{"id":483078,"date":"2026-02-16T05:57:11","date_gmt":"2026-02-16T05:57:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/483078\/"},"modified":"2026-02-16T05:57:11","modified_gmt":"2026-02-16T05:57:11","slug":"meet-the-chinese-teenager-already-being-compared-to-nba-star-victor-wembanyama","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/483078\/","title":{"rendered":"Meet the Chinese teenager already being compared to NBA star Victor Wembanyama"},"content":{"rendered":"<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">China has unearthed another towering teenage basketball player who can dunk with her feet barely leaving the ground and is being compared to NBA star Victor Wembanyama.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">At 14 years old, Cao Xichen is reportedly already 7ft 2in (2.20 metres) tall, a height that has forced her to give up volleyball, although that could be her new sport\u2019s gain.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">While commentators have highlighted some flaws in her basic skills, understandable given she has only been playing the game for a couple of months, the teen is said to have better conditioning and movement than another young sensation, Zhang Ziyu, who is 18 and 7ft 4in tall.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Fans got particularly excited by a viral video that showed Cao making a slam dunk while standing, spinning around defenders and shooting successfully from the free-throw line.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">\u201cIt felt like the Chinese women\u2019s basketball team has really struck gold!\u201d one social media user wrote. \u201cHer talent is phenomenal, transitioning from volleyball to basketball! Looking forward to her performance and hoping she can grow quickly.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Cao Xichen in practice. Photo: Handout\" data-qa=\"BaseImage-handleRenderImage-StyledImage\" class=\"e1gf69pb2 css-6ikqhs e445x7d0\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/ec2ad603-3858-4f7c-8896-16d59fa1a525_dce0b6a6.jpg\" title=\"Cao Xichen in practice. Photo: Handout\"\/>Cao Xichen in practice. Photo: Handout<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">And her thin body shape and long arms had fans comparing Cao to Wembanyama, who plays for the San Antonio Spurs and was the league\u2019s overall top pick in 2023.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"China has unearthed another towering teenage basketball player who can dunk with her feet barely leaving the ground&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":483079,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[64,63,726,244830,21976,512,21421,244833,4019,244834,244832,149120,244835,27203,10728,10549,21422,85,78568,12838,244831],"class_list":{"0":"post-483078","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-basketball","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-basketball","11":"tag-cao-xichen","12":"tag-cba","13":"tag-china","14":"tag-chinese-basketball-association","15":"tag-chinese-womens-basketball-team","16":"tag-dallas-wings","17":"tag-fiba-under-womens-asia-cup","18":"tag-han-xu","19":"tag-li-yueru","20":"tag-li-yuqian","21":"tag-mongolia","22":"tag-new-york-liberty","23":"tag-san-antonio-spurs","24":"tag-shandong","25":"tag-sports","26":"tag-tianjin","27":"tag-victor-wembanyama","28":"tag-zhang-ziyu"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/483078","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=483078"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/483078\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/483079"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=483078"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=483078"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=483078"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}