It was a wild Wednesday in the WNBA, with players and draft assets criss-crossing the league at a dizzying pace. 

• When the dust finally settled, here’s how things stood: 

Seattle Storm: 

• Added: Mikiah Herbert Harrigan, Katie Lou Samuelson, two 2022 second-round picks (from Dallas and New York), and the rights to Stephanie Talbot. 
• Lost: Natasha Howard, Sami Whitcomb. 

New York Liberty: 

• Added: Natasha Howard, Sami Whitcomb, and the No. 6 pick in this year’s draft. 
• Lost: Kia Nurse, Megan Walker, the No. 1 pick in this year’s draft, a 2022 second-round pick, and the rights to Stephanie Talbot. 

Dallas Wings: 

• Added: This year’s No. 1 pick.
• Lost: Katie Lou Samuelson and a 2022 second-round pick. 

Minnesota Lynx: 

• Added: 2022 first-round pick (from Phoenix).
• Lost: Mikiah Herbert Harrigan. 

Phoenix Mercury: 

• Added: Kia Nurse, Megan Walker. 
• Lost: No. 6 pick and a 2022 first-round pick. 

What it all means: 

• Dallas now has the top two selections in this year’s draft, as well as the fifth and seventh picks. Expect the Wings to trade some assets for veteran players, especially after having drafted three players in the top seven last year. 
• New York is jumping ahead of schedule in choosing to pair Natasha Howard with Sabrina Ionescu rather than finding a running mate with the No. 1 pick in the draft. 
• Seattle has now lost two huge pieces from its Championship starting five. Howard and Alysha Clark are out. Samuelson and Herbert Harrigan are in. They’re younger players on cheaper contracts who now have an opportunity to step into impact roles. 
• Minnesota simply had too many bigs competing with Herbert Harrigan for playing time. Phoenix, meanwhile, was able to add low-cost contributors to surround its superstar core of Diana Taurasi, Brittney Griner and Skylar Diggins-Smith. 

Go deeper: What Wednesday's blockbuster WNBA trades mean and how they impact each team (ESPN)

Sofia Kenin’s repeat bid at the Australian Open is over, as the defending champion and No. 4 seed fell to Kaia Kanepi in the second round, 6-3, 6-2. 

• No. 8 Bianca Andreescu and No. 9 Petra Kvitova were also bounced, as were 40-year-old Venus Williams (the oldest player in the draw) and 16-year-old Coco Gauff (the youngest). 

Top-ranked Ash Barty survived a close-call Thursday after blowing a 5-2 lead in the second set before defeating her compatriot Daria Gavrilova 6-1, 7-6 (7). 

• Sporting a heavy leg wrap, Barty’s near collapse stunned the local crowd. 
• The World No. 1 is hoping to become the first Australian to win the women’s title since Chris O’Neil in 1978.

Pernille Harder scored a brace before Fran Kirby knocked home a third in the 90th minute as Chelsea clobbered Arsenal 3-0 on Wednesday. (Highlights) 

The results of this London Derby were huge for both squads. 

• Chelsea now sits alone atop the FAWSL standings, three points ahead of Manchester United after finally catching them on matches played. 
• Arsenal is now fourth, 12 pts behind Chelsea, and seven points behind third-place Manchester City. 

The big picture: Chelsea is loaded, and their eyes are not just on winning the FAWSL, but dethroning Lyon in the Champions League. With Harder, Kirby and Sam Kerr all playing in top form, they might just have the best squad on the planet. 

• For Arsenal, they’ll need to catch one of the Manchester teams in order to qualify for the Champions League, a tall task with only nine games left. 

Annika Sorenstam is returning to the LPGA, at least for a weekend. 

• The 10-time major champion and LPGA Hall of Famer will tee up for the Gainbridge LPGA Championship February 25th-28th, in what will be her first competitive LPGA event in more than a decade. 

Sorenstam “retired” in 2008 to start a family. This January, she played in the celebrity division of the Diamond Resorts Tournament of Champions. 

• For many current LPGA players, that was the first time they’d ever seen Sorenstam hit a golf ball in person. 
• Now, they’ll be competing against the legend on her own home course of Lake Nona in Orlando, Florida. 

Sorenstam says the purpose of the event is just to get some competitive rounds in before the U.S. Senior Women’s Open later this summer. 

• But something tells us the 50-year-old might flip that competitive switch if she finds herself anywhere near contention heading into the later rounds.

Jocelyne Lamoureux-Davidson and Monique Lamoureux-Morando are retiring from the U.S. women’s national hockey team.

• In 2018, the twins helped Team USA win its first Olympic women’s hockey gold in 20 years by defeating Canada in the final. 
• Lamoureux-Morando scored the game-tying goal in the third period, before Lamoureux-Davidson's shootout goal sealed the victory.

The twins also played a key role in 2017, when the players threatened to boycott the World Championships in a challenge to USA Hockey.

• The two sides eventually agreed to a landmark, four-year contract with improved pay, travel arrangements, fundraising and programming. 

Go deeper: read the twins’ farewell essay in the Players Tribune here. And relive the thrilling 2018 Olympics final here. 

Elsewhere this week, Atlanta Dream guard Renee Montgomery announced she is retiring from the WNBA after 11 season. 

• Montgomery won a title at UConn before going on to win two WNBA titles with the Minnesota Lynx. 
• She sat out last season in order to focus on social justice and her own work in media, launching her own Remotely Renee podcast. 

Go deeper: catch Renee’s farewell show here.

• United is higher ranked, but City may be the favorites after having won six consecutive league games since a draw with United last November.

• For City, Sam Mewis has been nursing an ankle injury, but Abby Dahlkemper and Rose Lavelle should be available. 

In honor of Black History Month, we’re continuing to profile those athletes who broke down barriers in and out of sports. Today, we’re talking about the one and only Althea Gibson. Grab a cup of coffee, because her’s was one heck of a life. 

Althea Gibson was born to sharecroppers on a cotton farm in South Carolina in 1927. The Great Depression forced her family to move to Harlem in 1930, where Gibson discovered paddle tennis. 

• At age 12, she was already New York City’s women’s paddle tennis champion. At the same time, she picked up boxing from her father and won local competitions. 
• She quit school at 13 to devote herself to street fighting and basketball, living for a time in a protective shelter for children. 

In 1941, she entered and won her first tennis tournament, the American Tennis Association’s New York State Championship. 

• Gibson went on to win ten straight ATA national women’s titles, beginning in 1947. 
• Gibson then broke the color barrier at the US National Championships (now the US Open) in 1950. 

In 1956, Gibson became the first African-American athlete to win a Grand Slam tournament, the French Championships singles event. But it was 1957, to use her own words, which was “Althea Gibson’s year.” 

• Gibson became the first Black champion in Wimbledon history, and personally received the trophy from Queen Elizabeth II. 
• “Shaking hands with the Queen of England,” she wrote, “was a long way from being forced to sit in the colored section of the bus.”
• Gibson won the doubles championship as well, received a ticker-tape parade in New York, and a month later won her first US National Championship. 

Gibson defended both her Wimbledon and US National Championship singles titles the following year, being named the AP Female Athlete of the Year both years. She also became the first Black woman to appear on the covers of Sports Illustrated and Time. 

• In all, Gibson won 11 Grand Slam tournaments (five singles, five doubles, one mixed doubles) before retiring from the sport due to a lack of prize money and its then-prohibition on endorsements. 
• “Being the Queen of Tennis,” she wrote, “is all well and good, but you can't eat a crown. Nor can you send the Internal Revenue Service a throne clipped to their tax forms. The landlord and grocer and tax collector are funny that way: they like cold cash.”

For Gibson’s second act, she became the first African-American to join the LPGA tour in 1964. 

• She was one of the tour’s top 50 money winners for five years, despite often having to dress in her car because she wasn’t allowed in the clubhouse.
• A multi-talented force, Gibson also acted, wrote, and even once sang on the Ed Sullivan Show. 

A woman ahead of her time, Gibson, who died in 2003, was a larger-than-life figure who transcended the world of sports. 

• While she has only recently received her due, with a statue erected in her honor outside Arthur Ashe stadium in 2018, athletes have always credited her for breaking new ground. 
• Said Venus Williams: “Her accomplishments set the stage for my success, and through players like myself and Serena and many others to come, her legacy will live on."

Learn more about Gibson: 

• Althea Gibson: She Always Wanted To Be Somebody (Wimbledon, YouTube) 
• Althea Gibson, Tennis Star Ahead of Her Time, Gets Her Due at Last (New York Times) 
• Althea Gibson broke barriers (ESPN)

• Megan Rapinoe and Sue Bird are on the cover of GQ’s Modern Lovers issue. (The two also sat down for a hilarious couples quiz.) Featured on an additional cover is tennis star Naomi Osaka and rapper Cordae. (And they, too, sat down for a quiz.) 
• Amanda Zahui B. has announced her signing with the LA Sparks. 
• The Las Vegas Aces have signed Riquna Williams, who previously played for the Sparks. 
• Tokyo Olympics president Yoshiro Mori is stepping down over sexist remarks he made about women talking in meetings. 
• Burnley Football Club has announced that Burnley FC Women will be fully integrated into the football club. The move is the first step towards the long-term aim of making Burnley FC Women a fully professional team.
• The Portland Thorns have re-signed Bella Bixby, Tyler Lussi, Madison Pogarch, and Angela Salem. They’ve also signed GK Shelby Hogan. All five players are on one-year contracts.

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