September 11, 2022- After the loss against Finland meant Croatia's goodbye in the WorldCup qualifiers, today the two teams met again in Berlin in the Round of 16 of EuroBasket. For the second time within just 2 months, Finland prevailed over Croatia thanks to a sensationally strong performance by Lauri Markkanen (43 points).

The game started with four fast points by Croatia before Finland came around for their first lead. After the checkered team around Bogdanović followed to tie the game again, the remainder of the first quarter (20:21) and the entire second quarter remained tight. Thanks to a remarkable tip-in buzzer beater by Markkanen with 0.1 seconds to execute, Finland took a slight advantage into the locker rooms at halftime (45:43).

Another tied third quarter (22:22) meant the decision would have to come in the final ten minutes. Ramljak scored an important three-point shot for Croatia to tie the game 77:77 five minutes into the final quarter before coach Mulaomerović's team lost control of the game. Finland scored 10 points without response to secure the win at 87:77 with still 2:25 to play. 

Markkanen and his teammates did not let go of their lead and finished the game 94:86. Finland's top scorer had 43 points recorded in the stat sheets and became one of only 10 players to ever score 43 or more points during a European Championship. 

While Bogdanović (23), Smith (17) and the rest of the Croatian team will now head home, Finland will face Spain on Tuesday for a spot in the semi-finals. 

Result by quarters: (FIN-CRO) 20-21, 25-22, 22-22, 27-21

Box score can be found here. 

August 29, 2022 (HKS).

The Croatian national basketball team achieved its second victory as part of the pre-qualifications for the EuroBasket 2025. In Opatija, Damir Mulaomerović 's team defeated Switzerland with a score of 84-53 (50-26) .

Croatia has shown authority and seriousness from the beginning. A 6-0 start grew to 22-10 by the end of the first quarter. Bojan Bogdanović (7), Dario Šarić (5) and Karlo Matković (4) got off to a particularly inspired start .

In the second quarter, Croatia increased the speed, and the advantage constantly grew. After a great assist by Dominik Mavra for Matković, Croatia led 27-13. Bogdanović's three-pointer for 32-17 followed, and the first escape to a 20-point advantage via Matković (37-17), and by half-time the advantage grew to +24 (50-26).

By then, Matković had already shown a great performance with 17 points and 8 rebounds. Bogdanović scored 10 points, and Dario Šarić scored 9 with 6 rebounds and two assists. Krunoslav Simon, although without a point, collected four assists and two steals by halftime.

The second half was an ideal opportunity for coach Mulaomerović to deploy his forces before going to EuroBasket, which starts on September 1, and give an opportunity to players who participated less in the previous part of the preparations and pre-qualifications for Eurobasket 2025. This did not affect the result. Matković was replaced under the basket by Ivica Zubac and with his dunk, Croatia went ahead for the first time by more than 30 points (59-28). The Croatian side entered the final quarter with +29 (70-41) and the game ended peacefully.

Karlo Matković finished the match with 17 points, 12 rebounds and 5 blocks, Dario Šarić scored 13 (7 rebounds), Ivica Zubac (7 rebounds) and Bojan Bogdanović 12 each, Toni Perković and Jaleen Smith 7 each, and Roko Prkačin 6 points.

The first game at EuroBasket in Milan will be played on Friday, September 2nd, 2022 at 17:00 against Greece.

Result by Quarters: 22-10, 28-16, 20-15, 14-12

Find the Boxscore here

Croatia will play Lithuania on September 14 in Osijek. 

TCN looks back on a wild year of Croatian sports.