She Got Game

County’s Woman-Led Pro Basketball Team, PG Valor Wins ABA Division Championship

The day after PG Valor, the county’s pro-basketball team, topped the Baltimore Hawks in a 98-96 victory to secure the ABA Chesapeake Divisional Championship, team owner LaDonna M. Smith was horse from the celebration.

“I’m like screamed-out right now,” she said, still savoring the victory for a team that started the season at 0-and-four. “They counted us out. They talked about us. They were like, ‘You’re a girl, you don’t know what you’re doing,’” said Smith, a Fairmount Heights native.

Well, she does now.
 
In the modern ABA, Smith is the only female owner in the Washington, D.C. metro area. The league is a reincarnation of the famous American Basketball Association that featured the play of Julius Erving ( Dr. J) who was the best-known ABA player before it merged with the National Basketball Association at the end of the 1975-1976 season. The current ABA has been operating since the year 2000, and still uses the iconic red, white, and blue ball featured in the original league.

Smith is a self-described girly-girl who never played organized sports. But she was shrewd enough bring on Chuck Pickard II, as coach, who has a high basketball IQ. He’s also a celebrated athlete. Pickard was recently inducted into the University of Maryland Eastern Shore’s Hall of Fame for baseball, track and field, and basketball.

Since taking on the team in 2015, Smith’s handled the marketing and front office duties while Pickard managed player development. “He’s on the court and I’m off the court, that’s the winning combination we found this year,” she said.