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JWS Player of the Year: Amelia White, a game-changing soccer talent

Amelia White finished her senior season with 25 goals and 15 assists, leading Homestead to its first-ever state championship. (Photo provided)

There’s a moment from last fall that sticks with coach Rick Link the most when he reflects on Amelia White’s career at Homestead High School.

The Spartans were in the regional semifinals of Indiana’s Class 3A bracket, and their opponent was two-time defending state champion Noblesville, a program that hadn’t lost a match in over two and a half years. On top of that, Noblesville hadn’t allowed more than three goals in a game in over four years.

But with White on the pitch, this year was different.

In front of a jubilant home crowd, Homestead faced a 1-0 deficit before one touch to White changed everything.

“We touched the ball to her to kick it back off, and she dribbled straight to the goal past five of their defenders and scored within six seconds to tie it back up,” Link says. “She had a hat trick, plus she was tripped in the box. Another girl took the PK, and we won 4-2.

“I saw their coach later at the state voting that we do together down in Indianapolis. He said people were asking, ‘Well, why didn’t you do something different to stop her?’ And he goes, ‘There was nothing you could do to stop her.’ She’s flying by his best defenders, and that was the most dominating performance I’ve ever seen on the offensive end.”

White hasn’t slowed down since then.

Homestead went on to finish the season 22-0 and claim its first state championship in program history. White was named Miss Indiana by the Indiana Soccer Coaches Association and the Gatorade Indiana Girls Soccer Player of the Year, and now she can add one more accolade to the list — Just Women’s Sports High School Soccer Player of the Year.

After racking up 25 goals and 15 assists in her senior season, she’s headed to the Division I ranks to compete for Penn State.

While the future is certainly bright for White, her beginnings warrant their own story. It all began when she and her twin sister discovered their passion for soccer a little more than a decade ago.

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Amelia White, left, competes in a match for Fort Wayne United FC. (Photo provided)

Growing up in Fort Wayne, Amelia and Sophia both began playing soccer when they were 6 years old. Inspired by their older brother, they discovered their own love of the game and played on a recreational team, but it didn’t last very long.

“I would just score goals,” Amelia says. “Me and my sister would only pass to each other, so they actually kicked us off the rec team because we wouldn’t pass to anyone and we’d just score goals.”

Shortly thereafter, they joined Fort Wayne United FC and the journey started to get more serious. Amelia was about 13 years old when she began training with the boys, and by the time she was 14, she was playing with FWUFC’s oldest age group for girls.

It was around that time that Link watched Amelia play for the first time.

“I was just amazed,” Link says. “The ball sticks to her foot. Her speed with the ball, I mean, I’ve never seen anyone that fast with the ball at her foot. She’s racing past people, dribbling past people, and they don’t have the ball. And they can’t keep up.

“You could watch her play for five minutes and realize she’s a once-in-a-lifetime type of player.”

The experience of getting to share the pitch with her sister throughout the years is one that Amelia cherishes, but she admits it wasn’t easy to navigate the comparisons that always seemed to surface between the two. While Amelia was busy attending national team camps, Sophia was settling into her role as a stalwart defender and wasn’t drawing the same level of hype. It was hard on Sophia, but as time passed, they learned to handle it better.

“I think now it’s really good that we recognize we’re on different sides of the field,” Amelia says. “We both have different jobs. She’s really good at what she does, and I’m good at what I do. We’re pretty competitive still, but I think that helps us a lot.”

As freshmen, they made an immediate impact on Link’s squad. The Spartans advanced to the state championship game but lost to perennial powerhouse Carmel in a 2-1 decision.

Sophia went on to start at center back all four years at Homestead, but Amelia’s eyes were fixed on competing internationally. In 2019, Amelia was invited to play for the U.S. U-17 women’s national team at a friendly tournament in Sweden, and the obligation forced her to miss a large chunk of her sophomore season at Homestead.

Then, a year later, Amelia was upfront with her coach early on that she had planned to compete for the U.S. at the U-17 World Cup and would have to miss the season due to training in the fall. The World Cup was eventually canceled because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“It was pretty much the first time that I’d ever been away from home for a long amount of time at a pretty young age, but it was a really good experience and a really big learning experience, just going to other countries and learning about other cultures,” she says. “It was awesome. Trainings were super intense. It definitely helped me develop as a player, but it was mainly the stuff they would tell me and I took back home that really made a difference.”

From the moment it began, Amelia knew her senior season was going to be special. For one, it was an opportunity to get to take the field with her sister one more time. But beyond that, she had developed a unique bond with her entire team that made their cohesion as a unit that much stronger.

“Even though everyone was really close and best friends, we took the training pretty serious. I think that’s what made a difference. I love those girls,” Amelia says. “Once we did get to the tournament, we played at such a high level against older girls, so I think the seniors did a really good job of showing and leading how to deal with that.”

Link believes Amelia’s experience with the national team brought along an entirely new element to her game. She was much more focused on elevating the players around her, demonstrating a sense of maturity he’d yet to see from her.

“She set a lot of other girls up,” Link says. “She could’ve taken over every game we played. She took over at times if she needed to, but she really involved her teammates more her senior year and was just out there to have fun.”

Following the momentous win over Noblesville, Homestead went on to claim the region crown with a 2-0 victory over Harrison before Amelia was forced to miss the state semifinal match due to a training obligation with the national team. The Spartans escaped that game with a win over Saint Joseph, in which they tied 0-0 in regulation before advancing in penalty kicks.

A week later, Amelia was back on the pitch with her sister in the state final. She scored a goal and led the Spartans to a 2-1 win over Carmel, avenging their loss from three years prior and clinching the first state soccer title in school history.

“It didn’t even feel real,” Amelia says. “Coming off of hard games before, like the Noblesville game, we were already on a high, but we knew that was going to be a really tough game. Once the final whistle blew, it was just really surreal.”

Although she only played two full seasons at the high school level, Amelia finished her career at Homestead with 52 goals and 31 assists. She’s ranked as the No. 2 recruit in the Class of 2022 by Top Drawer Soccer, which earned her attention from a handful of Division I schools.

In November, Amelia and Sophia sat next to each other in front of family, friends, coaches and media as they each signed national letters of intent to continue their careers at the college level — Sophia with IUPUI and Amelia with Penn State.

Amelia chose the Nittany Lions over the likes of Georgetown, USC and Notre Dame, impressed by the relationship she’d built with head coach Erica Dambach.

“It’s very family-oriented, which I really liked to see when I was on my visit,” says Amelia, who currently plans to major in political science but is still undeclared. “The campus is also just gorgeous, and it was the only place where I really felt at home and secure. I could just envision myself being here, and I think that was the really big difference that separated Penn State from the other schools because I just didn’t really feel that when talking to other coaches or visiting campuses.

“Penn State is just such a big school. There’s so many degrees and opportunities to explore here, so I really enjoyed that, too.”

As she heads to the college level, Amelia is bound to run into competition unlike anything she’s seen before, and Link is fascinated by how her game will translate at the next level.

“She’s always been the best player on her team by far, even when she’s playing up. Obviously when she came in as a freshman in high school, she was playing against seniors, but she was used to that because she was always playing up in club level, too,” he says. “I think she’ll need to continue to work really hard because I think it’ll be the first time where there might be some girls who will be able to match her skills and speed, and that typically has not been the case.”

Amelia is already training with her teammates at Penn State and is enrolled in summer classes. She has goals of getting back in the mix with the national team and wants to make an impact right away at Penn State, but she understands her role while learning behind players like Ally Schlegel, who led the Nittany Lions with 10 goals last season.

Amelia credits her coaches at FWUFC as some of her greatest mentors over the years — people like Bobby Poursanidis and Claire Ward.

For Amelia, it always seems to come back to Fort Wayne, a town that has produced soccer stars like Sarah Killion, DaMarcus Beasley and Akil Amen-Diop Watts.

Amelia wants to be the next name on that list, and if her senior season at Homestead is any indication, she’s well on her way.

“It was just one of those years where things came together, and we didn’t have any serious injuries,” Link says. “We won in PKs twice in the tournament, so there’s obviously luck involved there.

“It doesn’t hurt to have players like Amelia and Sophia as well.”

Trent Singer is the High School Editor at Just Women’s Sports. Follow him on Twitter @trentsinger.

UEFA Draw Sets Champions League Quarterfinals

The UEFA Champions League trophy sits on display before the 2024/25 quarterfinals draw.
Eight teams' paths to May's Champions League final in Lisbon were determined in Friday's draw. (Kristian Skeie - UEFA/UEFA via Getty Images)

The 2024/25 Champions League quarterfinals are officially set, with UEFA drawing the remaining eight teams into the field early Friday morning.

The annual season-long competition pits Europe's top leagues against each other. This season, 72 clubs across 50 different leagues qualified for the contest. From the UK to Ukraine, all teams have been vying for the continent's top-dog status amidst a cutthroat atmosphere and a growing sense of parity in the sport.

Two qualifying rounds narrowed the initial teams down to the 16 contending in the tournament's official group stage. Each played six group-stage matches from October through December to determine the eight clubs that advanced to Friday's final draw.

A screen shows the 2024/25 UEFA Champions League quarterfinal pairings at Friday's draw.
Four previous champions made the 2024/25 Champions League quarterfinals. (Kristian Skeie - UEFA/UEFA via Getty Images)

The road to Champions League glory in Lisbon

All remaining clubs are now eyeing the May 24th final in Lisbon, Portugal, and Friday's draw mapped each team's path to that championship match. The 2024/25 quarterfinals will feature four former champions and four seeking a first-ever trophy, with both familiar fights and rarely tested toss-ups on deck.

Both the March quarterfinals and April semifinals employ a two-leg format, offering teams who suffer narrow first losses a shot at second-match redemption.

Friday's draw determined that WSL contenders Arsenal will kick off the tournament's quarterfinals against Real Madrid on March 18th, with Germany's Bayern Munich taking on France's 2024 UWCL runners-up Olympique Lyonnais shortly afterwards.

The following day, Bayern's Frauen-Bundesliga foes Wolfsburg will face Spain's 2024 UWCL champs FC Barcelona. Closing out the initial tilts is a WSL standoff between Manchester City and the UK league's undefeated titans Chelsea FC.

Lyon's Michele Kang, president of the winningest Champions League team in history, speaks to the media after Friday's UEFA draw.
Backed by club president Michele Kang, Lyon will seek its record ninth UWCL title this year. (Kristian Skeie - UEFA/UEFA via Getty Images)

Increased global parity to test UWCL dynasties

With eight of the tournament's 23 titles under their belts, Lyon is the winningest team in UWCL history. Meanwhile, current back-to-back champions Barcelona claimed three of the last four trophies.

Despite the recent two-team domination, capturing this season's title will be a challenge. Hoping to spoil Lyon's and Barcelona's dynastic runs is four first-time title-hunters, plus two-time winners Wolfsburg and early champion Arsenal — who won the trophy in 2007, when the tournament was called the UEFA Women's Cup.

All in all, the European crown has never been tougher to claim, with leagues across the continent increasingly stocking up on standout — and potentially game-changing — players from beyond their borders.

Portland Announces Joint NWSL x WNBA Training Center

A rendering of the outside of the proposed NWSL x WNBA performance complex in Portland.
The Portland facility will be the first shared WNBA-NWSL performance complex under the same ownership. (RAJ Sports/Populous)

Portland is going all in on women's sports, with RAJ Sports — the ownership group behind both the NWSL's Thorns and Portland's incoming WNBA team — announcing the development of a new $150 million sports performance complex on Thursday.

The 12-acre dual-sport performance center will be the first-ever facility housing both a pro women's soccer squad and a pro women's basketball team.

Innovation and amenities lead Portland design

At 63,000 square feet, the incoming NWSL x WNBA training facility will feature two basketball courts, two soccer pitches, a 17,000-square-foot practice gym, a state-of-the-art strength training facility, and a laundry list of additional top-of-the-line amenities.

According to the Thorns' announcement, the center aims to "[elevate] the standard of athletic development by integrating cutting-edge training, advanced recovery, and holistic wellness with lifestyle elements specific to the needs of female athletes in a collaborative multi-team setting."

The wellness additions include recovery lounges and pools, hyperbaric therapy, red-light therapy, and a yoga and pilates room, plus access to a full-time chef and nutritionist via the center's kitchen and dining hall.

"This kind of high-performance training facility allows us to elevate every part of our game, becoming better and more well-rounded athletes," said Thorns forward Sophia Wilson (née Smith).

"Having a space designed specifically for female athletes gives us yet another leg up on the competition and will be vital to our future successes."

A rendering of the basketball court in the proposed Portland performance complex.
The WNBA and NWSL performance complex adds Portland to a growing list of women's sports facilities. (RAJ Sports/Populous)

Portland joins other WNBA and NWSL teams building own facilities

Portland is just the latest in a wave of women's teams across top-tier US leagues breaking ground on dedicated performance facilities.

Earlier this week, WNBA newcomer Golden State unveiled their own custom-built Valkyries Performance Center. Last month, NWSL side Angel City cut the ribbon on their dedicated training facility.

RAJ Sports’ effort to continue the investment trend comes barely a year after their January 2024 purchase of the Thorns. That move was finalized a little over eight months before the WNBA accepted their expansion bid, making the Bhathal family — who also have a stake in the NBA's Sacramento Kings — the first-ever ownership group to oversee pro women's teams in two different sports.

Las Vegas Aces Revamp Roster with Offseason Moves

Las Vegas Aces standouts Sydney Colson and Tiffany Hayes race downcourt during a 2024 game.
Both Sydney Colson and Tiffany Hayes are departing Las Vegas this season. (David Becker/NBAE via Getty Images)

WNBA roster shakeups kept rolling this week, with a deluge of moves radically reshaping the 2022 and 2023 league champion Las Vegas Aces.

After three seasons in Las Vegas, backup guard and popular locker room presence Sydney Colson signed a one-year deal with Indiana on Thursday. The Fever, who've been aggressive about inking athletes they believe will bring a title back to Indianapolis, targeted Colson for her veteran experience.

"[Colson] brings a championship pedigree to the Fever, adding depth to our point guard position, said Fever COO and GM Amber Cox in the team's announcement. "We have the utmost confidence in her ability to step into any situation and deliver on both ends of the floor."

Joining Colson in leaving Las Vegas is forward Alysha Clark. A key factor in the Aces' 2023 title run — which ultimately earned her the WNBA's Sixth Woman of the Year award — Clark is returning to the Seattle Storm, where she played from 2012 to 2020.

The Aces are also losing their 2024 Sixth Woman of the Year, Tiffany Hayes. Despite the Aces protecting her in December's expansion draft, the free agent guard will take her talents to incoming franchise Golden State. There, she'll link up with former Las Vegas assistant coach-turned-Valkyries boss Natalie Nakase.

"Having coached Tiffany last season in Las Vegas, I know firsthand the impact she brings both on and off the court," Nakase noted. "Her versatility, intensity, and ability to score will be invaluable as we build our team's identity."

Atlanta's Cheyenne Parker-Tyus guards Las Vegas's A'ja Wilson during a 2024 WNBA game.
Cheyenne Parker-Tyus will join A'ja Wilson in the Aces' front court this season. (Rich von Biberstein/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)

Las Vegas Aces take aim at refreshed dynasty

After falling short of a three-peat championship last season — despite three-time WNBA MVP A'ja Wilson's outstanding 2024 performance — a significant Aces roster reshuffling was all but guaranteed ahead of the 2025 season.

Las Vegas kicked things off by shipping All-Star guard Kelsey Plum off to the LA Sparks last month. The blockbuster three-team trade sent Seattle's two-time champ Jewell Loyd to the Aces in return.

To shore up their front-court, Las Vegas inked 6-foot-4 power forward Cheyenne Parker-Tyus on Thursday. The 2023 All-Star averaged 15 points and 6.7 rebounds for Atlanta that season, and was on her way to matching that production last year when an ankle injury curbed her 2024 run.

Ultimately, Las Vegas's roller coaster offseason reflects both the WNBA's shifting landscape and the Aces' quest to revive their former dynasty, hoping a fresh start can fuel them all the way to another league title in 2025.

Tennessee Upsets NCAA Rival UConn in Vols’ First Top 10 Win

Tennessee basketball players Jewel Spear and Zee Spearman celebrate their 80-76 upset win over UConn.
Tennessee scored their first win over UConn since 2007. (Johnnie Izquierdo/Getty Images)

No. 19 Tennessee notched the first major win of their Kim Caldwell era on Thursday night, stifling No. 5 UConn 80-76 to capture their first Top 10 basketball victory of the season — and first win over the Huskies since 2007.

Bolstered by a 13-0 run in the third quarter, Tennessee out-rebounded UConn 46-34 to hold the Huskies at bay.

On defense, the Vols managed to limit UConn star and projected 2025 WNBA Draft No. 1 pick Paige Bueckers to just 5-of-16 from the field and 2-of-6 from beyond the arc.

"We had poise down the stretch. I think we played with confidence. I think we played to win, as opposed to afraid to lose," commented first-year Tennessee head coach Caldwell after the game.

Tennessee flips the historic rivalry script against UConn

Once one of the most heated historic rivalries in NCAA basketball, Tennessee and UConn met 22 times from 1995 to 2007. The Huskies took 13 victories over that stretch.

Since the teams rebooted their non-conference series in 2020, UConn has taken the win in all four meetings — until Tennessee halted the Huskies on Thursday.

A big upset win from the Vols has felt increasingly inevitable this season, as Tennessee has come wildly close to claiming multiple top-tier upsets. They fell to No. 4 Texas by just four points, No. 6 LSU by two points, and logged one-point losses against both No. 15 Oklahoma and No. 24 Vanderbilt.

Last week, the Vols lost to No. 2 South Carolina 70-63. Subsequently, Tennessee became just the second team to limit the reigning NCAA champs to a single-digit win this season.

Despite Tennessee’s recent rise, Thursday's result was a blow to UConn. The Huskies are now 21-3 in 2024/25 play, with all three losses coming against Top 10 teams. UConn likely has just one regular-season Top 10 matchup left by way of a February 16th clash with South Carolina.

"The bottom line is we have some players on our team that are supposed to be our best players and they've got to play better. That's all there is to it," said UConn head coach Geno Auriemma in response.

South Carolina's Bree Hall defends Texas guard Madison Booker during a 2024 NCAA basketball game.
Texas and South Carolina will meet in a Top-4 matchup on Sunday. (Sean Rayford/Getty Images)

How to watch top-ranked NCAA basketball this weekend

As tough as the SEC has been, there's little rest for the weary, with No. 19 Tennessee gearing up for a rematch with No. 6 LSU at 4 PM ET on Sunday. Live coverage will air on ESPN.

In Top 10 weekend action, No. 8 Ohio State will cap their West Coast trip against No. 7 USC at 9 PM ET on Saturday, live on Fox Sports.

Then on Sunday, No. 4 Texas will host No. 2 South Carolina at 2 PM ET, with ESPN broadcasting live.

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