Friday, Matas Buzelis, while on location in Vilnius, Lithuania, to attend his Buzelis Cup youth basketball tournament, announced he will play for the Lithuanian men’s national basketball team in FIBA World Cup 2027 qualifying games.
Matas is set to make his debut for the Lithuanian National Team this summer. pic.twitter.com/0ll1dbuCmK
— Chicago Bulls (@chicagobulls) June 5, 2026
Buzelis’ announcement represents the second young NBA talent commitment to Lithuania’s men’s national basketball team for the FIBA World Cup 2027 qualifying games. According to Stefan Acevski of Eurohoops, Miami Heat guard and former University of Illinois men’s basketball star Kasparas Jukocionis will also be a teammate with Buzelis during his Lithuanian men’s national basketball team games in July 2026.
The workload ahead for Buzelis’ contribution to the Lithuanian FIBA program amounts to two games, with the first contest scheduled between Lithuania and Great Britain on Jul 2, 2026, and the second game scheduled between Lithuania and Italy on Jul 5, 2026. Buzelis confirmed that the Bulls will decide if Buzelis will continue to play in Lithuanian men’s national basketball games beyond July 2026.
A promising offseason development opportunity for Buzelis
With Buzelis preparing to enter his crucial third NBA season when the 2026-27 NBA season tips off in October 2026, Buzelis playing FIBA basketball is a welcome addition to his offseason development plans.
FIBA hoops has nuanced differences from the NBA style of basketball. FIBA games are played on smaller court dimensions relative to the NBA. FIBA games are 40 minutes in length as opposed to 48-minute NBA games. Most importantly, FIBA games typically allow more physicality in gameplay that would otherwise generate foul calls in the NBA.
The increased physicality of FIBA basketball should benefit Buzelis’ player development, as he needs to grow into a player who can more consistently absorb physical contact from his defensive assignment.
Ideally, Bulls fans should hope that his stint with the Lithuanian men’s national basketball team will also give him a healthy amount of on-ball offensive possessions to help him continue to grow as a secondary ball-handler who can develop play creation skills as opposed to functioning primarily as a play finisher with highlight reel dunks.
The physicality of FIBA should also be a great development challenge for Matas to moderate his turnovers as a ball handler. One of the side effects of Buzelis’ increased usage rate in his sophomore NBA season (22.8%) was also a complementary spike in his turnover rate, going from a 10.9% to 13.0% turnover rate, per Basketball Reference.
Hopefully, dribbling in tighter spacing against handsy, more physical defense should refine Matas Buzelis as a ball handler.
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