tweeterhawk
Well-Known Member
The current issue of Referee magazine has a provocative story suggesting that NCAA Division 1 men's basketball is played at too slow of a pace as coaches focus more on defense and possession. As a result, scoring continues to slide to a 60-year low.
"There are supposedly a lot of explanations for why NCAA D-1 men's teams scored on average this year a record low 67.5 points per game: bigger, stronger players; better defenses; advanced scouting techniques; deteriorating player skills and even supposedly inconsistent refereeing," writes Todd Warnick, currently head trainer for referees in the Israeli Premier League and a referee instructor on behalf of the International Basketball Federation (FIBA.) "There were a whole bunch of games in which teams scored less than 40 points. And how can we forget Eastern Michigan's 42-25 January win over Northern Illinois?"
Warnick targets the 35-second shot clock, and suggests reducing it to 24 seconds as used by the NBA and adult and youth international games. He also mentions other rules adopted internationally and elsewhere, such as reducing the time allowed to get the ball over half-court from 10 seconds to eight, and no longer allowing throw-ins to be taken from the frontcourt to an offensive player in the backcourt, to help speed up the game and increase scoring here.
The story is behind a firewall, and you have to be a subscriber or dues-paying member of a national sports officials organization to access it, so I cannot post a link here.
Some key points from the article:
"There are supposedly a lot of explanations for why NCAA D-1 men's teams scored on average this year a record low 67.5 points per game: bigger, stronger players; better defenses; advanced scouting techniques; deteriorating player skills and even supposedly inconsistent refereeing," writes Todd Warnick, currently head trainer for referees in the Israeli Premier League and a referee instructor on behalf of the International Basketball Federation (FIBA.) "There were a whole bunch of games in which teams scored less than 40 points. And how can we forget Eastern Michigan's 42-25 January win over Northern Illinois?"
Warnick targets the 35-second shot clock, and suggests reducing it to 24 seconds as used by the NBA and adult and youth international games. He also mentions other rules adopted internationally and elsewhere, such as reducing the time allowed to get the ball over half-court from 10 seconds to eight, and no longer allowing throw-ins to be taken from the frontcourt to an offensive player in the backcourt, to help speed up the game and increase scoring here.
The story is behind a firewall, and you have to be a subscriber or dues-paying member of a national sports officials organization to access it, so I cannot post a link here.
Some key points from the article:
- While Tom Izzo recently called for reducing the NCAA D-1 men's shot clock from 35 seconds to 30, a move endorsed by some national sports media, most coaches told the NCAA men's rules committee they prefer that the clock stay as it is.
- FIBA, which has authority over virtually all basketball played outside of the U.S., is proposing a change that after a rebound of a ball that hits the rim by the team in possession, the shot clock will reset to 14 seconds, not the full 24 seconds. (I believe the NCAA has adopted something similar.)
- Using the 24-second clock, Europe's top professional leagues and the NBA average 11-19 percent more points and more attempted field goals than the NCAA. Field-goal attempts in Europe average 8-13 percent per team more than in the NCAA. In the NBA, there are on average 23 percent more field-goal attempts than in the NCAA (adjusted for 40 minutes.)
- Collectively, NCAA D-1 men's teams shot 43.4 percent from the field during the 2012-13 season, 1.8 to 3.7 percent lower than top leagues in Europe or the NBA. "Shooting is not as good," Warnick quotes Brad Greenberg, a former assistant coach at Virginia Tech, South Florida, Saint Joseph's and other schools as well as the New York Knicks and Los Angeles Clippers. "Coaches make more decisions as to who plays based on who can guard. That's true in the NBA as well." Greenberg, now a head coach in Israel's top professional league, added "(t)here's a lot of false motion in NCAA offenses that is not designed to score, but just to control the possession. Teams pass the ball around and don't attack until late in the shot clock."
- Mike & Mike in the Morning host Mike Greenberg recently sided with Izzo's call for a shorter shot clock on his morning show. "You're not selling 'Come and watch our great defensive rotations.' That's ultimately not what you want to be selling as your product. You want to be selling a graceful game played by the great athletes that play basketball and let them go out and do their thing."
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