The Orlando Pride have signed Maltese star Haley Bugeja through 2023, the NWSL club announced Friday.

Bugeja joins Orlando from US Sassuolo of Italy’s Serie A, where she finished the 2021-22 season with three goals and two assists after battling injury. The 18-year-old made her professional debut with the club in 2020, contributing a team-leading 12 goals and one assist as a rookie.

The newest resident of the City Beautiful 🔥#PrideOfOrlando pic.twitter.com/y3nzswYozl

— Orlando Pride (@ORLPride) July 1, 2022

Buugeja has attracted a considerable amount of buzz at a young age, named No. 3 in GOAL.com’s “NXGN 2022: The 20 best wonderkids in women’s football” and No. 15 in “ESPN’s 21 Best Women Players 21 or Under.” She was also identified as one of UEFA’s top 10 women’s players to watch.

“Haley is one of the brightest young talents in the world and we are absolutely thrilled to have her join our Club. She has already shown her quality at a high level in Italy and at the international level with Malta, and she is still just scratching the surface of the player that she can become,” said Pride general manager Ian Fleming. “She is a constant threat to opposing defenses and will be a valuable addition to our group, both in the immediate and moving into the future, as we continue to build and bolster our roster. We are all very excited to see her in Orlando, as a member of our Pride, very soon.”

The acquisition comes after the Pride traded star forward Sydney Leroux to Angel City FC this week, capping a series of marquee exits from the team and prompting a response from the club’s main supporters group. In the Leroux deal, Orlando picked up ACFC’s 2024 natural first-round draft pick in another effort to stockpile young talent for the future.

Bugeja will join the Pride pending the receipt of a P-1 visa and International Transfer Certificate.

With the 2025 WNBA season looming, teams have been adding preseason competitions to their upcoming training schedules, offering fans and players alike an early taste of both new squads and revamped rosters.

For those excited about the Golden State Valkyries, preseason will offer a first glimpse of the expansion team in action, with the franchise set to face the LA Sparks and Phoenix Mercury prior to their official WNBA debut.

WNBA returns to school for international exhibitions

Like the Valkyries, most teams will supplement their preseason camps with exhibition games against fellow WNBA squads. Two, however, have booked road tilts against the Brazil national team into their 2025 season prep.

Both Indiana and Chicago are strategically tapping into markets connected to their biggest stars, with the Fever traveling to Caitlin Clark’s alma mater, Iowa, for their May 4th bout with Brazil.

Two days earlier, the international visitors will contend with the Sky at LSU — the collegiate stomping grounds of Chicago star Angel Reese.

Adding even more flavor to the Sky's matchup is Kamila Cardoso. The Chicago center is also a rising star for Brazil, meaning the May 2nd tilt will pit her against her national squad teammates.

This wave of exhibitions at NCAA sites comes on the heels of last year's preseason success, which saw Las Vegas defeat Puerto Rico at Aces superstar A'ja Wilson's college home of South Carolina.

While Unrivaled and NCAA tournaments will keep women’s basketball in the spotlight, the WNBA’s 29th season is fast approaching — and teams appear eager to flex their refreshed rosters well ahead of the league's May 16th opening day.

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Sun deny Mabrey's trade request

One WNBA player who is likely not overly excited to report for training camp on April 27th is guard Marina Mabrey, who asked for a trade from the Connecticut Sun on February 5th. On Tuesday, team president Jennifer Rizzotti told Sportico that the Sun have denied Mabrey’s request.

Mabrey started the 2024 season with Chicago — a team she joined in February 2023 as a restricted free agent from Dallas — before landing in Connecticut last July after filing a midseason trade request.

"We knew at the time that she had already forced her way out of two teams, so it was a bit risky for us to trade for her," said Rizzotti, reflecting on her decision to roster Mabrey despite her trade-request track record. "But we felt like it was worth it."

In this instance, however, Mabrey asked to exit a Sun team that is wildly different from the 2024 WNBA semifinalist squad she joined last July. Head coach Stephanie White left to join the Fever after the 2024 season wrapped, and this offseason has seen Connecticut offload their entire starting playoff roster — including Alyssa Thomas, DiJonai Carrington, DeWanna Bonner, and Brionna Jones — via trades and free agency losses.

"The coach parted ways. No free agents returned and they are doing all they can to try and force Marina to stay when she clearly doesn't want to be there. It's interesting," Mabrey’s agent told ESPN.

As for the Sun, they're hoping to see Mabrey succeed alongside newly added Connecticut players like Tina Charles, Natasha Cloud, and Diamond DeShields.

"The reasons that we have for not trading Marina are rooted in positivity," Rizzotti explained. "It's rooted in a desire to build around her, have her here, have her be the catalyst for what we want to do offensively."

The NWSL dropped its updated 2025 Competition Manual on Tuesday, with the most significant changes impacting the upcoming season’s finances.

Each 22- to 26-player team’s salary cap has increased 20% from $2.75 million in 2024 to $3.3 million for the 2025 season. This does not include the league’s new revenue sharing system, which offers additional benefits to ultimately bring each club's total maximum roster spend to $3.5 million.

Salary cap exceptions will aid NWSL club accounts

With the newly negotiated CBA eliminating the waiver wire and trade windows as well as allowing all out-of-contract players to negotiate as free agents, teams can further supplement their salary cap with any remaining allocation money.

Additionally, to address absences due to injuries, mental health, parental leave, or national team call-ups, clubs can sign athletes to short-term roster relief or salary cap exempt contracts. So long as those deals extend no further than the end of the calendar year, teams will not have to account for those roster additions in their salary cap.

Bonuses will count toward a club's cap, though some will be delayed to a subsequent season.

Individual player performance bonuses will count toward the following season’s cap, regardless of whether or not the team retains that player. On the other hand, one-time boosts like signing bonuses are applicable to a club's current season salary cap.

Official tournament prize money as well as postseason and award bonuses funded directly by the NWSL will not count toward a team's salary cap.

Per the aforementioned new CBA, league-wide caps will continue to grow year-over-year to at least $5.1 million by 2030, with minimum base salaries rising from $48,500 in 2025 to $82,500 over that same timeframe.

In a global economy where record transfer fees and other benefits are luring top contenders away from the NWSL, salary caps will continue to constrain certain elements of the way US clubs do business — but the positive long-term changes ushered in by the NWSL CBA are sure to make their mark far beyond this offseason.

Welcome to another episode of Sports Are Fun! presented by TurboTax.

A new episode of Sports Are Fun! dropped today, with soccer icon Kelley O'Hara, sports journalist Greydy Diaz, retired NWSL great Merritt Mathias, and JWS intern BJ professing their hottest takes all things women's sports — joined this week by current WNBA star and former UConn legend Stefanie Dolson.

But first, the lineup takes a good look at USWNT coach Emma Hayes's 2025 SheBelieves Cup roster.

"I think this is an interesting point in time for this team and Emma as a coach," says O'Hara. "She is now having to make decisions and choose to leave people off that she's had consistently since she's been there for the purpose of trying younger talent, newer talent, uncapped talent."

"My only pushback to you is that in the past, when younger talent has been brought in the expectation is that you don't see significant minutes or opportunity within games," answers Mathais. "I think that's a massive shift, like performing or having runs within the NWSL does now get you an opportunity to see if your ability and your talent transfers to a level that is higher."

"And if you are going to start having this conversation and see what depth you have, what pipeline you have, whether you like it or you don't like it, this roster seems to be very aligned within this runway you have leading up to the World Cup," she adds.

In addition to chatting with Dolson about all things basketball, the Sports Are Fun! squad also tackles iconic walk-out songs, the week's wild NCAA upsets, how to avoid tanking your checking account, and so much more.

Stef Dolson invites 'Sports Are Fun!' into UConn's playbook

Later, guest star Stefanie Dolson joins the part to talk about college basketball, the WNBA, and Unrivaled — starting with a look at her alma mater UConn and their up-and-down NCAA season so far.

Diaz kicks the interview off with a question: "As a former multi-champion, do you think this UConn team with Azzi [Fudd], with Paige Bueckers, and their supporting cast, do you think they have what it takes to win it all?"

"They needed a big win," Dolson says of UConn's upset victory over top contenders South Carolina on Sunday. "I think a game like this was really important for them to kind of build that confidence. And I know that they've had a lot of tough games — when they played USC, that was a huge game for them although they didn't come out on top, it just showed how tough they are."

"I'm always gonna put my money on UConn. If you're a Husky, you're a Husky for life," Dolson continues. "I would never count them out, but there are a lot of really, really good teams — UCLA, USC, Texas — a lot of really, really great teams so I think it's going to be a fun tournament.

Dolson then looks back on her time at UConn, sharing an insider's perspective on how legendary head coach Geno Auriemma ran things.

"We had a lot of different rules in terms of teams and how we wanted to play," she remembers with a laugh. "And even if we won by 40, if we didn't play well, Geno was making us run."

About 'Sports Are Fun!' with Kelley O'Hara

'Sports Are Fun!' is a show that’ll remind you why you fell in love with women's sports in the first place. Join World Cup champ, Olympic gold medalist, and aspiring barista Kelley O'Hara as she sits down with sports journalist Greydy Diaz and a revolving cast of co-hosts and friends. Together, they're talking the biggest, funnest, and most need-to-know stories in the world of women’s sports.

From on-court drama to off-field shenanigans, to candid (and silly) chats with the most important personalities in the space, this show screams "Sports Are Fun!"

Subscribe to Just Women's Sports on YouTube to never miss an episode.

Several women’s basketball greats earned nominations to the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame on Friday, with Maya Moore, Sue Bird, and Sylvia Fowles among the Class of 2025’s 17 finalists for first-ballot induction.

After leading UConn to back-to-back undefeated NCAA seasons en route to the 2009 and 2010 national titles, Moore won four WNBA championships across seven seasons with the Minnesota Lynx. The 2014 WNBA MVP and six-time league All-Star also earned a pair of Olympic gold medals in 2012 and 2016 before exiting the game to pursue criminal justice reform in 2018.

Fellow Husky alum Bird also won two NCAA titles at UConn before picking up five Olympic gold medals with Team USA and four WNBA championships in her 21-season career with the Seattle Storm. Despite retiring in 2022, Bird remains the WNBA's career assists leader with 3,234 dimes, and her 13 All-Star nods still sets the league record.

Before joining Moore in leading the Lynx to WNBA championships in 2015 and 2017 — and earning Finals MVP awards during both runs — Fowles helped her alma mater LSU to four straight Final Four appearances. Her 14-year pro career included four Olympic golds, eight All-Star nods, four Defensive Player of the Year awards, plus the 2017 WNBA MVP trophy. When Fowles exited the sport in 2022, she did so as the WNBA's career rebounds leader, with a total of 4,006 boards.

Also on the 2025 Naismith ballot is Stanford standout and 1996 Olympic gold medalist Jennifer Azzi, who spent five years in the WNBA before retiring from play in 2004. Azzi now serves as the chief business development officer for the Las Vegas Aces.

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Naismith committee to decide Hall of Fame class

A 24-member Honors Committee will assess all 17 finalists. Those who garner at least 18 committee votes will earn admittance into the Hall of Fame.

The Class of 2025 will be announced in during the NCAA men’s Final Four in San Antonio, Texas, on Saturday, April 5th, with an official enshrinement ceremony to follow at a later date.