Finland men's national basketball team

The Finnish Basketball Association was founded in February 1939. A few months earlier the Finnish Football Federation had decided to add basketball to its own repertoire. Finland first competed at the European championship at its third installment, the EuroBasket 1939. In the round-robin, they initially struggled and lost to each of the other seven teams and finished with a 70–541 overall point differential.

Finland's next European competition was 12 years later, at the EuroBasket 1951 in Paris. Overall, they fared much better and split their four preliminary round games and finished at third place in the group at 2–2 but were eliminated from championship contention. They had success after that, winning all three of their classification round 1 games and both round 2 games to finish in 9th place of the 18 teams.

In 1952, by virtue of hosting the games in Helsinki, Finland played at the Summer Olympics for the first time. The national team finished at the bottom of Group B in the preliminary round losing all of its game to the Soviet Union, Bulgaria and Mexico, and failing to advance.[2]

Finland used this international experience when they competed again at the EuroBasket 1953 in Moscow. In the preliminary round, they finished with 1 win and 3 losses for 4th place of the 5 teams in the group. They fared significantly better in the first classification round, winning 3 and losing only 1 to finish in the middle of a three-way tie in the group. They lost both the 9–12 and 11/12 classification games, however, taking 12th place of 17 overall.

At the next event, Finland had some difficulty in the preliminary round of EuroBasket 1955. They lost all three early games in Budapest and were relegated to the classification round. Once again, not faced with the world elite opponents anymore, the Fins shone in the classification round and won all four of the pool play games. They won their classification 9–12 match as well, but lost to France in the 9/10 final to finish 10th of 18 in the tournament.

In Sofia, at the EuroBasket 1957, the Finns finished third in their preliminary group after going 1–2. They moved to the 9–16 classification pool and won five games there with only one loss. They took 11th place overall in the tournament.

Finland after defeating France at EuroBasket 2017.

At the EuroBasket 1995 in Greece, was Finland's first qualification to the top European basketball tournament since 1977. The national team did not fair too well at the event though. As they were routed in their first match against Russia 126-74, and ultimately led to them finishing with an 0-6 record (13th place) and were eliminated.

Finland qualified for the EuroBasket 2011. The tournament berth was the first for Finland in 16 years. There they finished third out of six teams in EuroBasket 2011 Group C and defeated Bosnia and Herzegovina 92–64 and Montenegro 71–65. This allowed them to they qualify for the EuroBasket 2011 Group F. In their first match they were easily defeated by Russia but afterwards they defeated Georgia, before losing to Slovenia in their final match of the tournament. Despite not making it to the best of 8 tournament, Finland ended up making it to their first ever FIBA World Cup as a wild card team alongside Greece, Turkey, and Brazil.

Roster for the 2023 FIBA World Cup Qualifiers matches on 24 and 27 February 2023 against Israel and Germany.[3]

Finland men's national basketball team roster
Players	Coaches
Pos. No. Name Age – Date of birth Height Club Ctr. PG 4 Aatu Kivimäki 25 – (1997-06-08)8 June 1997 1.84 m (6 ft 0 in) Tübingen F 5 Alex Murphy 29 – (1993-06-03)3 June 1993 2.06 m (6 ft 9 in) Hokkaido SG 9 Sasu Salin 31 – (1991-06-11)11 June 1991 1.91 m (6 ft 3 in) Tenerife G/F 14 Henri Kantonen 25 – (1997-08-20)20 August 1997 1.98 m (6 ft 6 in) Kauhajoki F 18 Mikael Jantunen 22 – (2000-04-20)20 April 2000 2.04 m (6 ft 8 in) Treviso G/F 19 Elias Valtonen 23 – (1999-06-11)11 June 1999 2.04 m (6 ft 8 in) Rostock PG 21 Edon Maxhuni 24 – (1998-03-21)21 March 1998 1.88 m (6 ft 2 in) Merlins G/F 32 Shawn Hopkins 27 – (1995-05-09)9 May 1995 1.94 m (6 ft 4 in) Craiova PG 35 Ilari Seppälä 29 – (1993-03-23)23 March 1993 1.88 m (6 ft 2 in) Saint-Chamond SG 41 Topias Palmi 28 – (1994-08-26)26 August 1994 1.94 m (6 ft 4 in) Craiova C 42 Daniel Dolenc 29 – (1993-08-10)10 August 1993 2.06 m (6 ft 9 in) Kauhajoki F 43 Max Besselink 20 – (2002-04-04)4 April 2002 2.02 m (6 ft 8 in) Göttingen F 44 Remu Raitanen 25 – (1997-08-21)21 August 1997 2.06 m (6 ft 9 in) Albacete PG 44 Severi Kaukiainen 24 – (1998-05-11)11 May 1998 1.85 m (6 ft 1 in) Kauhajoki	Head coach Lassi Tuovi Assistant coach(es) Hanno Möttölä Mikko Larkas Legend (C) Team captain Club – describes last club before the competition Age – describes age on 24 February 2023

• 2015: Li-ning[4]
• 2019: Adidas

• Finnair
• Nokia
• Vantaan Energia
• 2015: Microsoft[4]
• 2019: PostNord

• Finland - Tournament Highlights - 2014 FIBA World Cup Youtube.com video