Athletic has launched a sports debate series in which two writers analyze a particular topic, and in the soccer/basketball crossover edition, Meg Linehan and Chantelle Jennings will debate the roster composition decisions of the U.S. Women's National Basketball Team and the U.S. Women's Basketball Team.
The rosters for the U.S. Women's National Team and the U.S. Women's Basketball National Team for the Olympics have been finalized, but there are some pretty big gaps between them. The women's basketball team, selected by a six-person committee, will not call up any current or recent WNBA rookies as in past Olympic cycles, instead going for a slightly older age group. The team's youngest players are 26-year-old Sabrina Ionescu and Jackie Young, and the 12-player roster also includes 42-year-old Diana Taurasi, who will be playing in her sixth Olympic Games. Meanwhile, the U.S. Women's National Team roster, selected by coach Emma Hayes, took a different approach, leaving its most well-known veteran, 35-year-old Alex Morgan, playing in her fourth Olympic Games, off the 18-player roster (as well as the four named reserves), and featuring only four players with more than 100 caps.
The differences between these lists therefore raise the question: To review or not to review?
JenningsI know the player selection processes for these teams are completely separate, but I have to say I was pretty shocked to see that Alex Morgan wasn't on the U.S. Women's National Team roster, especially after the addition of Taurasi to the U.S. team. Or was it just that I wasn't aware of what was going on under Emma Hayes' leadership?
Linehan: The Alex Morgan controversy has been brewing for a while now, but there's some important context to understand why she was potentially left off the team (besides her NWSL run with the San Diego Wave, which Jeff and I have written about at length here). The Olympic field for the women's tournament is limited to 18 players, which is very strict. At the World Cup you can take 23 players (three goalies and 20 field players), but at the Olympics you're cut to two goalies and 16 field players. At the World Cup, teams definitely have room to bring in veterans for leadership and atmosphere. Not so here.
At the same time, Hayes made a big decision that we may not have seen from a previous head coach of the U.S. women's national team.
Today, I regret that I never had the opportunity to represent my country on the Olympic stage. This event will always be dear to my heart and I feel great pride every time I wear the emblem.
I look forward to cheering on this team in just under a month… pic.twitter.com/NAXmQnNN8B
— Alex Morgan (@alexmorgan13) June 26, 2024
Jennings: Yes, the big difference here is roster size. If Team USA's Olympic roster had been limited to eight players (which is the same mathematical ratio of field/court players to bench players in soccer), I don't see how Taurasi would have been on that team.
Side note: It's pretty surprising that the U.S. Women's National Team and Team USA take the same number of substitutes to the Olympics, despite the differences in how their coaches substitute players.
So the question is…how good is the recent past and Olympic past as an indicator of Olympic success? Morgan has six goals in the Olympics. No player on the USWNT team has scored more than one. We've seen her perform well before, but it didn't happen in 2024. But how do the past few months compare to the past decade?
LinehanIt seems like there must be some kind of complicated formula where Olympic history provides some insight into future accomplishments, but also into intangibles that are much harder to measure. And when it comes to Morgan, it's hard not to immediately think of the 2012 Olympic semifinal between the U.S. and Canada. Not only was it an instant classic (at least on the U.S. side), it's one of her most iconic matches. It's now a perfect example of the heart versus the head. The heart tells you that Morgan has to be on this roster, because she's proven herself at the highest level, knows everything there is to know about how this tournament works, and of course, will come up with something late in the game. But when the head considers recent form and the other forwards, it becomes harder to justify a selection based on those intangibles.
On the other hand, I've spoken to Olympians in a variety of sports, and they're all big proponents of using a big-name veteran to clinch the victory, so there must be something there, right?
Jennings: Ah, yes, the battle between the head and the heart. It's the basis for Olympic rosters and a great Netflix romantic comedy. We can't wait for this holiday classic, in which Vanessa Hudgens is a princess and prepares for her first roster announcement as director of a national team. (Netflix: Call me.)
anyway …
“There's definitely something about a veteran player who can provide a steady presence in tight situations, even if they haven't played extensively. I wasn't expecting much from Team USA's player rotation during the Olympic qualifiers in Belgium this February, when neither Chelsea Gray nor A'ja Wilson played, but I think it's fair to look at Taurasi's playing time in comparison to the other players. She started in the first game against Belgium but played less than 17 minutes. She didn't play in the second game against Nigeria and played about 12 and a half minutes against Senegal.
Most Olympic team coaching staffs don't use nine players evenly. Coach Cheryl Reeve will likely rotate six or seven players, with one or two more contributing. I don't know if Taurasi will necessarily be in that group, but if the team needs a clutch three or comeback shot, there's no player on the U.S. roster that a DT wouldn't be able to provide.
So here's the question: If the other 11 players on the U.S. team are willing to rely on Taurasi for late, potentially game-deciding shots, wouldn't the 18 players on the U.S. Women's National Team feel the same way about Morgan and a potential penalty shootout?
LinehanI think so! But they're not on the roster. It feels like another echo of the USWNT's ongoing issues balancing veteran talent with up-and-coming young players. (I say “young players” as an old millennial.) Do you think there are similar issues on the basketball side?
This year Ionescu competed in her first Olympic five-on-five tournament (Photo by Lance King/Getty Images)
JenningsMeg, as a fellow millennial oldie, I say gently: get off my lawn.
This is definitely one of the issues with Team USA's roster. One of the things about this record of seven gold medals is that each roster includes rookies. These players are usually (but not always) taking notes in their first Olympics, preparing to become the foundation for future Olympic rosters. The youngest players on the roster, Ionescu and Jackie Young, are hardly part of that group, even though they're playing in their first five-a-side Olympics. (Young won gold in 3×3 in Tokyo.)
Unless Team USA plans to move the 3×3 team to the Olympic Training Grounds for a future 5v5 roster, it's odd to see no young talent on this roster. I genuinely believed either Aaliyah Boston or Caitlin Clark would be on the Paris roster, but they're both with the US.
But let's get to the point, we put together a roster to try our best to win a championship, and Emma Hayes put together that team with 18 players?
Linehan: I'm going to cheat as hard as I can now. Yes and no.
JenningsIs that the Olympic spirit?
Linehan: Yes, I think she has put together as strong a roster as she could. It also feels like a natural consequence of what we have seen on the field since the 2023 World Cup loss. The reason I hesitate is that while the goal is still to win, Coach Hayes has indicated on multiple occasions that she has a bigger goal in mind beyond this tournament. She made it clear last week that she feels the young players are not growing up with enough experience in big tournaments. Whenever she is asked what color medal the team will bring home, she refuses to answer about the actual tournament results (and rightly so!). The players would love to win the Olympics, and it is certainly a possibility, but the status of the US Women's National Team as the default favorite is long gone.
The US women's national team hasn't had a newcomer get as much media attention as Clark, with the closest candidate being Jaydyn Shaw, who was added to the roster (and rightly so, from where I stand).
From my perspective, the US team still gets this “we better win, we're expected to win” vibe from the public, right? Should winning take precedence over development, or can you really have it all?
Jennings: The expectations are high, both internally and externally. Eight years in a row, to be exact. I joked with Reeve recently (and I wasn't even joking) that she's landed the only job in the world where total failure is to be second in the world. It's awful.
Honestly, this Olympic cycle has done both (even if it wasn't super obvious). This group gives Team USA an inside lane to the gold medal and sends a strong message about commitment to Team USA through the quad. I can't tell you how many times Jennifer Rizzotti, the team's selection chair, has talked about the importance of attending camps and saying “yes” when offers for camps and tournaments are extended to athletes.
Every player on the Team USA roster has attended camp regularly over the past few years (when healthy), and those who may have declined the invitation or participated less over the last four weeks won't forget that. Thanks to that subliminal message, the future looks bright for Team USA.
LinehanReturning to the question of “to reconsider or not to reconsider,” I will admit that I fully expected Morgan to make the U.S. Women's National Team roster based on team standards and the usual approach of a four-year cycle ending with the Olympics. Consider Brazil's other Olympic team. They bring in their now 38-year-old legend, Marta. But Marta made that decision easy for Brazil's technical staff. She appeared reinvigorated, scoring four goals, adding an assist and playing a key role in the midfield during the Orlando Pride's unbeaten start to the season.
This summer's games will be Malta's final Olympic Games. (Photo: William West, Getty Images)
The USWNT is also lacking in veterans — their most well-known player and the only one to have won a gold medal — but players like Crystal Dunn and Alyssa Naher can give the team the sense of stability it needs from a veteran. And that will be a major test for captain Lindsey Horan to see if she can stand on her own as the team's spiritual leader.
Jennings“Team USA made the choice (to test players), but I have to say the decision is a lot easier when you have seven positions on the bench in addition to the five positions on the court. This conversation would be very different if Team USA only had eight positions total. But that's not the case.”
I wouldn't be opposed to Taurasi being included, but I do wonder if the absence of the rookies will have an impact going forward. We'll start to see some answers in four weeks (and another four years for the next wave).
Linehan: We're really in the same boat when it comes to soccer. The Olympic squad is the first of many decisions heading into the World Cup in Brazil in 2027. Hayes would look like a genius if the U.S. Women's National Team wins gold, but the expectations on the soccer side seem different given that she only just took over the team. The long-standing dominance of both teams makes things even more complicated overall, but Team USA is in an even tougher spot this summer. This should be fun.
Jennings: Hey, sports?
(Illustration: Dan Goldfarb/ Athletic; Diana Taurasi and Alex Morgan Photos: Gregory Schamus/Getty, Sean M. Hafey/Getty)
