Syracuse native Breanna Stewart’s on-court resume is so stacked, it’s hard even for basketball insiders to fully absorb it. The two-time WNBA champion and two-time Finals MVP has won arguably every prestigious championship and MVP honor available in her sport, from four national titles in a row at UConn to a EuroLeague Championship and MVP award in Russia to two Olympic gold medals, not to mention all of her WNBA accolades.

Breanna Stewart's resume is STACKED at age 27 🔥

- 2x WNBA Champion & Finals MVP
- 2018 WNBA MVP
- 2016 WNBA Rookie of the Year
- 2x Olympic Gold Medalist
- 4x NCAA Champion
- 4x NCAA Tourney MOP
- 3x NCAA National POY
- 2021 EuroLeague Champion & Final Four MVP
- 2019 Euro MVP pic.twitter.com/JzU757kXKY

— Bleacher Report (@BleacherReport) August 27, 2021

Given all she has accomplished, we can smile and nod when, in a recent interview for Just Women’s Sports, Stewart says, “I’m 27, so I’m getting a little old now.” It’s even more understandable given the fact she has a 4-month-old infant at home with wife and fellow pro baller Marta Xargay.

Despite feeling a bit beyond her years, Stewart has her sights set on more WNBA championships.

“To be able to say that I’ve won twice already in six years, and I didn’t play one season is kind of crazy,” she says. “I believe that I’m going to have more moments to win more rings, but I’m just making sure that I don’t lose sight of what I have done and then continue to want to do more.”

And she is well aware of the amount of work it will continue to take to win more rings.

“I think everybody has to have a little bit of crazy in them when they’re at this level, and a little bit of obsessiveness to want to work out, and want to be in the gym, and want to do things that nobody else would want to do,” Stewart says. “But that’s how you get to where you are.”

While she no doubt has “a little bit of crazy” when it comes to working on her personal game, Stewart has always had a sound, mature perspective of her place in the bigger picture. She cares deeply about the success of the women’s game as a whole and many other social causes.

Upon graduating from UConn, Stewart was awarded the ESPY for Best Female Athlete and used her 60-second acceptance speech, by far the biggest platform she’d ever been given, to call out the media for its lack of attention to the WNBA. There’s no doubt her popularity and unbelievable talent on the court have been significant factors in the growth the W has had in recent years. And she’s happy to acknowledge the improvements she’s seen since winning that ESPY in 2016.

“I think the women’s game is in a really great place right now. I think that we’re continuing to trend upward as far as what we’re doing, how we’re perceived by media, how we’re gaining attention,” she says. “Media outlet companies are getting behind women, it seems like, at a much faster rate than they were probably 5 to 10 years ago.”

She also likes what she sees in the next generation of players, specifically fellow UConn Husky Paige Bueckers, who was off to a strong encore to her historic National Player of the Year freshman season before injuring her knee and having surgery performed last week.

“Her future is super, super bright,” Stewart says of Bueckers. “She has so much potential. She’s already doing great things now, but she’s at the right place to want to continue to be the best because Coach Auriemma is not going to treat her any different than anybody else.”

While she sees much to be optimistic about, Stewart also knows there’s still a long way to go. A recent source of frustration for her has been the low-key fanfare for 2021 WNBA MVP Jonquel Jones, who’s clearly one of the best players on the planet but hasn’t been given the media attention that comes with it.

“She won MVP and I still don’t think she got the props or the flowers that she deserves. I think people need to realize that and appreciate her game for being 6-6, 6-7, able to shoot the 3, handle it, play in the post,” Stewart says of her versatile on-court adversary.

The fact that fans still can’t get a pre-printed Jonquel Jones jersey from the WNBA Store is just the latest example of long-standing frustration with the lack of quantity, variety and accessibility of WNBA merchandise, something the league is hoping to remedy with its new partnership with DICK’s Sporting Goods (on whose site Jones’ jersey was stocked and ready to ship at the time of writing).

Very true and very sad. Extremely detrimental to a growing league and generating fan excitement. https://t.co/sQT9myxahA

— Jonquel Jones (@jus242) December 9, 2021

“The fact that she won MVP, she deserves more than what she’s getting. That’s for sure,” says Stewart.

As a player who knows the value of fan engagement in helping to grow the game, Stewart is often at the forefront of enhancing that connection. She’s got her signature shoe with Puma coming out in 2022. Most recently, she’s teamed up with Brandon Steiner, CEO of CollectibleXchange, as a feature athlete for The Collective Marketplace, an online platform that sells memorabilia and merchandise for athletes exclusively in women’s sports.

In teaming up with The Collective Marketplace, Stewart has opened a whole new pathway for fans to connect with her. She has nearly 200 personally worn and autographed items available for sale on the site taken directly from her own closet.

“I think it’s a great way to engage with the fans,” Stewart says. “I had all of these sneakers and jerseys and practice things … You keep them all because they’re amazing. But now you’re able to have them be reachable and, I guess, accessible to fans. And fans are able to really have a different type of relationship than just a player-fan relationship.”

Sue Bird and Diana Taurasi have also joined The Collective Marketplace. Stewart says of Taurasi, her WNBA rival and USA Basketball teammate, “I’d much rather be on the court with D, playing with her than against her. She’s just a killer, super competitive, obviously can hit the 3 like no other. Her IQ is off the charts.”

Just like Taurasi did for many years, Stewart is contracted to play overseas in Russia this winter with a stacked UMMC Ekaterinburg team. But her participation in the 2021-22 EuroLeague season is up in the air as she’s currently recovering from a minor surgery that repaired and reinforced the left Achilles tendon she injured late in the WNBA season (not the same one she ruptured in 2019). The decision for her to miss the Storm’s final two regular season games and their playoff showdown against Taurasi and the Mercury all but guaranteed Seattle wouldn’t repeat as league champions after winning it all in 2020.

Heading into what’s expected to be a wild 2022 WNBA free agency period, Stewart is one of four former league MVPs who are unrestricted free agents this offseason: Jonquel Jones, Sylvia Fowles and Tina Charles are the other three. With Bird still undecided about returning and Jewell Loyd entering restricted free agency, there is a lot up in the air for Seattle this offseason. But it’s impossible to imagine a scenario where the Storm don’t fight tooth and nail to keep their franchise player, and without making an official announcement, Stewart revealed she’s not envisioning playing anywhere else next year.

“We’re just going to take it one step at a time, see where my leg is at. And if I can play [in Russia], then maybe I’ll play. If not, I’ll make sure I’m ready for the Storm season — or the WNBA season,” she says.

An unplanned WNBA offseason at home in the states could be a blessing for Stewart to fully rehab while venturing into parenthood with her wife and baby daughter. And while her offseason routine and off-court home life may be quite different this year, her laser focus to succeed on the court is as strong as ever.

“I think it’s just coming with the preparation, the understanding of what it takes to win and making sure that when I’m out on the court, I’m not wasting my time or anyone else’s,” Stewart says of sustaining her peak level of performance.

“I feel as a basketball player, your goal should always be winning. When you step on the court, you should always be focused on winning.”

(Editor’s note: The Collective Marketplace on Athlete Direct is a sponsor of Just Women’s Sports)

Tessa Nichols is a contributing writer at Just Women’s Sports.

After an illustrious career for both club and country, Gotham FC and U.S. Women’s National Team defender Kelley O’Hara announced today via Kelley on the Street that she will be retiring from professional soccer at the end of this year, making the 2024 NWSL season her last.

"I have always said I would play under two conditions: that I still love playing soccer, and if my body would let me do it the way I wanted to," O’Hara told Just Women’s Sports in the lead-up to her retirement announcement. "I realized a while back that I was always going to love it, so it was the physical piece that was going to be the deciding factor."

The 35-year-old will retire as a two-time World Cup champion, an Olympic gold medalist, and at least a two-time NWSL champion, depending on where Gotham finishes this season. Her legacy as a player is hard to fully encapsulate, and will forever run through some of the biggest snapshots in USWNT and NWSL history. 

In 2012, O’Hara played every minute of the USWNT’s Olympic gold medal run, after having recently converted into a defender. Her soaring goal off the bench in the 2015 World Cup semifinal is the stuff of legend. And her return from lingering injury to play in every knockout match of the national team’s 2019 World Cup win cemented a storybook international career. 

It was O’Hara who scored the overtime goal in 2021 to earn the Washington Spirit their first-ever NWSL championship, and O’Hara who returned to help see Gotham earn a title in 2023 after years spent in the trenches with the club’s previous iteration, Sky Blue. Her 15-year career spanned two professional women’s soccer leagues in the U.S. (she earned her first professional title in 2010 with WPS’s FC Gold Pride), as well as sweeping changes to the sport both on and off the pitch.

On the field, O’Hara has always been known for a motor that never quits, making the right flank her domain in attacking possession and defensive transition. In recent years, she’s also been celebrated for a competitive fire that raises the level of her teammates, whether she’s in the starting XI or supporting from the bench.

But injuries take a toll, a reality not always seen by the fans watching from home. "I've never taken anything for granted, and I feel like I've never coasted either," O’Hara said of her late-career success in the NWSL despite battling injuries. "I've always been like, 'I gotta put my best foot forward every single day I step on this field' — which is honestly probably half the reason why I'm having to retire now as opposed to getting a couple more years out of it. I've just grinded hard."

Recently, O’Hara has been sidelined at Gotham with ankle and knee injuries, and the situation motivated her to really prioritize listening to her body. "To get injured and come back, and get injured and come back, and just keep doing it, it really takes a toll on you.

"People don't see the doubt that's associated with injury,” she continued. "As athletes we feel a certain way, we perform a certain way, our body feels a certain way, we're very in tune with our bodies. And there's always so much doubt surrounding injury. It’s like, 'Can I feel the way I felt before?' The reality is sometimes you don't."

O’Hara didn’t arrive at the decision to move on from her playing career lightly. But once she began seriously considering making 2024 her final year during the last NWSL offseason, it felt right. "Once I was like, 'Alright, you know what, this will be my last year,' I have had a lot of peace with it," she said. "Truly the only thing I felt was gratitude for everything that my career has been, all the things I've been able to do and the people I've been able to do it with."

She said she’ll miss daily interactions with her teammates and all the amazing memories they’ve created, though she feels lucky to have formed relationships that go beyond sharing a locker room. "You're basically getting to hang out and just shoot the shit with your best friends every day," she reflected. "Which is so unheard of, and I just feel very lucky to do it for so long."

The Stanford graduate also mentioned that the NWSL’s suspension of regular season play in 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic made her realize how much playing allowed her the space to simply be creative every day. The tactical elements of soccer provided O’Hara an outlet for problem solving and made use of her naturally competitive edge.

She’s now gearing up to channel her on-field intensity into her post-playing career full time, which is a new chapter she’s excited to begin. "I don't know if the world's ready for it, like the fact that I'm not going to be putting all of my energy into football all the time," she said with a laugh. 

O’Hara said she would like to stay connected to the game in some fashion, whether it be as an owner, coach, or member of a front office. She’s also interested in the growing media space surrounding women’s sports, having provided on-camera analysis for broadcasters like CBS Sports in addition to starting a production company with her fiancée.

"I just feel like I have a lot of passions, and things that excite me," she says. "And I do want to stay as close as I can to the game, because I feel a responsibility — and I'm not sure in what capacity — to continue to grow it."

A sense of responsibility to grow the game has been a consistent refrain for the USWNT and NWSL players of O’Hara’s era, who ushered in a new age of equal pay for the national team and collectively bargained protections for those in the league. The landscape for new players looks different than it did 14 years ago, in large part due to this pivotal generation.

"I feel an immense sense of pride around that, because I don't know if any of us knew that was gonna happen," she said. "We kind of, as things unfolded, took the next step towards changing what women's football looks like in this country and around the world.

"I'm really grateful to have been part of this era with the players that I was [with], not backing down and pushing and knowing that was the right thing to do."

Whatever the future holds, O’Hara is going ahead full throttle. It’s a piece of advice she’d also give to the next generation of professionals looking to make their own impact.

"Whatever you do in life, do it because you love it, and the chips will fall in place," she said. "If you love something, you're willing to do what it takes. You're willing to make the sacrifices, you're willing to handle the roller coaster.

"To me, it's simple. Don't do it for any other reason but that, and I think you'll be alright."

The Phoenix Mercury center spoke with Robin Roberts about her 10-month incarceration, reflecting on her poor living conditions and shaky mental state ahead of her May 7th memoir.

"The mattress had a huge blood stain on it. I had no soap, no toilet paper," Griner told the ABC News anchor in last night’s 20/20 special. "That was the moment where I just felt less than a human." 

She also detailed some of her lowest moments during that time, saying with tears in her eyes that she went so far as to consider taking her own life on more than one occasion. However, the thought of Russian officials not releasing her body back to her family made her reconsider.

"I just didn't think I could get through what I needed to get through," said Griner.

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In February 2022, Griner was arrested and charged with drug possession and smuggling by a Russian court after Sheremetyevo International Airport police found vape cartridges containing hashish oil in her luggage. The cartridges were prescribed by Griner’s doctor for chronic pain back in Arizona, where medical marijuana is legal. In the interview, the two-time Olympic gold medalist said she had a "mental lapse" while packing, and never intended to bring the cannabis products with her when she returned to play for UMMC Ekaterinburg.

"It's just so easy to have a mental lapse," Griner said. "Granted, my mental lapse was on a more grand scale. But it doesn't take away from how that can happen." 

She was later sentenced to nine years behind bars after her Russian attorneys advised her to plead guilty the following July. Griner was then sent to a remote penal colony where she was forced to spend her days cutting cloth to make military uniforms. From there, it only got worse.

"Honestly, it just had to happen," she said when asked about her decision to cut off her signature long locks. "We had spiders above my bed making nests.

"My dreads started to freeze," she added. "They would just stay wet and cold and I was getting sick. You've gotta do what you've gotta do to survive."

Shortly after Griner’s initial arrest, the U.S. State Department classified her case as wrongfully detained, escalating its urgency within the government and calling even more attention to the situation. On December 8th, she was freed in a prisoner exchange negotiated by the Biden administration.

While she told Roberts she was "thrilled" when she got the news, she was also very upset about having to leave fellow wrongful detainee Paul Whelan behind. She also continues to carry guilt about her arrest, saying "At the end of the day, it's my fault. And I let everybody down."

Griner’s memoir, Coming Home, hits shelves on May 7th.

"Coming Home begins in a land where my roots developed and is the diary of my heartaches and regrets," Griner told ABC News in an exclusive statement. "But, ultimately, the book is also a story of how my family, my faith, and the support of millions who rallied for my rescue helped me endure a nightmare."

Longtime USWNT fixture Carli Lloyd took to Instagram Wednesday morning to announce that she’s pregnant with her first child. 

"Baby Hollins coming in October 2024!" she wrote. The caption framed a collaged image of baby clothes, an ultrasound photo, and syringes indicating what she described as a "rollercoaster" fertility journey.

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In a Women’s Health story published in tandem with Lloyd’s post, the Fox Sports analyst and correspondent opened up about her struggles with infertility and the lengthy IVF treatments she kept hidden from the public eye.

"Soccer taught me how to work hard, persevere, be resilient, and never give up. I would do whatever it took to prepare, and usually when I prepared, I got results," Lloyd told Women’s Health’s Amanda Lucci. "But I found out that I didn’t know much about this world. I was very naive to think that we wouldn’t have any issues getting pregnant. And so it began."

Lloyd went on to discuss her road to pregnancy in great detail, sharing the highs and lows of the process and expressing gratitude for the care and support her family and medical team provided along the way. She rounded out the piece with a nod toward others navigating the same challenges, encouraging people to share their own pregnancy journeys, painful as they may be.

"My story is currently a happy one, but I know there are other women who are facing challenges in their pregnancy journey. I see you and I understand your pain," she said. "My hope is that more and more women will speak up about this topic, because their stories helped me. I also wish for more resources, funding, and education around fertility treatments. There is much to be done, and I hope I can play a role in helping."

The 41-year-old New Jersey native retired from professional soccer in 2021, closing out her decorated career with 316 international appearances, the second-most in USWNT history, in addition to 134 international goals. A legend on the field, Lloyd walked away from the game with two World Cups, two Olympic gold medals, and two FIFA Player of the Year awards.

On Tuesday, FIFPRO announced the launch of Project ACL, a three-year research initiative designed to address a steep uptick in ACL injuries across women's professional football.

Project ACL is a joint venture between FIFPRO, England’s Professional Footballers’ Association (PFA), Nike, and Leeds Beckett University. While the central case study will focus on England’s top-flight Women's Super League, the findings will be distributed around the world.

ACL tears are between two- and six-times more likely to occur in women footballers than men, according to The Guardian. And with both domestic and international programming on the rise for the women’s game, we’ve seen some of the sport's biggest names moved to the season-ending injury list with ACL-related knocks.

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Soccer superstars like Vivianne Miedema, Beth Mead, Catarina Macario, Marta, and England captain Leah Williamson have all struggled with their ACLs in recent years, though all have since returned to the field. In January, Chelsea and Australia forward Sam Kerr was herself sidelined with the injury, kicking off a year of similar cases across women’s professional leagues. And just yesterday, the Spirit announced defender Anna Heilferty would miss the rest of the NWSL season with a torn ACL. The news comes less than two weeks after Bay FC captain Alex Loera went down with the same injury. 

Project ACL will closely study players in the WSL, monitoring travel, training, and recovery practices to look for trends that could be used to prevent the injury in the future. Availability of sports science and medical resources within individual clubs will be taken into account throughout the process.

ACL injuries in women's football have long outpaced the same injury in the men's game, but resources for specialized prevention and treatment still lag behind. Investment in achieving a deeper, more specialized understanding of the problem should hopefully alleviate the issue both on and off the field.