EDMONTON—The demands are great, the rewards could be memorable and if Nirra Fields has to give up a few hours of idle time, it’s all going to be worth it.

The 21-year-old from Montreal is striking a delicate balance between obligations to her future and to her current team at the FIBA Americas Olympic qualification tournament here.

As if playing for Canada’s senior women’s team here isn’t enough to keep her busy, Fields, a backup guard, is balancing her online courses as a UCLA student.

It makes for days that start around 6 a.m. with an hour or so in front of computer screen doing schoolwork, followed by a shootaround, another couple of hours in cyber class, and then back to the gym for a game as Canada chases a berth in the 2016 Rio Olympics.

“Honestly, that’s been like the story of my life: Time management,” the five-foot-nine Fields said here this week. “It’s so hard to motivate myself, especially getting up in the morning . . . I just have to be disciplined and do my work.

“I really had no choice but to do it. I just got good at it and I get a lot of help from people at school who help me schedule out my whole entire year with what I need to do in terms of basketball and getting all my assignments done.”

The payoff could be tremendous, both athletically and educationally, for Fields, who will be playing her senior season for the Bruins starting this fall.

The film-TV course she is taking — and one she worked on during the Pan Am Games last month in Toronto — should give her a leg up on a possible career in movie production or screenwriting.

The basketball benefits are tremendous; she is competing against women vastly more experienced and that can only help with her college career.

“Just playing against bigger, older, more experienced players really helps,” she said. ”I go back to the college setting and they’re not as smart, they’re not as skilled, so I can take advantage of that because I’ve played against people who are more skilled and more experienced.”

Fields averaged 15 points, 5.4 rebounds and about 32 minutes per game as a junior starter for the Bruins last season. She’s been a consistent starter at UCLA for two seasons and is more than comfortable in a different role with Canada, where she is providing an offensive spark in her second season with the senior team.

“The starting the five is always going to be scouted well and they’re really good players and I can come in and try to give them an energy boost if we’re down or just come in and get some key stops,” she said.

“I’ve really embraced that and it’ll help me going back to UCLA, where my role is different and I’m expanding it as well.”