Baia Mare Women

Eliza Buceschi is the name that comes up first when the conversation turns to Baia Mare handball. Two seasons later the same squad reached the quarter-finals of the EHF Champions League, and by 2020–21, playing under a different structure, it stood on the podium of the Women's EHF European League with a third-place finish.

That different structure came about because the original club, HCM Baia Mare, ran into financial trouble, and the municipality started over in 2015 under the name CS Minaur Baia Mare, folding the women's handball section into the new multi-sport body. The rebuilt team had to climb back from the second division, where it played in 2016, before returning to the Liga Națională in 2018.

Games against CSM București carry more weight than the rest of the calendar; Romanian handball calls the fixture the derby of the championship, and the table tends to go out of the window whenever the two meet. The current squad has drawn players from well beyond Romania, including Bárbara Arenhart, Camilla Herrem, Allison Pineau and Lois Abbingh.