Georgia Amoore is the one who needed consoling; at least that’s what you’d think. The Washington Mystics rookie was in the third practice of training camp when she suffered a torn ACL that ended the season for the No. 6 overall pick before it began.

Later, she would walk into an apartment where teammates were hanging out and let them know the bad news.

“We were all really upset,” guard Jade Melbourne recalled. “She’s like, ‘No, no one cry. No one be sappy. I hate that bulls—’. We were like, okay, like, whoa. OK, no worries.”

That wasn’t the only time she had to put others at ease. Kenny Brooks, Amoore’s college coach, who refers to her as his daughter, cried when she told him. In five years with Brooks she missed just one game and never had a significant injury.

“Man, I lost it,” Brooks said. “And very quickly, in Georgia fashion, she was the one that was consoling me and letting me know that this is devastating, but she’s going to attack it. She was already, within five minutes of telling me, (saying) what the benefits were going to be.”

That’s why coaches and teammates can’t stop talking about someone who won’t play a single minute in 2025. There’s something about the 5-foot-6 point guard from Central Highlands of Victoria in Australia that connects with people.

Teammates missed her so much by the first game of the season they had a picture of her face attached to a stick behind the bench. Since then, Amoore has been a mainstay on the bench, charting information for coach Sydney Johnson and being a constant source of support.

None of this is new, Melbourne explained. The two were teammates and opponents over the years in Australia. (Amoore is over a year older despite Melbourne being in her third WNBA season.)

“Everyone wants to be Georgia’s friend,” Melbourne said. “Georgia was so cool. She was that point guard that had all the swag. She was doing all these cool moves and stuff. But overall, like off the court, she was always the one that had the speaker, always the one that was confident in the dance circle and stuff like that.

“She’s a funny person. It could be a dark day and someone that’s going through rehab is the one brightening up the room.”

Amoore doesn’t have the mental space for darkness. Sure, there were initial tears after the injury, but she promptly moved on. Keeping things in perspective is something Amoore has worked on over the years, picking up traits from her father and grandfather and learning how to endure when she was stuck at Virginia Tech, unable to return home or visit family for two years during the pandemic. She even had to watch her grandfather’s funeral via live stream.

Her support system has also been vast. The Mystics have kept her involved in everything, and she’s consistently engaged with teammates during games, passing on her views from the sideline.

Star guard Brittney Sykes immediately shared her own experience from two ACL tears. No. 1 overall pick Paige Bueckers and Amoore’s former Hokies teammate Elizabeth Kitley, who both have torn ACLs, reached out.

“What has happened has happened,” Amoore said. “If I dwell on that, then I’m going to miss out on so many opportunities. It’s like I’m still living a life, so I’m not going to waste 9 to 12 months of my life being miserable just because of an injury.”

She is focused on preparing for 2026 while contributing however she can now. Johnson has lauded her basketball IQ and said she has been a player-coach of sorts. He has her writing postgame reports to focus her thoughts and as a learning tool.

That has always been part of her game as a point guard: reading, evaluating and understanding what happens on the court at a high level. She became a film junkie in college and watched hundreds of hours of film with Brooks, who groomed Amoore in the mold of Steve Nash to take advantage of her elite decision-making. By the end of her college career, which followed Brooks to Kentucky, Amoore had the freedom to make her own play-calls out on the court.

She has an acute memory that she puts to work during film study. Scenarios come to her easily, then she imagines what she could have done different. Amoore is huge on visualization.

“When you see it in your mind and you see yourself doing it, you can do it,” Amoore said. ”I’m still visualizing myself dunking. I’ll get there eventually.”

When not on the sideline, Amoore is constantly texting other players, and even General Manager Jamila Wideman, about what she sees during the game. Fellow rookie Sonia Citron actively seeks Amoore’s insight when coming off the floor.

There was a moment during a recent practice when the Mystics were working on a new concept, and a subtle mistake was made. By the time Johnson had looked up to make a mental note, he noticed Amoore had already clocked it.

“The way she sees the game is just different from other people,” Citron said. “She’s just someone that you trust. … Whatever she tells me, I’m just going to listen.”

Said Brooks: “She’s the smartest player I’ve ever coached. For me, it was like a cheat code.”