FIBA Basketball

2024 Class of FIBA Hall of Fame: Lijie Miao

MIES (Switzerland) - Four-time FIBA Women's Basketball World Cup competitor and three-time Olympian Miao Lijie of China is being inducted into the FIBA Hall of Fame.

A dynamic and energetic guard, Lijie was the centerpiece of the national team for many years and amassed a stellar resume during a truly glittering career.

Appearing at no fewer than four editions of the FIBA Women's Basketball World Cup, she debuted at the event in 1998 aged just 16-years-old and celebrated her 17th birthday during the tournament in Germany.

Lijie was particularly effective at the 2006 edition of the FIBA Women's Basketball World Cup

Her influence would grow hugely in the competition. She went from being by far the youngest member of the side to racking up more than 12 points per game at the 2002 edition.

Lijie then netted a superb 17.6 points per outing during 2006 in Brazil, which saw her lead China in scoring and land in the top four overall. Her last FIBA Women's Basketball World Cup appearance came in 2010 with another classy offering.

Miao was also hugely influential in her Olympic displays too, firstly appearing at the 2004 Games in Athens and eventually waving goodbye at London 2012.

Lijie signed off her career at FIBA global events at the London 2012 Olympics

It was her efforts in between on home soil at Beijing 2008 that truly cemented her status as a China national team legend. A massive fan favorite, she poured in 17.9 points per game to propel the hosts into the Semi-Finals.

At the Continental level, the guard excelled with four FIBA Women's Asia Cup titles, landing MVP honors in both 2004 and 2011. She also managed ot harvest a hat-trick of gold medals at the Asian Games.

In respect of her club career, Lijie made a huge splash by briefly taking her skills to the WNBA where she won the title with Sacramento. That meant she was able to lay claim to becoming the first Chinese player to win WNBA and WCBA titles.

She won a domestic title with Shenyang in 2011. It was quite a year as she became the first player to score 6,000 points in the competition and signed off as Finals MVP. The sheer impact of Lijie on Chinese basketball is also underlined by the fact that she can proudly reflect on being a five-time WCBA Regular Season MVP.

Lijie is being enshrined in the Class of 2024 which includes two other female players in Danira Nakic-Bilic (Croatia) and Skaidrite Smildzina-Budovska (Latvia). The Class also includes Reggie Miller (USA), Kirk Samuel Penney (New Zealand), Romain Sato (Central African Republic) and Predrag Stojakovic (Serbia). There is also coaching recognition for renowned playcaller Daniel Lowell Peterson (USA)

The 2024 FIBA Hall of Fame induction ceremony will take place in Singapore later this year, during September.

Name	MIAO Lijie
Category of Inductee	Player (Guard)
Date of birth	June 3rd 1981
Place of birth	Harbin, Heilongjiang Province, People's Republic of China
Nationality	Chinese
Height	1.78m - 5ft 10in
Clubs	WCBA Harbin Hualong (2002-2004) WCBA Heilongjiang Chenneng (2004-2007) WNBA Sacramento Monarchs (2005) WCBA Hayaojituan (2007-2009) WCBA Shenyang Military (2009-2015) [/unordered]
Club highlights	WNBA champion (2005) Chinese WCBA League champion (2011) [/unordered]
National Team highlights	Asian Games silver medalist (1998) Three-time Asian Games gold medalist (2002, 2006, 2010) Four-time FIBA Women's Asia Cup gold medalist (2001, 2004, 2009, 2011) [/unordered]
Individual highlights	Debuted with the National Team at 16 years old (1997) Played in one FIBA U19 Women's Basketball World Cup (1997) Played in one FIBA U19 Women's Asian Championship (1998) Played in four Asian Games (1998, 2002, 2006, 2010) Played in two Diamond Cup Tournaments (2004, 2008) Played in five editions of the FIBA Women's Asia Cup (1999, 2001, 2004, 2009, 2011) Played in four FIBA Women's Basketball World Cups (1998, 2002, 2006, 2010) Played in three Olympic Games (2004, 2008, 2012) Two-time FIBA Women's Asia Cup MVP (2004, 2011) First player to score 6.000 points in the Chinese WCBA League (2011) First Chinese player able to win both the Chinese WCBA League and the WNBA (2011) Five-time Chinese WCBA League Regular Season MVP (2002, 2003, 2005, 2010, 2013) Chinese WCBA League Final MVP (2011) [/unordered]

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