Mikael Jantusta, 23, is worth admiring. However, Finland initially let Denmark look like a basketball powerhouse, writes Roope Visuri of Urheilu.
Roope Visuriruheluth reporter
On Monday, the Finnish men’s national basketball team beat Denmark after dramatic stages in the European Championship qualifiers with a score of 89–85 in Espoo.
At the same time, Susijengi got off to a happy start towards two big things, this summer’s Olympic qualifiers and next year’s EC home games.
Even Friday’s match in Belgrade against six World Cup silver medalists Serbia was great to see, but Monday’s rise from 17 points behind to win over Denmark certainly did good for the current Susijengi generation.
One player in particular talked about Susijengi in full translation.
A new star can finally be announced for the wolf pack, Mikael Jantunen.
His importance to Susijeng’s success has grown really big. Jantunen repeatedly makes winning decisions on the field. In that sense, he can be considered a star, even though by nature he is a humble team player and seems like one among the others.
When Susijengi started to rise after a sluggish opening half, Jantunen scored ten points in the third period on the offensive end, both near and beyond the basket.
He was also on the defensive as the architect of Susjieng’s rise. On that side, the man from Paris Basketball shared a total of four passes leading to the basket in the game.
The action of the versatile player on the field impressed me.
And the best! Jantunen only turns 24 this year. How hard can he still reach?
What was bad?
Before Jantunen’s wonderful performance and Finland’s great rise, however, there was quite a bit of Susijeng’s boredom. The opening half was really bad. It went exactly according to the worst threats.
It shouldn’t have been unclear to anyone that Denmark was just about to make power Gabriel “Iffe†Lundberg. Euroleague star and one of the best defenders in Europe. Big center Kevin Larsen was also known as a threat.
Susijengi certainly had in its game plan to stop this duo, but it was not successful at first. Denmark rallied to go and broke Finland’s defense. In the end, the duo Lundberg-Larsen got tired.
The wild fanfare and gestures of the Danes told a lot about the robbery at the beginning of the match.
For example, Iffe Lundberg saw his own club team coach in a moment of ecstasy Lassi Tuovin frustration at one’s own grips.
Susijeng’s head coach and Virtus Bologna’s first assistant coach Tuovi beat his hands together in frustration when Lundberg rode the Finnish defense and scored a hard basket.
Lundberg, who scored several wins for Virtus Bologna in the Euroleague this season, responded by happily clapping his hands in Tuov’s direction.
Denmark bagged no less than 58 points in the first two periods. The last time someone was able to score more points against Susijeng was at the 2022 European Championship last halftime, when the world’s best player Nikola Jokic Serbia scored 62 points in the opening half.
The biggest upset before Denmark is already the 2014 World Cup opener against the wild team of the United States. At that time, the United States scored 60 points in the opening half in Bilbao.
All credit to Denmark on Monday, but they are from a different planet than the other two teams mentioned.
– You have to be critical. If there is so much hair, everyone has a place to look in the mirror. We didn’t change the tactics, but emphasized that we are not doing things well enough. It was a valuable lesson to learn how to turn the game around, Lassi Tuovi described to Urheilu after the match.
What next?
In July, one continuation of the success of the last years awaits, the Olympic qualifiers.
With that in mind, one unfortunate thing happened during this window. Olivier Nkamhouan and Henri Kantonen the past seasons ended in injuries.
In the big picture, the qualifying games in February offered positive spice towards the Olympic qualifiers.
The wolf gang will probably have to overthrow Spain in Spain in order to get an Olympic place.
However, the qualifying window in February showed that Spain can be shaken. The reigning European champions lost both of their qualifying games, first at home against Latvia and then, surprisingly, away to Belgium. And Spain wasn’t the only top country to crash.
Poland, playing in the same Olympic qualifying group as Finland, lost both of their February qualifying matches clearly, world champion Germany bowed to Bulgaria and Lithuania as well Jukka Toijalan For Estonia.
Of course, drawing direct conclusions from February’s games into the summer is not worthwhile for many reasons.
Still, the numerous surprise results of the EC qualifiers in February underlined the consistency of top European basketball.
Everything is possible for Finland in individual matches in July. The starting point is, of course, that the Susijeng team needs to be successful and push hard for an Olympic place. Performance at a good level for the entire 40 minutes of the game, which is not seen in February games.
Before Spain, you have to face several tough NBA players in the Bahamas. But Finland also has one huge advantage, Lauri Markkanen, who is usually the best player on the court in national team basketball.