The surest bet at the 2024 Summer Olympics is a bet against Cheryl Reeve. She won’t win. She can’t win. Put your money down now. These circumstances aren’t completely her fault, though she probably could have done more to change them, to help herself avoid this odds-on outcome. And even in the best-case scenario for her and the U.S. women’s basketball team, she will be at the mercy of those circumstances.

These Games should be the crowning moment of what has already been a glorious life in the sport for Reeve. From her childhood in South Jersey to a terrific collegiate career at La Salle, from four WNBA championships as the head coach of the Minnesota Lynx to two Olympic gold medals as an assistant, she can’t match the first-name recognition of Dawn or Geno, but her resumé testifies that she’s every bit their equal. Now she’s in charge of a team that hasn’t lost an international game since 2006, that is 70-3 all-time in Olympic competition, and that in Paris should cruise to its eighth straight gold medal.

Without Caitlin Clark.

That’s Reeve’s problem. If the Americans win the tournament with ease, well, everyone knew they were going to win the tournament with ease, so why couldn’t Clark have joined them for the ride? If they struggle some and still get the gold medal, couldn’t Clark have helped? And if … God forbid … they lose … the schadenfreude from the pro-Clark partisans will be a hailstorm, on social media and everywhere else. The decision by USA Basketball’s national women’s committee to keep Clark off the roster has created this no-win situation for a coach who, for her part, doesn’t appear all that broken up about the absence of the world’s most popular basketball player.