{"id":1042545,"date":"2026-09-04T08:46:22","date_gmt":"2026-09-04T08:46:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/1042545\/"},"modified":"2026-09-04T08:46:22","modified_gmt":"2026-09-04T08:46:22","slug":"duo-standing-7-foot-3-and-6-10-will-have-teams-looking-up-to-china-at-womens-fiba-world-cup","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/1042545\/","title":{"rendered":"Duo standing 7-foot-3 and 6-10 will have teams looking up to China at women’s FIBA World Cup"},"content":{"rendered":"

BERLIN (AP) \u2014 Opponents will be looking up to China during the women\u2019s FIBA World Cup, starting with the the United States.<\/p>\n

The Americans and everyone else will have to navigate around and over some of the tallest women on the planet: China\u2019s 19-year-old Zhang Ziyu stands 7-foot-3. The U.S. team is already familiar with 6-10 Han Xu<\/a> from her WNBA<\/a> games with the New York Liberty<\/a>.<\/p>\n

If not for a passport mishap, Zhang and Han would be joined by another center \u2014 6-7 Li Yueru, who plays with the WNBA’s Dallas Wings<\/a>. Li posted on social media Wednesday that her passport was lost in the mail and she won\u2019t be able to compete.<\/p>\n

China opens its campaign against the four-time defending champion in Berlin on Friday.<\/p>\n

Tournament will be Zhang\u2019s world debut<\/p>\n

Zhang wasn\u2019t playing when the U.S. beat China 83-61 in the 2022 World Cup final in Sydney for a fourth consecutive gold medal. She made her senior debut at the Women\u2019s Asia Cup last year and helped China capture the bronze, averaging 14.8 points and 5.5 rebounds in the tournament.<\/p>\n

Han praised her performance at that tournament and said she was ready to step onto the world stage.<\/p>\n

\u201cWorld Cup is a good moment for her, for the whole world to know her,\u201d Han told The Associated Press. \u201cI am so excited to play with her again.\u201d<\/p>\n

Both of Zhang\u2019s parents played basketball and it was her mother who encouraged her to take up the sport.<\/p>\n

As one of the oldest players in the Chinese roster at 26, Han takes on the responsibly of looking out for her younger teammates. She points out that Zhang is still \u201cvery young\u201d and just starting her career.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019s a little girl, you know, like the heart is soft,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

If Zhang plays on Friday \u2014 she missed China\u2019s pre-tournament warmup against France on Tuesday and wasn’t practicing during the brief time-slots open to media Wednesday and Thursday \u2014 her height alone will ensure she stands out against the tournament favorites.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019s good,\u201d Han said on Wednesday. \u201cShe just needs some rest … she has (a) big body and tall girl, and she needs some time to rest a little bit.\u201d <\/p>\n

On Thursday she said Zhang had practiced \u201ca little bit\u201d earlier before the media was allowed in.<\/p>\n

U.S. guard Sonia Citron<\/a>, also making her World Cup debut, says they\u2019ll be prepared either way.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think just try to make it difficult for her, you know, to guard her as a team,” Citron said. \u201cJust don\u2019t leave anybody on an island, but yeah, I think we\u2019ll prep everything and then be ready.\u201d<\/p>\n

China\u2019s ambitions for the World Cup<\/p>\n

Few expect China to go further than it did in 2022, with France and Australia expected to be most likely challengers for the U.S.. But Zhang’s introduction gives the Chinese an extra weapon they didn’t have four years ago.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the last World Cup, we played our best, but before we played, we never thought we would do so well, but we gave 100%,” Han said.. “I\u2019ll try to do the same or better and try to focus every single game. \u201cEspecially me, I just try to focus because there\u2019s so much noise around me.\u201d<\/p>\n

___ AP Basketball Writer Doug Feinberg contributed to this report. <\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

See AP\u2019s full WNBA coverage here<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BERLIN (AP) \u2014 Opponents will be looking up to China during the women\u2019s FIBA World Cup, starting with…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":999469,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[49],"tags":[2470,310573,1520,62,67,132,68,232,12860],"class_list":["post-1042545","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wnba","tag-dallas-wings","tag-han-xu","tag-new-york-liberty","tag-sports","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us","tag-wnba","tag-womens-national-basketball-association"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1042545","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1042545"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1042545\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/999469"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1042545"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1042545"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1042545"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}