The Bucks' first game against Golden State on their China tour will air live on ESPN Classic at 7 a.m. Milwaukee time on Wednesday, the team announced today.

The game in Guangzhou will not be a live telecast on ESPN2, as originally scheduled. Instead, the game will be aired on ESPN2 on a tape-delayed basis at 7 p.m. Wednesday.

The Bucks-Warriors game in Beijing will air live on ESPN2 at 10:30 p.m. Friday Milwaukee time (11:30 a.m. Saturday in Beijing).

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Yi Jianlian is no longer a member of the Milwaukee Bucks, but the team still has a player who is fluent in Mandarin.

That's rookie forward Joe Alexander, who was born in Taiwan and later lived in Hong Kong and Beijing.

The Bucks and Golden State Warriors were feted at a reception in Guangzhou on Tuesday night (this morning Milwaukee time), and Bucks coach Scott Skiles and Warriors coach Don Nelson spoke on behalf of their teams. Skiles asked Alexander to say a few words, and the Bucks player was greeted with warm applause when he spoke in Mandarin.

Both teams practiced on Tuesday, and the Bucks had a spirited session as they prepared for the first of two exhibitions against the Warriors. The teams will play at 8 p.m. Wednesday (7 a.m. Milwaukee time) in a game to be televised live on ESPN Classic and re-aired at 7 p.m. Wednesday on ESPN2.

Following the game, the Bucks and Warriors will depart for Beijing, arriving early in the morning on Thursday. The Bucks will take a trip to the Great Wall of China later that day before practicing at the Olympic venue in Beijing on Friday and taking part in an NBA Cares Special Olympics clinic.

The teams will play the second game in the tour on Saturday morning in Beijing (10:30 p.m. Friday Milwaukee time) in a game aired live on ESPN2.

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While the Bucks get settled in Guangzhou, China, before their Wednesday game against Golden State, Yi Jianlian is off to a good start with his new team, the New Jersey Nets.

Yi scored 17 points in the Nets' 94-92 victory over the Miami Heat on Sunday in London.

Yi worked well with Nets star Vince Carter and was in the game in the closing minutes as New Jersey held on to beat Miami for the second straight time on the two teams' European tour.

The Bucks and Warriors will be the first NBA teams to play in Guangzhou, where Yi starred with the Guangdong Tigers before being selected with the sixth overall pick by Milwaukee in the 2007 NBA draft. Yi was traded, along with Bobby Simmons, to New Jersey in exchange for veteran forward Richard Jefferson on draft day this year.

The Bucks are scheduled to practice at the Guangzhou Gymnasium on Tuesday afternoon (beginning around midnight Milwaukee time) and will be guests at an NBA reception on Tuesday night. The first of two games against Golden State is scheduled at 7 a.m. Wednesday (Milwaukee time) and will be televised live on ESPN2.

Milwaukee is winless in its first four exhibition games, but coach Scott Skiles is concerned that his team continues to make progress as it approaches the regular-season opener on Oct. 28 in Chicago.

"It's good for people to see a different culture," Skiles said. "But at the same time, we're not on vacation, either. We've got to balance it.

"There's a lot of league receptions we have to go to, and the players have appearances. But when we do get those couple of practices, couple of shootarounds and couple of games, we've got to still get some stuff done. We're just trying to make progress every day."

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