Utah Jazz big man Lauri Markkanen knows as well as anyone what it takes to be a great basketball player at both the NBA and FIBA levels. He’s been an All-Star caliber player for the Jazz for the last couple of seasons now, and he’s amid a highly impressive stint playing for the Finnish national team at EuroBasket.
Markkanen contrasted the two levels of competition and said that FIBA “might be tougher” than the NBA in “certain ways.”
“I think there’s both sides to it,” he said. “NBA has the best players in the world in every team, and games are longer so you have more time to score points and stuff. And then — well, of course there is rules that make the NBA easier for that, which is the defensive three-second rule or the not tipping the ball on the top of the rim, which pisses me off here. But yeah, I think there’s both sides to it. And obviously game is really physical here, and sometime you do get the call, sometimes not. But I think in certain ways, FIBA might be tougher, for sure.”
Finland is one of only a few teams still kicking in the EuroBasket tournament thanks in large part to the production it has received from Markkanen. Across seven games played for his home country dating back to group phase contests, he’s averaging 24.7 points (the third-highest scoring average of any player in the tournament behind only guard Luka Doncic and big man Giannis Antetokounmpo) to go along with 7.9 rebounds and 2.6 assists per game.
Markkanen and company are on the heels of a quarterfinal victory over Georgia on Wednesday, and the Jazz star actually didn’t lead his team in scoring in that contest, believe it or not. He was the team’s second-leading scorer, however, with 17 points on 7-of-12 shooting from the field and 2-of-5 from 3-point range.
Who Finland will play in Friday’s semifinal matchup isn’t yet set in stone, as Slovenia and Germany are doing battle as of this writing for the right to advance and face off against the Finnish. A similar performance from Markkanen against Georgia versus one of those two teams maybe wouldn’t be enough for Finland to win on Friday, however.
Slovenia just so happens to employ one of the best players on the planet in Doncic, and Germany is replete with current and former NBA players. Orlando Magic star Franz Wagner might just be the top player for Germany.
It would be quite the accomplishment if Markkanen goes on to lead Finland to the EuroBasket title, and with any luck, he will soon. Finland will play for the title on Sunday if it can win its upcoming game on Friday.