Will The NBL’s Sleeping Giant Awaken?

NBL analyst Liam Santamaria believes South East Melbourne Phoenix big man Zhou Qi is the “sleeping giant” of the league as he nears his return.

Qi has played just five games this season while battling a lingering calf injury and illness. The 26-year-old hasn’t played since late October, but Newscorp reports Qi is a 50-50 chance to make his return in Thursday night’s clash with the Illawarra Hawks.

Santamaria has told the NBL Today podcast there is a genuine hope Qi will help elevate the Phoenix in the second half of the campaign.

“I feel like Zhou Qi is the sleeping giant of the NBL. It makes the South East Melbourne Phoenix similar,” Santamaria said.

“They have a guy who can really dominate a ball game and have a massive impact, not only coming off the bench, but he hasn’t been playing. He hasn’t been his full self yet this season.

“There is some excitement around South East Melbourne bubbling along here about the potential return of Zhou Qi and ramping him up towards the postseason to take them to another level.”

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Phoenix coach Simon Mitchell added Qi looked as good as he has in a while during Tuesday’s training session, fuelling hopes he will play against the Hawks.

“That’s the best I’ve seen him move this year…I really like what we saw out of him today, that was the most nimble that he’s looked,” Mitchell said via Newscorp.

“So we’ll go through the medical staff, they’ll assess him, see what his recovery is like and we’ll operate from there.”

South East Melbourne hosts Illawarra on Thursday night at 7:30pm AEDT.