Finland’s Defense Needs Miikka Muurinen to Ease Markkanen Load

Finland moved to 2-0 at EuroBasket 2025 with victory over Great Britain but there’s a glaring problem for the Susijengi. The Finnish D simply hasn’t been up to the level required through the first two games. Emmet Ryan sees a solution of sorts, relying less on Lauri Markkanen and more on Miikka Muurinen.

Considering Finland have won both their opening games at EuroBasket 2025, it may seem harsh to be concerned about their prospects. The Susijengi are all but certain to advance to the knockout stages due to those two wins. Yet the performance against Great Britain showed no marked improvement defensively from the narrow win over Sweden. Tampere, we have a problem.

It’s too obvious

The game against Great Britain is the one every other team in Group B has marked down as ‘must not lose.’ There is plenty of fight in the British but an obvious difference in quality. A team that expects to go deep at EuroBasket 2025 needs to do more than just get the win.

Finland clearly didn’t get the memo. Space was all too easy to find for the British. Myles Hesson, Akwasi Yeboah, and Amin Adamu repeatedly found themselves open at a level they likely weren’t expecting. When it came to closing down in the half court, the underdog British were clearly more disciplined.

For much of the game, as was the case with the win over Sweden, Finland’s defensive strategy seemed to be just hoping Lauri Markkanen pulled off a miracle steal. Now, he’s really good at those but it’s not a sustainable strategy. Everyone knows Markkanen is going to score a bunch but relying on him as your core defensive plan feels foolhardy.

Needs more Miika

If a conventional approach isn’t working then it’s time to try what might work. Miikka Muurinen made his presence felt mostly on the offensive end in the win over Sweden. It was however whenever he was on the floor against Great Britain that Finland looked at their most comfortable defensively.

Muurinen is 18 and still developing but his fundamental core discipline shone through on the defensive end. When he was there, the British had real struggles attacking the inside. Now, that didn’t exactly solve the perimeter defensive problems the Susijengi had.

Yet it can play a role in that respect. Muurinen providing extra stability on the inside can enable Lauri Markkanen or Mikael Jantunen to be deployed differently. This in turn could, and the word could is doing a lot of heavy lifting, bring up the defensive level a good bit.

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