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Los Angeles Clippers are looking to the Chinese market to improve their team. Clippers looked at Zhou Qi, a 26-year-old who had previously made an appearance in the NBA with the Houston Rockets between 2018 and 2019. 215 centimeters tall, Zhou Qi has just returned from a season in the Australian championship with South East Melbourne that ended with 12 points and 7 rebounds per game.
In the Los Angeles Clippers Zhou Qi should play in the center position, behind Ivica Zubac. In qualifying for the 2023 World Cup, the Chinese finished the six races with over 16 points, 11 rebounds and 2.2 blocks per exit.
Zhou Qi's highlights
After turning down some offers from US colleges, in 2014 he started playing professional basketball with his hometown team, the Xinjiang Flying Tigers. On June 23, 2016, he was selected in the 43rd choice of the NBA Draft by the Houston Rockets.
After leaving him to mature for a year in China in the ranks of the Xinjiang Flying Tigers, Zhou Qi signed a three-year contract, with an option to the team for the fourth year, with the Rockets. He made his NBA debut with rockets in the Texas derby won 107-91 on October 22, 2017, in which he totaled 3 rebounds and 1 block in 7 minutes on the pitch.
On November 6, 2017 he was assigned for the first time in the G-League to the Rio Grande Valley Vipers, a team affiliated with the Houston Rockets. However, he never managed to establish himself with the Texan team, being employed very little by coach Mike D'Antoni, so much so that the second year, after being used only on 18 occasions in the first where he spent more time in the G-League, precisely on December 17 2018, was cut from Houston.
In total, during the second season he only played one game with the club scoring 2 points. On September 8, 2021, Zhou signed a two-year deal with the South East Melbourne Phoenix of the Australian National Basketball League (NBL) as a Special Restricted Player, with the second year being a player option.