs. Popularly, Wilson used her A’One PEs last season to highlight Black cartoon characters.
Wilson drew the most attention with the shoes she wore as she became the fastest player in league history to score 5,000 career points in a June 25 win over the Connecticut Sun. The sparkly, lime green version of the A’Ones were inspired by Tiana from “The Princess and the Frog” — Disney’s first Black princess.
Other designs included a bright yellow shoe that commemorated Susie Carmichael — the only Black main character in Nickelodeon’s “Rugrats” — while another mismatched pair was a nod to Black comic book heroes Storm and Static Shock.
“That was a no-brainer… It’s who I am,” Wilson told the Review-Journal when asked about her choice to highlight Black characters with her PEs. “I grew up watching these characters — I grew up wanting to be these characters. They look like me. They were so special in the roles that they played.”
The shoes sold out in minutes following their May release last year. Details regarding the A’Two, the second edition of Wilson’s signature shoe, have yet to be released.
London Johnson, who is Black, served as lead designer to help create it. Johnson lauded Wilson’s vision as a perk that makes the creative process easy.
“A’ja is incredible to work with. She has such a distinct point of view about how she wants to see things come to life,” Johnson said. “There are so many iconic Black characters that A’ja wanted to give flowers to… I think she sees a bit of herself in those characters.”
To walk a mile in Wilson’s shoes, the best route runs through Columbia, South Carolina.
It was there, in her hometown, Wilson was made acutely aware of what her race meant.
There, a 6-year-old Wilson was told by a friend that she could attend a party but might need to “stay outside” because the friend’s father did not like Black people.
And there, Wilson grew up hearing stories about segregation from her late maternal grandmother, Hattie Rakes, who in those days wasn’t allowed on campus at the University of South Carolina.
Eventually, that same campus would erect a statue in Wilson’s honor after she powered the Gamecocks to their first NCAA championship and entered the WNBA as the No. 1 overall pick.
But before all of the accolades, Wilson was a girl working to embrace her own identity, which also includes working through dyslexia. She wrote about all of those experiences in her New York Times best-selling book, “Dear Black Girls.”
“I never lose sight of who I am, and sometimes I’m just a big kid,” Wilson said. “Like I watch TV, all those moments. I just wanted people to understand that. And hopefully you guys can see that when I play.”
Richanda Bell, a teacher and assistant basketball coach at Calvary Christian Academy in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, doesn’t usually encourage running through the campus halls. But when her student’s Black History Month project was noticed on social media by its subject, Bell made an exception.
Olivia Richards, a ninth grader at the small K-12 school, selected Wilson for Bell’s assignment. Richards chose to sketch Wilson in the uniform she wore to win her second Olympic gold medal with Team USA during the 2024 games. She surrounded Wilson with a list of all of her accomplishments.
Bell posted a photo of the project, leading Wilson to reply with a quick “thank you.”
“We may have run around the school screaming,” Richards said with a laugh. “Wilson’s determination, strength and work ethic are my favorite things to highlight to my students about her.”
But for the fans who use their voices to ask Wilson to make her PEs available for purchase, Wilson has another clear answer.
“No, we can’t do that,” she said, smiling. “Some things I just want to keep to myself.”
Read more on Las Vegas Review-Journal
