Vice-Premier Liu Yandong (center) poses for a group picture with young players and former NBA Houston Rockets star player Yao Ming on Sunday at the Toyota Center. Chang Jun / China Daily

Houston Rockets CEO Tad Brown said he was honored to host Liu and her delegation and the Rockets had enjoyed a tremendous relationship with basketball fans in China over the past decade.

Brown was thrilled Yao Ming was visiting his old NBA team. "Yao Ming is part of our family. The very first NBA broadcast in China was the Houston Rockets' world champion game back in 1993. At that time there was a young Chinese man called Yao Ming who saw Hakeem Olajuwon play for the first time. That helped to create his love of basketball. By those forces here we are today with Yao Ming. It's been a pleasure for us to be part of the understanding and growth of Chinese sports. We are happy with the role we can play with Chinese youth."

Shoemaker said it was wonderful to have Vice-Premier Liu visit Houston and witness basketball diplomacy between high school students from Houston and Beijing. "It's a statement of how important the partnership is to her," Shoemaker said.

Prior to the start of the game, Liu and Yao Ming met with the high school players. Speaking to the young people, Liu mentioned that China and the US resumed their formal relationship through "ping pong diplomacy" 37 years ago, encouraging the young players from Tsinghua to learn from their US counterparts about teamwork and sportsmanship.

"I hope you folks can play an active role promoting people-to-people exchange through this sports activity, and in the future can contribute to the China-US friendship," she said.

Wang Shaojie, a member of the Tsinghua team, said he had learned a lot during the week of training.

Speaking of meeting Yao and Liu, Wang said: "We appreciate Vice-Premier Liu's coming to watch us play and cheer us on."