Maybe you’ll find her sitting at the lakefront Colectivo, or soon enough on the court at the Al McGuire Center, playing for the Marquette women’s basketball team.
Whatever the location, one thing is clear: Yu Han Lin is an anomaly – both on and off the court. Your eyes are drawn to her when she plays, and when she makes what seems to be an improbable behind-the-back pass, you wonder what she sees that you don’t.
“She just reads ball screens, reads plays so well that it’s so fun to play with,” MU teammate Kayl Peterson said. “It’s easy for us because she reads them so well. All we gotta do is make the layup.”
Born in Hualien, Taiwan, Lin is one of three Taiwanese players currently playing NCAA basketball. That number is even smaller at the professional level – there is only one player of Taiwanese descent playing in either the NBA or WNBA (Kaitlyn Chen for the Golden State Valkyries).
Lin moved to the United States in 2025 to play basketball for Middle Tennessee State University. She started seven games early in her freshman season but afterward came off the bench in a mostly limited capacity. Lin averaged 4.7 points, 1.0 rebounds and 1.1 assists over 33 games.
Marquette coach Cara Consuegra suggested her playing time might have been the reason Lin entered the transfer portal for her sophomore season.
“I just love her creativity as a guard,” Consuegra said. “I don’t think she really got to showcase that at her previous school.”
Lin said she likes Consuegra’s honesty, and that’s part of what drew her to the MU program.
Back home in Taiwan, no one in her family played basketball, Lin said, but they did play a lot of table tennis. Lin played for years but decided that she liked basketball more and now plays table tennis less often, although she sometimes plays against her new MU teammates.
She can’t remember how she got into basketball, but pieces of her game come from different places. The creativity that her coach and teammates laud her for has a simple origin, according to Lin.
“I think because I played with boys before,” she said.
When she started to play in Taiwan for fun, she played against boys, which helped give her game a competitive and aggressive edge.
As for the rest of her game, she said she didn’t watch a lot of NBA or WNBA games before she came to the U.S. Instead, she watched highlights online and subconsciously emulated what she saw.
“My body will remember,” she said.
Consuegra repeated a similar sentiment when asked about Lin’s ability.
“She can watch something, then she can go out and do it,” Consuegra said. “She’s just a natural.”
Whether it was her first season at Middle Tennessee or her upcoming season at MU, Lin said she is lucky to be able to compete in the U.S., and she wants to continue pushing herself to get better.
“I want to learn more, and I don’t want to stay comfortable,” she said. “So that’s why I come here.”
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Marquette women’s basketball transfer Yu Han Lin credits background for creativity
Reporting by Gabriella Hartlaub, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Gabriella Hartlaub, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel | USA TODAY Network
