The table has been set for something big to happen in the California town whose name, when mis-pronounced, translates to 'three buns' in Mandarin. Asian Week columnist W. S. Wang reports that Chinese National Team sensation Sui Fei Fei is on the verge of making the Sacramento Monarchs along with teammate Miao Lie Jie. If Fei Fei and Miao Miao make the cut, writes Wang, 'they might draw more fans than anyone else for TV audiences of the WNBA in North America, especially in China where women athletes are much more admired and promoted.'

Fei Fei is the official face of a Chinese youth national paper and a three-time Chinese Basketball Association MVP. Her emergence is said to have paralleled her nation's as an 'economic powerhouse'. Miao Miao is an MVP who led the CBA in scoring four seasons. How big can the duo be in the town Margaret Wong elects to call 'Sangemanto'?

Stateside fans organized a support group and hosted a website, Chinese newspaper reporters camped out at practice, the Bee ran two stories on Fei Fei, KXTV interviewed Fei Fei and Miao Miao, and the Basketball Pioneers, a popular newspaper in China, sent a reporter.

"They can do for Sacramento what Yao Ming did for Houston," Li Yuanwei, Chinese Basketball Association general secretary, said through an interpreter after arriving for an exhibition between the Monarchs and the Chinese National Team. "Feifei and Miao Miao are among the biggest names in China and all of Asia," said Vicki Beaton, a reporter with the World Journal, North America’s largest Chinese newspaper. "People want to know everything."