Feature: Li Meng chases basketball dream despite challenges

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Feature: Li Meng chases basketball dream despite challenges

2020-10-22 19:18 Last Updated At：19:19

China's women's basketball national team player Li Meng remains headfast in chasing her dream, despite facing several hurdles along the way.

The path to pursuing her basketball dream started from the age of five, despite her coaching labelling her as "too small". In her twenties, Li suffered anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) ruptures to both knees within six months.

But the 25-year-old Chinese international just kept it rolling towards her basketball dream.

"Because I love it," she told Xinhua in an exclusive interview.

Li was hailed for her sporting talent at a young age, and her parents wanted her to take up a sport, so they brought her to a swimming class when she was four years old.

After swimming for just one year, Li often suffered from painful ear ache, so her mother took her to see a doctor.

"Do not let your child swim again, as she may get otitis media due to her ear's constant exposure to water," the doctor said.

Her mother finally gave up hope of Li becoming a future swimming star. She heard about a basketball class from a friend, and decided that her daughter should give that a go.

"When the coach saw me, he immediately refused as I was only five years old then. From his viewpoint, such a young kid could not hone anything. But my mom persuaded the coach to give me a chance. As you see, I've persisted in playing basketball until now," Li recalled.

Li immediately fell in love with basketball. "At five years old, I never knew what it would bring me. But after I took it up and was involved in it, I found a passion for the game."

Li rose to fame at the FIBA U17 Women's Basketball World Cup in 2010. She averaged 15.4 points and 6.2 rebounds as China claimed the bronze medal. Her stellar performance earned her the Most Valuable Player (MVP) award at the competition.

"I was taking photos with teammates at the ceremony, and suddenly heard my name called and received the trophy. I didn't realize how important it was until my coaches informed me after I returned home."

Li began to look ahead to her professional career. But the darkest days of her basketball career arrived, when she ruptured the ACL in both knees in less than six months.

"When I was injured for the first time, I was not quite worried about it. But then I got injured again, I began to think about it seriously," Li revealed.

She told her mother she wanted to stop playing basketball and go to school.

But following her coaches' persuasion, Li decided to persist with her life-long dream.

Li made her professional debut in the 2012-13 Women's Chinese Basketball Association (WCBA) season.

"You can be successful in the youth leagues with good skills. But in the pro league, you have to know how to spur your teammates on with your character and strength."

China punched its ticket to the Tokyo Olympic Games this February, which carried more weight as China was already battling against the COVID-19 outbreak.

Li was the driving force in China's successful qualification campaign, and again won the MVP award.

"It is my dream (to play at the Olympics), and my responsibility to represent my country. It also boosted everyone's confidence during that special period," she noted.

Li believes the postponement of the Olympics will offer the team more preparation time, while calling for the team to maintain its training level and match fitness.

"Getting an Olympic spot is not our destination. We have to fully prepare for the Games. We have to review and see if there are some weaknesses, whether in mentality, condition or technique. Hopefully everyone can make some improvements before the Olympics," Li commented.

After missing out at the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, Li expressed her anticipation towards the Games in Tokyo.

"I will strive to win an Olympic medal. This is also the team's target," she said.

Due to her outstanding physical quality and all-around performance, Li is dubbed "LeBron Meng" in China, in reference to her idol and NBA megastar LeBron James.

"Mentally he (James) has a huge impact on me. He can step up anytime when the team needs him. I have a big gap from him, but I will spare no effort to get closer to him," Li said.

Li, who recently signed an agreement with world-renowned sports brand Nike, said it reflected the brand's recognition towards her, while pushing her to work harder in future training.

"Now more and more people are following women's basketball. We are also getting better to make more people realize our value," she commented.

"I'm on a road of challenging myself. I have a lot to improve on," said Li, who received a contract from Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA) side Minnesota Lynx last year, but decided not to go overseas to better prepare for her national duties.

"No matter in the national team or club, I always target the top of the podium," she added.

USA Basketball announces its men's team for the Paris Olympics

2024-04-17 23:56 Last Updated At：04-18 00:01

USA Basketball studied every men's basketball game it has played for about two decades and a clear trend eventually appeared. When the defense isn't good enough, the Americans tend to get themselves into trouble.

And the team for the Paris Olympics was built with that in mind.

LeBron James, Stephen Curry, Kevin Durant, Bam Adebayo, Devin Booker, Joel Embiid, Jayson Tatum, Anthony Davis, Jrue Holiday, Tyrese Haliburton, Anthony Edwards and Kawhi Leonard were formally announced as members of the U.S. Olympic team on Wednesday — a group with nearly 200,000 NBA points, 84 All-Star Game selections and 10 Olympic gold medals between them.

“You want obviously talented individuals, but you want players who can blend and can fit and can play certain roles that you need," USA Basketball managing director Grant Hill said Wednesday. “But I think defense was certainly a priority and having guys that were capable of locking down, guarding multiple sets within a possession.”

The thinking is simple: Scoring shouldn't be a problem, and if the defense does its job, the Americans — looking for a fifth consecutive Olympic gold medal — will be tough to beat.

The group has seven players with gold medals; Durant has three, James has two, while Adebayo, Booker, Holiday, Tatum and Booker each have one. Combined, the 12 players had averages of 24.2 points, 7.0 rebounds and 5.6 assists this season, shooting 39% from 3-point range.

“Obviously, it's a great honor to represent your country,” Adebayo said. “But for me, to be in that room as part of those 12 players, part of who they think are the 12 best players to represent the United States, it takes it to a different level.”

The amount of talent on the U.S. roster is staggering. Of the 12 selections, seven finished the season ranked among the NBA's top 15 scorers per game. James is the league's all-time scoring leader, Curry the all-time leader in 3-pointers, Haliburton won the assist-per-game title this season and 10 were All-Stars this season as well.

“The goal is to win the gold,” Hill said. “They know that.”

The timing of Wednesday's announcement coincided with the U.S. Olympic summit in New York and the window where the Americans were celebrating the start of a 100-day countdown to the opening ceremony in Paris. USA Basketball could have waited longer to announce but saw no point.

“There will be a lot of interest and a lot of people who will want to be along for this incredible journey we’re about to be on," Hill said. “So, if we know, why wait?”

The Americans remain ranked No. 1 in the world by FIBA even after failing to medal in the two most recent World Cups — finishing seventh at China in 2019 and fourth at Manila last summer.

They won gold at the Tokyo Games by topping France 87-82. A slew of other nations will expect to contend for gold in Paris — the host French, reigning World Cup champion Germany, Serbia and Canada among them — but the American roster has a depth of NBA stars that no other country can reach.

“Your hope is that they haven’t played together before," Canada's Kelly Olynyk said when told this weekend of the U.S. roster, “other than the 12 last All-Star games.”

Hill led the task of assembling the roster, a process that took about 18 months, and the plan all along was to put together the team well in advance of training camp starting at Las Vegas in early July. Players were given their jerseys in visits by Hill or other USA Basketball officials in recent days, or in some cases got them at practice with their team.

“The common theme, when we've lost, was our defense wasn't good enough," U.S. coach Steve Kerr said. "That doesn’t sound like anything earth-shattering. We feel like we are going to score points. We're going to have a lot of talent and we’re going to find a way to score. But the international game is more physical and we've addressed that.”

Durant has said since last year that he plans to play, which means he will pursue becoming the first men’s player in Olympic history with four basketball gold medals. He and Carmelo Anthony are the only men’s players with three Olympic golds; there are six women, all American, with at least four Olympic basketball golds. Sue Bird and Diana Taurasi each have five, while Teresa Edwards, Tamika Catchings, Sylvia Fowles and Lisa Leslie each won four.

James will seek a fourth medal, after winning bronze in 2004 and golds in 2008 and 2012. The other past gold medalists on the roster are Davis (2012), Adebayo (2020), Booker (2020), Tatum (2020) and Holiday (2020). The 2020 gold medals were won in 2021, since the COVID-19 pandemic forced a one-year delay of the Tokyo Games.

Curry will play in the Olympics for the first time, as will Leonard and Embiid — who chose to play for the U.S. last year after becoming an American citizen. The Cameroon-born center also could have chosen to represent France at the Paris Games.

The other first-time Olympians on the current roster are Haliburton and Edwards, both of whom played for the U.S. team that finished fourth at the World Cup in Manila last year.

“I definitely wanted this experience,” Curry said. “I think the timing is just right."

There were more than 40 players under consideration for this team. Getting the roster to 12 was far from easy.

“I think everybody understands that these Olympics are going to be maybe the most anticipated, given that it’s Paris, in terms of players wanting to go, players' wives wanting to go, everybody wanting to go,” Kerr said. "It made for some really difficult decisions for us, for sure.”

Durant and Curry said in October that they wanted to play this summer, Adebayo said then that he had already committed to the team, and it’s been assumed for some time that if players like James want to play, then all they have to do is say so.

The U.S. men have competed in basketball at the Olympics 19 times, winning 19 medals — 16 gold, one silver and two bronze.

The Paris team will be coached by Kerr, assisted by Erik Spoelstra, Tyronn Lue and Mark Few. It’s still possible that the roster changes before the summer, if injuries or deep runs in the NBA playoffs force players to change their minds about committing to the national team.

“We have a contingency plan," Hill said, "and we have that at every position.”

AP Summer Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/2024-paris-olympic-games