A friendly match played in Juveskile also announced how difficult the task will be for Nikola Vučević and his teammates in the 3rd round of EuroBasket...
The Finnish basketball team, one of the hosts of the next EuroBasket and Montenegro's rivals in the group, defeated Belgium in a friendly match (105:62). And that may not be as scary as Lauri Markkanen's performance.
The Finnish NBA ace scored 48 points for the winning team - almost as many as the entire Belgian team combined, a selection that will also compete in the Old Continent championship starting on August 27th.
The Utah Jazz center hit 17 of 24 field goals, had nine rebounds, three steals and a block in 25 minutes on the court.
By the way, no one in the history of the Finnish national team has ever scored more points in a single match, more precisely, Markkanen improved his own record, which he set with 43 points against Croatia at the 2022 European Championship.
In total, only seven Finnish players have managed to surpass the number 40 throughout history, with the three best performances belonging to Markanen.
Apart from him, the "wolves" were also led to triumph by Olivier Nkamhua with 11 points, Miro Little with eight assists and captain Sasu Salin with eight points.
Montenegro and Finland will meet on August 30th in Tampere, and before that, both teams have more test matches to play - our national team will face Bosnia and Herzegovina in Sarajevo tomorrow (Sunday, 18pm).
Bonus video:
