BENGALURU (FIBA Women's Asia Cup 2017) - New Zealand and Chinese Taipei are good teams, but can they play well enough this year to finally be counted among the elite.

For far too long, the Tall Ferns have been on the receiving end of repeated beatdowns from Australia, but now they finally have a chance to show their true mettle against some of the best women's national teams in the world. In this part of the world, New Zealand are ranked higher than only DPR Korea and the Philippines, and that means a ton of pressure for the Tall Ferns to break into new ground.

Recently, however, they have shown promise. New Zealand are coming off an impressive showing at the William Jones Cup 2017, including a rousing victory over Japan, 75-72. Veteran Micaela Cocks was at her best in that game, scoring 27 points, and she will certainly be among New Zealand's top guns at the FIBA Women's Asia Cup.

New Zealand's outlook: Cocks should get a lot of help from Jillian Harmon and Kalani Purcell, both of whom played quite efficiently at the Jones Cup in Taipei. Adding depth to the Tall Ferns will be other experienced players like Natalie Taylor and Toni Farnworth, while Rebecca Ott and Georgia Agnew represent the new generation. In all, this is a deep team with good size and balance on all positions. As long as they play consistently, however, they could pose a serious threat in their group, perhaps even against the mighty Chinese.

Chinese Taipei, for their part, should be one of the better teams in their group. They are the second highest ranked squad next to China, and though the Taipei quintet have not finished on the podium in more than 10 years, they remain among the dark horses. They finished among the top 4 two years ago in Wuhan, but it should not come as a shocker if they make a big push for the top 3 this time around.

Perhaps the most important thing for Chinese Taipei is to be able to punch one of the tickets to the FIBA Women's Basketball World Cup 2018, and for them to do that a top 4 finish would be enough. That goal is not just realistic, it's definitely attainable. After their campaign at the Jones Cup, they were able to trim their pool down to the final 12, which look to be very competitive.

Chinese Taipei's outlook: It is clear that both Lin Yu-Ting and Huang Ping-Jen will be leading this team in Bengaluru. They have been the pillars of this team for the past few years, and they will reprise their leadership roles again this year. Helping them out will be the returning Bao Hsi-Le, or otherwise known as Joy Burke. Bao gives Taipei much needed size at the middle, and they'll need that against the bigger Tall Ferns and, of course, China. That big three for Chinese Taipei will hold they key to high they soar or how low they dive at the Women's Asia Cup.

FIBA