Stankovich Championship (China)- Go China, Go!

Without NBA games to watch in this hot summer, CCTV 5 seems to provide what I want to see. This Stankovich thing is big these days with basketball champions coming from each continent. The Chinese national team has, by far, outplayed itself and I was absolutely thrilled to see a tougher team. Everyone is much involved on both ends of the floor. Everyone helps to do a bit both offensively and defensively. Yi Jianlian is a rising star (of course he doesn't have the calibre of Yao Ming) and he seems to be comfortable with those midrange jumpers and his job down low. Is he an NBA material? Let's wait and see. He definitely needs to tone up his muscles.

With Yao Ming, Li Nan and Du Feng on the injured list, we are lucky to witness the growth of some younger players (I am so happy that we have a point guard of 2.04 meters (somewhere between 6-foot-9 or a 7-footer) and they could be the hope of the future, say, 2008 Beijing Olympics. While the football teams are still jerking off by match-fixing, the national basket team make us still want to believe in something and there is still something worth watching anyway.

As I am writing, the game finished on a very negative note. Yi Jianlian was fouled hard by this Puerto Rican player when they were battling for position in the low post. Yi Jianlian walked up to him and the push-and-shove began. It is ugly to watch and I just couldn't help laughing when CCTV 5 simply cut off the signals the moment the fight started. I guess maybe these Puerto Ricans were not happy about the officiating (China is the host country and all that) and they were behind and trying to catch up. They got a bit angry and started those really unnecessary defensive tricks. I give Yi Jianlian a big thumb up- we, as a people, should be tough and let the world know we are not cheeseballs.

The fighting scene: (Courtesy of Sohu.com)