The USWNT cruised to their fourth SheBelieves Cup title in February. Now comes the hard part.

• Coach Vlatko Andonovski can only take 18 players to the Olympics (plus four alternates). 
• Players will have a few more international games, as well as their own club seasons, to show what they can do. 

Assuming Vlatko takes 2 goalies, 6 defenders, 5 midfielders, and 5 forwards, below are our best guesses as to who’s in and who’s a maybe at this moment in time. 

• It goes without saying: anything can happen. 

Goalkeepers: 

• Locks: Alyssa Naeher. 
• Maybes: Ashlyn Harris and Jane Campbell are frontrunners to be Naeher’s backup. Harris has experience, Campbell has youth. Whoever doesn’t make the team likely ends up an alternate. 

Defenders: 

• Locks: Abby Dahlkemper, Crystal Dunn, Kelley O’Hara, and Becky Sauerbrunn.
• Maybes: It’s between Tierna Davidson, Ali Krieger, Casey Krueger, Midge Purce and Emily Sonnett for the final two spots. Sonnett and Davidson might be the favorites, but it’s still too early to know. 

Midfielders: 

• Locks: Julie Ertz, Lindsey Horan, Rose Lavelle and Sam Mewis. 
• Maybes: It’s a two-woman battle between Kristie Mewis and Catarina Macario for the fifth spot. Macario has a bright future with the team, but Mewis may be the more polished player at the moment. 

Forwards: 

• Locks: Christen Press, Megan Rapinoe. 
• Maybes: If they’re in form, Alex Morgan and Tobin Heath are in. Carli Lloyd has the experience, but expect Lynn Williams to make this a very difficult decision for Vlatko. 

The bottom line: we certainly don’t envy the coaching staff. No matter what happens, multiple world-class players will be left home. 

Go deeper: The USWNT’s Olympic roster: Where it stands today (Just Women’s Sports)

The first leg of the UEFA Women’s Champions League round of 16 is (almost) in the books, with PSG and Sparta Praha still needing to play next week. 

All the favorites have so far looked the part:

• Lyon 2, Brøndby 0: Catarina Macario made her first start for Lyon, playing 61 minutes in the win. Both Nikita Parris and Melvine Malard found the back of the net for the defending champs.
• Chelsea 2, Atl Madrid 0: Ann-Katrin Berger made not one, but two penalty saves, while goals from Maren Mjelde and Fran Kirby helped Chelsea pull away despite playing with 10 for most of the match. 
• Man City 3, Fiorentina 0: Sam Mewis found the back of the net in the 89’ minute, shrugging off a recent ankle injury to help put the game away. 

The rest of the week’s results: 

• Barcelona 4, Fortuna Hjørring 0
• FC Rosengård 2, St. Pölten 2
• Wolfsburg 2, LSK 0 
• Bayern 6, BIIK-Kazygurt 1

Next up: second leg games are next Wednesday and Thursday. 

No freshman has ever been named the national player of the year in women’s college basketball—that includes the Wooden, the Wade, the Naismith and the AP honors. 

• This year, two players have a shot to break that streak. 

Paige Bueckers came to UConn as the No. 1 recruit in the country. She now leads the nation’s No. 1 team in scoring (19.8 ppg), assists (6.2 apg), 3-pointers (50) and minutes played (36.1) 

• The Big East is a weaker conference, but Bueckers showed up against non-conference opponents, knocking in late-game daggers against both South Carolina and Tennessee. 
• On Thursday, she was named the Big East’s player of the year and freshman of the year. 

Caitlin Clark’s Iowa squad may be unranked, but that hasn’t stopped the sharp-shooting guard from making a name for herself. 

• Clark is averaging 26.9 points, 6.1 rebounds and 7.0 assists, all while shooting 41% from behind the arc. 
• She scored 30+ points for five consecutive games at one point. The Hawkeyes’ 14-8 record, however, will probably keep her from any POTY awards. 

Other potential POTY winners: 

• Aliyah Boston, South Carolina: Averaging a double double (13.0 ppg, 11.7 rpg) while anchoring the Gamecocks’ defense. 
• Charli Collier, Texas: 21.0 points and 12.2 rebounds a game, including a monster 44-pt performance against North Texas. 
• Dana Evans, Louisville: 2x ACC player of the year, averaging 21.0 ppg for one of the year’s best teams. 
• Rhyne Howard, Kentucky: 2x SEC player of the year, averaging 19.8 points, 7.5 rebounds and 3.7 assists. 
• Aari McDonald, Arizona: Pac-12 POTY and Co-DPOY. A tenacious guard on both ends of the court. 

Our pick: We’re going with Evans for her clutch play when it counts. According to ESPN, she has shot 56% in the last five minutes of the fourth quarter this season, including 8-for-13 from 3-point range.

Our guess: Bueckers has the hype and the UConn spotlight. In a field without a clear frontrunner, she’s in line to make history. 

Trivia: can you name the only player to ever win both the Wade Trophy and Wooden Award as a Sophomore? Answer below. 

Nneka Ogwumike has re-signed with the Los Angeles Sparks, the team which drafted her No. 1 in 2012 and with whom she won a championship in 2016. 

Why it matters: 

• The Sparks lost both Candace Parker (Chicago) and Chelsea Gray (Las Vegas) in free agency. 
• Ogwumike was given the core player designation, which technically meant she couldn’t negotiate with other teams, but she still could have asked for a trade. 

Had Ogwumike walked, the Sparks would officially be in crisis mode. 

• As it stands, the WNBPA President and her sister Chiney will form a new two-player core after each signed multi-year deals this offseason. 

Go deeper: Nneka Ogwumike 'very comfortable' in her role with Los Angeles Sparks (ESPN) 

Two fighting GOATs are hitting the ring and the octagon, respectively, this weekend, and both fights carry special significance for Claressa Shields and Amanda Nunez. 

Tonight: Claressa Shields vs Marie-Eve Dicaire

• Shields, a two-time Olympic champion, has organized the first-ever all-women card after being continually neglected by TV networks. 
• Her and Dicaire will fight for the undisputed super welterweight championship on Fite.tv. Both are undefeated in their careers. 
• Purchase the PPV here. Fight starts at 9:00pm ET. 

Read: Claressa Shields, Champion Boxer, Says Sexism Holds Her Back (NYT)

• “Shields, who feels a bit underappreciated these days, said she wants to beat her opponents senseless, of course, but she insisted she is actually ‘super nice.’” 

Saturday: Amanda Nunes vs Megan Anderson (UFC 259): 

• Nunes is defending her featherweight title in what will be her first competition since she and wife Nina Ansaroff (a UFC strawweight) gave birth to their first daughter, Raegan, last September. 
• The main card begins at 10pm ET on ESPN+ PPV. You can purchase UFC 259 here. 

Read: Nunes talks about what it means to be a mother (ESPN). 

• “Everyone can have a family. It could be woman with a woman, a man with a man, whatever the f---. Sorry for the F-word, but I want to show it. I want to go up to the cage with my daughter and my wife and show everyone that it's normal right now.”

• Louisville and NC State are the favorites, as they each make a late case for a No. 1 seed in the NCAA tournament.  

• Texas A&M won the regular season title. Can South Carolina get revenge? 

• Stanford won the regular-season title for the first time since 2014. Can they run it back in the conference tournament? 

• UConn begins play tomorrow. It’ll be a major upset if they don’t win the tournament. 

12 Takeaways From a Frenetic WNBA Free-Agency Period (Owen Pence, Winsidr) 

• How wonderful have the first two months of 2021 been for the growth of the league? Player movement begets chatter, and chatter brings new fans into the fold. I swear my eyes weren’t deceiving me when I saw the Natasha Howard sign-and-trade scroll by on an ESPN ticker. Multiple friends reached out to inquire about Candace Parker’s fit in Chicago. The momentum is palpable. 

Illusory Level Playing Fields: The Off-Pitch Battles Facing Women’s Soccer (Josie Cox, Forbes) 

• “If you make it to the top, you can do well for yourself. You can earn a seat at the table when it comes to determining your own career path. But for the rest it’s really very rough. The salaries are low, the women live like students. Many work part-time in coffee shops or bars to make extra money. Very few would tell you that they’re being treated fair.” 

C. Vivian Stringer Is the Thread Between the W.N.B.A.’s Emerging Stars (Howard Megdal, NYT)

• The Liberty’s Betnijah Laney and Erica Wheeler of the Los Angeles Sparks are coming into their own after winding paths with a key intersection: Stringer’s coaching at Rutgers.

• The Houston Dash have new kits, while the Seattle Storm have a new logo. 
• The WNBA draft will air in primetime on April 15 on ESPN. In years before, the draft has been for an hour on ESPN2. This year, it’s two hours on the main network. Boo-yah. 
• Billie Jean King’s upcoming memoir, All In, officially has a cover. 
• Katie Ledecky won her first race of the year (the 1500-meter freestyle) by 21 seconds on Wednesday… sheesh. 
• The women’s Rugby World Cup in England is set to be pushed back to next year due to COVID.

• Want to join the JWS team? Check out our Managing Editor job post here. 
• International Women’s Day is on Monday. You can celebrate by watching a star-studded webinar brought to you by Orreco. Register here.