Around Raleigh With Coach Wade: Jayme Kontuniemi (with transcript)

NC State Men’s Basketball released an episode of Around Raleigh With Coach Wade recently. Coach Wade sat down with Guard Jayme Kontuniemi, who was an international prep player from Finland in the Wolfpack’s 2025 recruiting class.

You can read the transcript below, and watch the video underneath.

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WW: Welcome to our next episode of Around Raleigh. We’re excited to be joined by Jayme Kontuniemi. There we go.

Fresh from Finland, we’re here at the beautiful Court of North Carolina at the heart of NC State’s campus. We’re right outside the international office, who played a huge role in allowing Jayme to get to NC State and we’re very, very thankful to our international office for all of their hard work on all of our international students. But as you can see, we got class change going on.

We got a lot of things going on. Fall semester started here at State and we are very, very excited to be here at the court of North Carolina.

Let’s talk about growing up in Finland and all the different sports you tried, hockey and soccer and everything else and how it led to your love of basketball.

JK: Had a bunch of friends. We went out, went around always. We used to play a bunch of soccer when it came summertime and then in the winter we’d go play hockey as a group. We didn’t really play any video games or be inside all that much if it was nice out.

One day, one of my friends said that he was going to practice so I had to leave. So I immediately called my mother and I was just like, ‘Can I just go to practice with him, see what basketball is about? She said yeah, and then I got there and it just turned out to be fun. All the guys were really inclusive.

I didn’t feel like an outsider when I got there and it felt like something clicked right there.

WW: That’s awesome and you brought up your mother. I know she’s a huge foundation and rock in your life, a great lady.

Talk about your mother and her influence on you growing up.

JK: She was very, very loving and always did her best when it came to us wanting stuff for birthdays and all that stuff. Always tried her hardest.

She’s always worked really long hours, so that just showed me how hard you really need to work to get to where you want to be, and if you really want something, how much hard work you need to put in.

WW: You ended up going to Drive Academy in Helsinki with Coach Justice. What most people don’t know is you worked three jobs to make sure you could pay the tuition, and make sure you had somewhere to live and that sort of thing.

I know that work ethic your mother instilled in you, you took that and moved forward so you could work your way through high school and earn a scholarship here to college. Talk about your days at Drive Academy and how that helped you being able to come over to the United States and play. You guys played in the U-20s and things like that over here in the United States. How did that experience help shape your basketball and really helped lead you to NC State.

JK: I started playing for Coach Justice in the seventh grade. He just really, really pushed us to a level that we didn’t know we could reach. He put us through all different types of running and conditioning, and he put us in situations that were mentally stimulating to say the least.

In an average week, we had morning practice and then we had classes for like two or three hours. Then we had practice again, and then once I started working it was work after that, work on the weekends, all that stuff in between games and traveling.

WW: Let’s talk about the unique reindeer dish with the mashed potatoes, the reindeer on top.

Pronounce it for our friends.

JK: So we have Poron käristys

WW: Say that three times fast.

JK: Poron käristys, poron käristys, poron käristys.

Just keep going, you’ll get there. So essentially poron käristys is…so you get reindeer, you cut it up into really small pieces, almost get to a mince and then you put it in kind of like a broth, and then on top you put mashed potatoes with cream or whatever you like, cheese.

You put it on and then you put it all in the oven. Once it gets in the oven you let it sit for a little bit, like 30 minutes to an hour. Then you take it out and you just scoop it up onto your plate. Then you have, it’s a jam that we have, I can’t remember what the berry is called in English, but for all my Fins out there…puolukkahillo.

WW: We’re gonna go with that, whatever he said, that’s gonna be good.

But I did have the reindeer, it was phenomenal. Let’s finish with your transition here to NC State. We’re excited to have him as a part of our team, he’s going to redshirt for us this season as he continues his development, and gets used to college basketball.

You’ve been very good in practice for us. You’re shooting the ball well. You’re getting in shape. You’ve done a great job there. Talk about what it means for you to be at NC State, to be a part of a Division-1 college basketball program, and how this is one of your dreams. You’re living out your dream, which most people don’t get to do. So that’s very cool and a credit to all of your hard work.

JK: First of all, I can’t tell people enough how grateful I am to be here and have this opportunity, to be around the people that I am this year. All the guys on the team are great people. They have a lot of experience that I can personally learn from, take from their knowledge and use it to develop myself as a person and as a basketball player. So it’s just a tremendous feeling to get to be here every day, go to class and be on this beautiful campus.

WW: We’re very very excited to have Jayme. He’s going to be a huge part of our winning this year. How hard he works in practice, how he pushes our players and how he’s very, very attentive to detail. He’s one of the leaders of our scout team and we’re excited for his continued growth and his ability to allow our team to grow as well.

So Jayme, from the Court of North Carolina here. This is another episode of Around Raleigh. We appreciate you tuning in.

Fresh from Finland, Jayne Kontuniemi joins Coach Wade on Episode 13 of Around Raleigh. pic.twitter.com/is4CyY3p6a

— NC State Men's Basketball (@PackMensBball) October 3, 2025