The Winnipeg native will be part of Team Manitoba at the 2023 Canada Games
Beth Johnson was an avid curler growing up, winning a championship at her local club in Winnipeg, Man. However, her curling career was put on hold eight years ago when she developed a hip condition.
During the summer between grades seven and eight, Johnson experienced a slipped capital femoral epiphysis.
“The growth plate on top of the femur just went for a ride,” Johnson explained. “There was no trauma, there’s nothing that happened to it; it just started sliding down the side of my leg. It was initially just screwed into the side of my leg here in Winnipeg. Then I had to get the whole joint reconstructed at Shriners in Montreal. There’s 11 pins and a big plate in there now.”
Rather than dwell on her condition, Johnson found the positives.
“I get to play wheelchair basketball now,” she said. “If it hadn’t gotten as serious as it did, I wouldn’t have started playing.”
After her first hip surgery, Johnson got introduced to wheelchair basketball on two separate occasions.
“I got into physio and rehab, and my physiotherapist, Darren Bittner, had played wheelchair basketball for Team Manitoba. So he wanted me to go try it out,” Johnson said. “Then, the following week, my gym teacher in high school decided to get the wheelchairs in school for Phys Ed class, so there was a one-two punch there. After that, I was like, ‘yeah, I got to do this’.”
On top of wheelchair basketball, Johnson has also represented Team Manitoba in canoe-kayak. The 20-year-old was introduced to canoe-kayak at the 2019 Canada Games in Red Deer and represented Manitoba at the 2022 Canada Games in Niagara.
“It was a really good experience for me, I think,” said Johnson. “It was good to get with another team and to take a break from basketball.”
Johnson has had plenty of reps on the court this season.
She was part of the mixed team of athletes from P.E.I., Manitoba and New Brunswick that won a Division 2 gold medal at the CWBL Nationals in Montreal in April.
“We had such a great team there,” Johnson said. “We had a great time, and I think we just clicked as a group of juniors. It was a really good team.”
Then in June, Johnson was part of Team Manitoba at Junior Nationals in Charlottetown.
“I had a great time seeing everybody again,” she said “There’s a lot of people that weren’t at nationals that I got a chance to see it at junior nationals. So that was great as well.”
The 2022 Junior National Championship was a test event for the upcoming 2023 Canada Games in P.E.I. in February, where Johnson is excited to wear her provincial colours again.
“I’m pumped,” she said. “I’m rewatching old games from 2019, and I’m like, ‘Oh, my gosh, we were not good.’ Then just looking at how small my teammates are because some of them were 13 years old.”
Johnson also attended NextGen camps in Charlottetown and Langley, B.C.
Off the court, Johnson is a student at the University of Manitoba, where she is a Kinesiology major.
“Hopefully, get into coaching, eventually,” Johnson said of her career plans. “I’m not sure what exactly I’m going to do, but I’m going to stay in basketball. I’m not going anywhere.”