President of Chinese Basketball Association Yao Ming (center) and women's basketball teammates take a group photo. Photo: Courtesy of Peak Sport

The first tier professional women's basketball league in China, the Women's Chinese Basketball Association (WCBA) is gearing up for its 2018-19 season. At the press conference hosted by WCBA in Beijing on Monday, details of the new season were released.

This year is a special one for WCBA, which marks its 16th anniversary. Since it was established in 2002, the association has expanded from 14 to 18 teams, exceeding the Women's National Basketball Association in terms of scales and becoming the world's largest women's basketball association.

The first tournament of the new season kicked off at Changji Gymnasium in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region on Thursday. The curtain raiser will feature Xinjiang's  representitive team and Daqing.

The president of the Chinese Basketball Association Yao Ming gave a speech at the press conference. "Ahead of this conference, the girls from the Chinese national basketball team have just returned from the World Cup and got sixth place. Before that, they won the championship at the Asian Games in Djakarta," Yao said. "The achievement associates with the development and expansion of WCBA. They show the fact that the high-level players can only be cultivated through high-level competitions," he added.

At the conference, the new styles of the team uniforms for the coming season were unveiled. They were created by exclusive WCBA partner Peak Sport, specially designed for each team with unique color schemes. Designers draw inspiration from the traditional Chinese women dress cheongsam. The clothes are made with perspiration absorption fabric that not only embodies the function for sport but also brings a sense of comfort and beauty to the players. The general manager of Peak Sport Xu Zhihua said that Peak hopes to use professional shoe materials, fashionable design and innovative fabric in a way to give full support to the women's basketball players in the new season. "I wish they could have better performance with many star players serving the team," Xu said.

In order to expand the influence of the league this year and draw young people's attention during the new season, the partner of the China Basketball Association has established a live broadcast platform with the collaboration of national TV, local TV and internet live broadcast platforms. Some 12 online media platforms are also going to promote the season through live broadcast.