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Message: [QUOTE="UConnCat, post: 2233625, member: 15"] How would what your suggestion prioritize the World Cup over the Olympics? Your suggestion -- adding guards to the World Cup and taking lumps to be better in 2 years -- would in fact prioritize winning at the Olympics, no? USA Basketball, at least on the women's side, treats the World Cup and Olympics equally even though the Olympics is obviously the more glamorous and publicized event and brings added pressure. That's why you rarely see the core, elite female players skip the World Cup (formerly World Championships) without a good reason. I don't believe Bird or Taurasi ever missed a World Championship and Catching missed one in 2014 because of injury. Having said that, I do think the World Cup is probably a better tournament to get a young guard or two acclimated to playing on that International stage. Team USA will add young guards for the 2018 World Cup because it's time, perhaps past time. Just one final thought on my earlier post, I think Sue Bird will play in 2018 if she's healthy and playing well and USA Basketball [I]asks[/I] her to play. That's what Sue said in the ESPN story that started this thread. I can see a scenario in which Dawn asks her to play for the reasons I stated in my previous post. The same could be true for Diana. [/QUOTE]