By Jeff Faraudo
jfaraudo@bayareanewsgroup.com
Posted: 12/24/2009 09:19:43 PM PST
Updated: 12/24/2009 11:18:13 PM PST
Cal basketball player Max Zhang sits down for lunch with mom Lixin Gong for
lunch with mom Lixin Gong for a home cooked meal in Berkeley, Calif., Wednesday, Dec. 16, 2009. Lixin Gong is spending several months living with Max, helping him eat right and take care of himself so he can improve his weight and strength for basketaball.... (KRISTOPHER SKINNER)
In the vernacular of sports, teams often refer to themselves as families. For Cal basketball players Jerome Randle and Max Zhang, the definition goes beyond hyperbole.
Randle, a 5-foot-10 senior guard from Chicago, and Zhang, a 7-foot-2 sophomore center from China, each has each brought a piece of home to Berkeley.
Randle, 22, plucked his brother Jeremy, 19, from the perils of Chicago's South Side, and the two have lived together off campus since July 2008.
Zhang is enjoying the company — and home cooking — of his mother, Lixin Gong, who is in the midst of a three-month stay with her son for the second year in a row.
"We're best friends," Jerome Randle said of the relationship he has with his brother. "It's been good. I don't think I could have made a better decision."
Zhang's mother misses her husband but has no doubts about the commitment she has made to her son's development.
"In Chinese culture, it doesn't matter how big, how old you get, your parents see you as a little kid all the time," Zhang, 22, said, interpreting his mother's Chinese words.
It was Zhang's father who last year suggested that his wife come to the United States for a prolonged visit with their only child. Zhang arrived on campus in the fall of 2007 carrying just 208 pounds on the tallest frame ever to wear a Cal basketball uniform. He needed to gain weight and strength.
"I didn't really take care of myself very well in terms
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of food," Zhang said of living in the dorms during his freshman year. "I'm pretty skinny. She knows what I like to eat and she knows the nutrition part. She thinks if I want to gain weight, I need to eat the meals she cooks."
Coach Mike Montgomery wrote a letter to the U.S. Embassy in the summer of 2008, seeking a visitor visa for Zhang's mother so she could cook for her son.
Gong spent three months here last season and will complete a similar visit in early January before returning home. She plans to return the next two seasons.
Max tries to eat four or five meals a day, many prepared by his mother. Asked if she can see a physical difference in her son, Gong said, "A little bit."
In fact, Zhang's weight is now 245.
"I think it helps," said Zhang, who wants to gain 15 more pounds over the next two years.
Zhang's mother speaks virtually no English but spends her days reading or chatting online with friends in China. She also has friends here with roots in China, and they spend time together.
One thing she hasn't done during this visit is attend any of her son's games.
"I said to Max last year, 'I'd like to meet your mom. Is she coming to a game?' " Montgomery recalled. "He said, 'No, she's afraid she'll make me nervous.' Max is getting older now, and he's probably not as nervous anymore."
Try selling that to his mother.
"She thinks if she shows up I'll try to do more than I can do or get nervous,'' Max confirmed.
But with Zhang starting and becoming more comfortable, Mom is planning to visit Haas Pavilion on game night soon, perhaps for Monday's Golden Bear Classic.
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