Just about every Utah Jazz fan should know by now that Lauri Markkanen is currently in the middle of a renaissance during the 2025 EuroBasket tournament. Among those who is paying attention is Jazz coach Will Hardy, and not just because he's the Jazz's head coach, but also because doing so was what helped elevate Markkanen when the Jazz first got him.
ESPN's Tim Bontemps explained this during the most recent episode of "The Hoop Collective" that Hardy watched Markkanen's EuroBasket performance from 2022, which turned the Jazz star into... well a star!
"If you go back a couple years ago, when Will Hardy got the Jazz job, he went over and watched Markkanen play with Finland in this tournament and came back and set up a lot of stuff for the Jazz to run through Markkanen in the same way he did with the Finnish National team.