Han Xu, a 6-foot-10, 22-year-old center for the New York Liberty, is so unique that it is nearly impossible to find an appropriate analog. a large athlete with a 3-point range? Yes, but there are several sizes of huge. Han is several inches higher than nearly everyone who protects her, so even centers capable of closing in on her cannot stop her shot. She played just 143 minutes as a 19-year-old 2019 season, but the complexity of her game has only increased in the 2022 season, her second in the league. In the last two seasons, COVID-19 protocols prevented Han from accessing the United States.

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Han’s arrival at Liberty’s spring training camp resulted in acquiring a two-way danger capable of altering what the league may anticipate from the center position. Even while current or former stars can’t directly compare Han, her statistics and potential make a strong argument for her to be one of the most influential young players in the game. On the offensive side, Han is already about as effective as anyone in the match. Just in front of Sylvia Fowles and Nneka Ogwumike, who both hold WNBA records for most career points per possession, she is ranked fifth in the WNBA among other players with at least five games played.

Han currently holds the seventh-best overall ranking among players 22 years of age or under, with a 55.9 effective field-goal percentage in 441 minutes this season. Only Nneka Ogwumike and Liz Cambage have played in more games than Han, and neither of them was an expert from beyond the arc when Han was their age. In contrast, Han has made 14 of her 29 3-point tries this season, enough for a 48.3 percent success rate. Although scoring is undoubtedly the most spectacular of Han’s tools, it is by no means the only tool in her arsenal. Han is one of 15 players with a block rate of at least 3% and a steal rate of at least 1% on a list containing some of the most significant players, and she has a turnover rate of just 8.4%.