Playing alongside Markkanen helped Paris's Jantunen improve

A 23-year-old forward prepped for his first EuroCup season by playing with one of his country's all-time greats.

It should be no surprise that Mickael Jantunen arrived at Paris Basketball this season a bit better than he was before last summer started. After all, the Finnish forward spent the entire summer playing alongside NBA superstar Lauri Markkanen.

Jantunen has started his first season in the BKT EuroCup strongly, averaging 7.8 points, 3.8 rebounds and 1.5 assists with the French club. Among his top highlights in the EuroCup was scoring 15 points against Prometey Slobozhanske and posting a season-high PIR of 19 this week against Umana Reyer Venice.

"I focus on doing the things that I can do to help my team win. If it's scoring points, it's scoring points. If it's something else, it's something else. As long as you can help the team win that is the main goal," said Jantunen, who arrived at Paris after spending last season with Italian League side Treviso Basket.

Between those two stops, the 2.04-meter forward Jantunen teamed up with 2.13-meter Markkanen on the Finnish national team at the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2023. The northern Europeans had high hopes in Asia but also knew they faced a challenging First Round group with Germany, Australia and co-hosts Japan.

Finland ended up losing all three games before then knocking off Cape Verde and Venezuela in the Classification 16-32 to finish 21st overall and lock up a spot at next summer's 2024 Olympic Qualifying Tournament.

Jantunen collected 8.0 points, 5.2 rebounds and 3.2 assists in his first World Cup experience.

"It was an unbelievable experience. Unforgettable. It wasn't easy. We had high expectations. We had a tough group. It wasn't probably the outcome that we wanted, but we still mostly have a very young team. It was a pretty painful growing experience as a whole group," Jantunen admitted.

Part of the learning experience was also playing alongside the team's star leader Markkanen, who led the way with 24.8 points, 8.0 rebounds and 1.0 blocks.

"Just seeing the level at which he does everything. He's taking steps forward in his career every year. Guarding him at practice is something that you can't really get anywhere else. He's an unbelievable player, extremely hard to stop. So getting those reps in are always something that I enjoy," Jantunen said of the Utah Jazz star.

"I am just trying to soak it in, trying to learn from him. It's just a great pleasure to play with him and see what he does. He's always easy to talk to so if you have questions you can ask him. He's such a skilled player so you can also just watch him and learn."

The 2023 World Cup was the second straight major tournament in which the 23-year-old played with 27-year-old Markkanen, after also helping Finland reach the quarterfinals at FIBA EuroBasket 2022, where Jantunen averaged 6.1 points, 4.0 rebounds and 1.7 assists.

"Just playing alongside players of that level helps you get that much better," Jantunen concludes. "You want to improve your own game."

And that has benefitted Paris Basketball as well.