CARY, N.C. -- World Cup qualifying remains a riddle for the United States, the most meaningful games the national team has played in two years but simultaneously little more than formality.
Unlike European qualifying, competitive enough that one of the two most recent Euro finalists is guaranteed to miss the World Cup, it is all but impossible for the world's top-ranked team to fail in the CONCACAF Women's Championship. A region with just three teams ranked among the top 30 in the world is guaranteed three bids to the big tournament in France next summer, and even fourth place over the next two weeks comes with a comfortable playoff parachute.
All of that and for the fourth time in the past five World Cup cycles, the United States will host all of the games by which it can qualify, too much of the confederation still ill-equipped for the task.
It leaves American players, 10 of whom are taking part in this process for the first time, to try to create a bubble in which games against Mexico, Panama and Trinidad and Tobago mean more than earlier encounters with the likes of Australia, Brazil, England and Germany.
"I think everyone [else] talks about France next summer, but we have this understanding that we have to qualify first," said World Cup qualifying first-timer Samantha Mewis. "And I think, in a sense, the past two years have all been leading to this. It's definitely very professional in camp right now, it's very businesslike."
For the rest of us, qualification is only part of the story for the next two weeks.
How big a challenge is the opening game?
One of these years Mexico will be a threat for reasons better than just memories of a 2-1 win in Cancun in 2010. That stunner still the only American loss in 28 World Cup qualifying games. But for now, that history is still the strongest case for the U.S. women losing any sleep about their opener Thursday (7:30 p.m. ET).
Mexico, 24th in the world rankings, has lingered on the periphery of relevance seemingly forever. It never enters the top 20 or exits the top 30. Fair or not to associate it with him, that consistency without obvious ambition or support defined the program's nearly two decades under Leo Cuellar.
But now there is a nascent pro league and a new national team coach in Roberto Medina. And in two friendlies against the U.S. women this spring, Mexico at least looked aggressive, albeit the three goals it produced more than offset by the 10 it conceded.
"I think they've continued to grow and progress," U.S. forward Tobin Heath said of a decade facing Mexico. "Every time you play them, you don't know what you're going to face. I think before it was kind of clear, but now they attack, they play. It's a different type of opponent, and I don't think we necessarily know what we're going to face in this game."
If Mexico needs to catch lightning in a bottle to get a result, there is at least now evidence of a spark around the program. That said, given the goals Mexico conceded to the United States and a more recent 4-0 loss against France, there are some fires in the back that need dousing first.
This is the trickiest opening group game the U.S. women have faced. That is still relative.
Is the United States ready for CONCACAF (and the world) defensively?
Heath, Alex Morgan, Mallory Pugh and Megan Rapinoe have combined for 23 goals and 18 assists in 2018. Other than keeping them on the field -- Heath and Pugh missed extended time with injuries -- there aren't many questions about where the goals come from on this team. There isn't a better front line in the world at the moment, no matter which trio starts.
The likely back line for United States-Mexico, on the other hand, will see Becky Sauerbrunn and Abby Dahlkemper flanked by Crystal Dunn at left back and Kelley O'Hara at right back. Those four players have started together as a back line exactly zero times in 2018 (that would change to a grand total of one start together if Emily Sonnett replaced O'Hara).
An area that has been in flux all year, and really for two years since the Olympics, is only more muddled in the wake of the ankle injury that will keep Tierna Davidson out for 10 to 12 weeks.
"It's really about the players getting comfortable in the positions that they're asked to play," Sauerbrunn said. "Everyone understands that whether you're in the middle or the outside, there are certain requirements of that position. Everyone understanding the job requirements, it makes it a little bit easier then to work from that and find some cohesion.
"Chemistry is important, but obviously we haven't had the same back line in games consistently. So a lot of it is just making sure you know your role, so when you're on the field everyone can kind of guess and know where that other person is going."
This isn't exactly unprecedented. Ellis didn't repeat a back line in World Cup qualifying in 2014 until the final game, and the collection of defenders in that tournament didn't include Julie Ertz, who wound up starting every game at center back in the World Cup that followed.
Is this Rose Lavelle's moment?
In explaining her decision to leave Lynn Williams off the qualifying roster, Ellis talked about the difference in style of play between the NWSL and the international game, which often features opponents intent on slowing down the game and the opponent. You might remember Hope Solo also had some thoughts on the general subject after Sweden packed numbers in the Olympics.
Lavelle might be at her most entertaining when games get stretched and she's free to roam vast tracts of land in the opponent's end. But she might prove to be at her most valuable -- if Ellis is right about the 23-year-old with just 13 caps -- when there is barely enough space to work.
Mexico might opt to attack, but the U.S. women are likely to face a steady diet of defensive-minded tactics in group play. Unlike the wide-open games in the Tournament of Nations, the Americans are going to have to pick that apart inch by inch. Comfort with the ball in tight spaces, the ability to find the pocket between defense lines, to receive the ball and turn and probe is the skill set that made Ellis so willing to wait out Lavelle's injuries since the 2017 SheBelieves Cup.
That's the piece that frees Lindsey Horan to play a box-to-box role and balances the midfield that also includes Ertz. Lavelle's health woes cost her important developmental minutes against a loaded U.S. schedule the past two years, but the particular challenge posed by CONCACAF might be as valuable and revealing in the long run.
Will the U.S. control the final half-hour?
This part of the game matters a great deal to Ellis. The U.S. women would hope to have their games settled within an hour, certainly in the group stage. But if they don't (and remember the 1-0 win against Trinidad and Tobago four years ago in which the winner didn't come until nearly the hour mark), the Americans can turn to a bench that they believe remains the envy of the world.
Start with the odd forward out, with Heath, Pugh and Rapinoe available at the same time for the first time this year. Any one of the three could demoralize an already fatigued defender.
It's premature to say Carli Lloyd is forevermore an option off the bench. She has more than earned the benefit of the doubt that if she says there is a chapter still to be written as a starter, we had best leave that door open. But accepting that her most likely role at this moment is coming in for the final 30 minutes as the No. 9, Lloyd has the potential to be every bit the game changer in that role that Abby Wambach was in 2015 -- and probably even more.
Lloyd has shown time and again in recent months that she needs little time to get her footing in games, missing out on what seems like half a dozen second-half goals by a foot here or there.
That leaves Mewis and Morgan Brian, each still very much in the starting picture in midfield, Christen Press and even Dunn, shifting forward late in games to an attacking role.
Ellis doesn't want to have the best 11; she wants to have the best 14, a depth able to keep the U.S. women pushing forward, pressing and attacking long past the endurance of opponents. A tournament setting with a lot of defensive-minded opponents is an ideal testing ground.