Sitting courtside at Allen Fieldhouse, a play-by-play man announced the usual Kansas University basketball action.
“Ná lánban, Brandon Rush,” he said. “ZántÃ-ng, Dartmouth.”
The play-by-play man, Zhiqun “James” Liang, broadcast Tuesday night’s Kansas University-Dartmouth basketball game entirely in Chinese – for the first time in KU history.
The event, organized by KU’s Confucius Institute, helped fans get a new perspective on basketball by commissioning staff members Liang and Sheree Willis to call the action streamed on the Kansas Athletics Web site and inside the Jayhawk Room at the Kansas Union.
The Jayhawk Radio Network also broadcast bits of the Chinese play-by-play.
“We thought, what a fun way to celebrate our wonderful basketball tradition and also our rapidly growing connection to China,” Willis said.
Tuesday night, about 15 students showed up to the Jayhawk Room to listen to the game, organizers said – most of whom did not speak Chinese but thought it would be interesting to hear the broadcast.
By the way, “ná lánban, Brandon Rush” means, “rebound, Brandon Rush,” and “ZántÃ-ng, Dartmouth” means, “time out, Dartmouth.”
Both of which happened plenty Tuesday night.
Cheering in Chinese
To cheer for the Jayhawks in Chinese, use the pronunciations:
¢ “Go!”: To cheer for your team, yell “jyah-yoh!” (“add fuel”)
¢ “Jayhawk!”: To shout out the mascot, yell “jyeh-yeeng” (“quick and victorious hawk”)
¢ “That’s a foul!”: To point out a foul, yell “fahn-guay! (“foul”)
¢ “Bad call, ref!”: To complain to the ref, yell “hay-hsiaow” (“Evil whistle!”)
¢ “What a cute mascot!”: To praise the Jayhawk, yell “KU jyeh-yeeng jun kuh-AYE” (“The KU Jayhawk is really cute”)
