An icon in her native China, Lin Gao had played at the highest level, representing her homeland in the Olympic Games before coming to FPU in 1999. Despite having to adjust to a completely new culture and language, Gao embraced the Sunbirds' system and her American teammates. What resulted was nothing short of exceptional.
A four-time NAIA First Team All-American and two-time GSAC player of the year, Gao is among FPU's all-time leaders in nearly every statistical category. She capped off her career by earning national tournament MVP honors in 2003 while leading the school to its second ever national title.
In her first year with the team she had 27 matches with double figure kills and digs, leading the Sunbirds with 530 kills and a .400 attack percentage as the team finished as the NAIA National Runner-Up. After a redshirt season, she came back as a sophomore in 2001 to lead the team to a 35-4 record and an NAIA Final Four appearance.
That year she led the team with 468 kills and 469 digs, while posting 38 solo blocks (the third-best single-season mark in FPU history). As a junior she smashed 502 kills and had 464 digs while leading the Sunbirds to an incredible 41-2 record, a perfect 20-0 run through their tough GSAC schedule and another NAIA Final Four Appearance.
In 2003, her final year with the team, Gao and the Sunbirds would capture the national title that had been eluding them for the first three years of her career. Once again leading the team in kills (463) and digs (485), Gao helped the Sunbirds finish 42-2 and defeat Columbia 3-1 to win the 2003 national championship.
To this day, she is Fresno Pacific's all-time leader in kills with 1,963, attempts with 4,378, and is second all-time in digs with 1,922. In 490 career sets (4th all-time), Gao had more than 100 matches with double-figure kills.
Her career .375 attack percentage ranks seventh all-time, as does her career 4.01 kills per set. Her career average of 3.92 digs per set is fifth in Sunbirds' history.
