Nicolas vs. Petteri, France beats Finland 82-72

Full recap and boxscore and whatever I can find in highlight videos to follow. We had some streaming problems in the second half. Soccer > Basketball qualifiers in Europe :)

France beats Finland 82-72.  

Nicolas with 14 points (7/9, 0/2 from three, 0/1 at the line), 1 rebound, 2 assists, 2 blocks (looked like more), 5 turnovers, no fouls. He played the most minutes with 34, and had some nice dunks early on. 

Petteri with 16 points (1/5, 3/7 from three, 5/6 at the line), 5 rebounds, 1 assist, 1 steal, 2 turnovers, 1 foul also in almost 34 minutes. A good game for him, he matched up fairly well against the French backcourt.

Tony Parker played just 5 min. Mostly standing in for him were 2009 Spurs second round pick Nando De Colo (8 points, 5 assists, will play in Valencia with Claver next year) and Antoine Diot, a 20 year old point guard playing for Le Mans (Nic's former team) who was the French top scorer with 16 and also recorded 4 assists. Like Nic a real talent, he already was crucial in the victory over Italy and this was his second game with the senior national team.

Top scorer for Finland was Samuel Haanpää with 21 points, who went hot from outside shooting 5/5. 

France held the lead the whole game and scored the easier points inside off dunks and layups, but sometimes let Finland catch up with some good three point shooting and a bit too many fouls resulting in 20 free throws.

Game recap (English) and boxscore from EuroBasket2009.org

Game recap L'Equipe "Des Bleus très sérieux"

-----

FRANCE - FINLAND, 20:00 local time, Palais Des Sports De Pau  - On French Sport+

Lets hope for another live stream, otherwise this will be a pretty boring recap from a boxscore and some media reports ;-)

Historic comparison: 18 wins, 3 losses for France. A year ago France lost a test match 78-76 with most current players incl. Parker in the lineup.

Lineups as far as I could determine so you at least have some background:

FRANCE

4 DIOT Antoine, 20, point guard, Le Mans (France)
5 BATUM Nicolas, 21, small forward/shooting guard, Portland Trail Blazers (USA NBA)
6 PETRO Johan , 23, center, Denver Nuggets (USA NBA)
7 KOFFI Alain, 25, power forward, Le Mans (France)
8 JEANNEAU Aymeric, 30, point guard, ASVEL Basket (France) 
9 PARKER Tony, 27, point guard, San Antonio Spurs (USA NBA)
10 BOKOLO Yannick, 24, shooting guard, BCM Gravelines-Dunkerque (France) 
11 PIETRUS Florent, 28, small forward/power forward, Pamesa Valencia (Spain)
12 DE COLO Nando, 22, point guard/shooting guard, Pamesa Valencia (Spain)
13 DIAW Boris, 27, small forward/power forward, Charlotte Bobcats (USA NBA)
14 TURIAF Ronny, 26, center/power forward, Golden State Warriors (USA NBA)
15 TRAORE Ali, 24, center/power forward, ASVEL Basket (France)
Not planned in lineup: JACKSON Edwin (SG, Nanterre), MAHINMI Ian (PF, San Antonio Spurs)

Coach: Vincent COLLET (former coach of Nicolas in Le Mans)

Watch out for: Nic of course. As well as the other NBA players, especially how the return of Tony Parker changes the quality of shots and the offensive game. And the good performance of Florent Pietrus, older brother of Mikael Pietrus (Orland) so far in the test games and the first match against Italy. Very young Antoine Diot closed out the game at the line against Italy making four FTs in a row.

FINLAND

 HAANPÄÄ Samuel, 22, small forward, Fos Provence (France)
 HUFF Shawn, 25, shooting guard/small forward, Maroussi (Greece)
 IISALO Tuomas, 27, shooting guard, Kouvot (Finland)
 KOIVISTO Mikko, 22, shooting guard, UNC-Greensboro (USA NCAA)
 KOPONEN Petteri , 21, point guard, Virtus Bologna (Italy)
 KOTTI Tuukka, 28, power forward, Honka Espoo (Finland)
 LEE Gerald Jr., 21, power forward/center, Old Dominion (USA NCAA)
 MÖTTÖLÄ Hanno, 32, center/power forward, no team
 MUURINEN Kimmo, 28, small forward, Honka Espoo (Finland)
 NIKKILÄ Antti, 30, center, Pyrintö Tampere (Finland)
 RANNIKKO Teemu, 28, point guard, BC Khimki (Russia)
 STEN Juha, 25, point guard/shooting guard, Solna Vikings (Sweden)
 VIRTANEN Petri, 28, point guard, Kataja Joensuu (Finland)

Coach: Henrik DETTMANN (former coach of Dirk Nowitzki on the German national team)

Watch out for: Petteri "The Finnisher" Koponen most of all. But also veteran Hanno Möttölä, who has previous NBA experience with the Atlanta Hawks and "un-retired" from the national team for this qualification. Shawn Huff is often Finlands top scorer, very dangerous from three hitting up to 50%. Temu Ranniko plays for a strong team in Russia and brings that experience to back up or play alongside Petteri on the guard spot. In general the team brings a good mix of youth and experience and especially a lot of size, which France doesn't. Italy was bad on outside shooting and didn't win the battle for the boards. Finland could give France more trouble in this regard.