Tonight, the national basketball team starts the European Championship against Finland in Tampere. Just that is big enough – Sweden has not played in the European Championship since 2013 – but for Mikko Riipinen, the match has an additional dimension.
38-year-old Riipinen speaks with a distinct Östergötland dialect, but as the name suggests, his roots are in the neighboring country.
Both my parents are from Finland and I also had a Finnish passport for a long time. I am very proud to represent Sweden and feel that I am in exactly the right place – but of course it is very special for me. It's just me and my mom who live in Sweden, otherwise all my relatives are here in Finland. But I hope they will be supporting Sweden now, says Riipinen.
Met Finland before
Funny enough, Mikko Riipinen's time as national team manager also began with a World Championship qualifying match against Finland, almost four years ago. Then, Sweden won surprisingly in the Globen, but back then, the NBA star Lauri Markkanen was not in Finland's team.
He is now. And Mikko Riipinen ranks the 213 cm tall Utah Jazz player as one of the best players in the entire European Championship.
"He will have to work"
Markkanen has scored a lot of points during the European Championship warm-up, including an incredible 48 points against Belgium.
We have a few different things we want to try on him, but we have to be prepared that it's not possible to stop him completely. He won't leave the game with six points, that's just the way it is. But he will have to work for his points, it should cost for their team play, says Riipinen, who is looking forward to tonight's throw-in in the European Championship premiere.
We have worked for so long to get here to a European Championship – and then you want to do it for real. There's probably nothing better than meeting one of the host nations, our neighbor. It will be sold out and loud. I wouldn't have wanted it any other way.
Sweden plays the entire group stage in Tampere. Of the six teams in group B, four will advance to the round of 16.
Today's matches in the group (Swedish times in parentheses): Great Britain-Lithuania (12.30), Montenegro-Germany (15.30), Finland-Sweden (19.30).
