NCAA tournament 2011 — running thread

Here's another proposal that's admittedly gimmicky, and one I know would never actually happen, but a few years ago one of those pseudo professional leagues experimented with an interesting rule where, if a team failed to get the ball past the half court line, the team that took it away would get an extra "bonus" point if they scored a field goal on the ensuing possession.

Thought that idea nicely promotes much of what's needed in today's game--awards teams that press defensively and play full court instead of just letting the opponent walk the ball to the other end, speeds up the tempo, encourages teams to put better ballhandlers and steal artist athletes and fewer big unskilled stiffs on the floor, and adds a fun element to the game for fans.

 

I for one like the rules pretty close to where they are. I wouldn't mind if everybody went to a 30-second shot clock, meaning the pros adding time and colleges subtracting time. I like the length of international clock at 30. Gives you time to run offense, but keeps you from delaying the game.

To me, if your shot clock is right, then the half-court violation rule really becomes less relevant. If you only have 30 seconds to shoot and you waste 8 seconds just trying to get past half court, by the time you settle into your offense, you'll barely have 17-18 seconds to run it, which is not good enough. And, if the other team is pressing you, making you struggle to get it past half court, you want to do more than just settle into the offense, you want to push the ball up and score. If you don't try to do that, to me the game has a way of penalizing you anyway.

To me, that's plenty of incentive to get it over the timeline and get things rolling on offense. I don't see getting the ball over the timeline as an issue now, for that matter. I actually don't mind the women's game's lack of a 10-second rule (it's still like that, right?) because they have the shot clock. If they want to piddle away in the backcourt while the shot clock is running down, well, good luck.


To me, the 8-second rule would be akin to football going to the three-down Canadian system because you don't like the off-tackle play on first-and-10.

 

Players fouling out in basketball, to me, is stupid.

After 10 team fouls (or seven or whatever) give the fouled team one shot plus possession or one point plus possession.

You want a quick moving game? Stop lining them up for a free throw. Just give them a point every time they are fouled.

 

You'd have even more fouls that way.

As soon as people propose not fouling out, I tune them out. Even going to six fouls in the Big East for a year, I believe, was a flop.

 

Really? You think blowing a whistle and awarding a point and possession for every foul would not slow people down or stop them from fouling? If it's a shooting foul, give them two points automatically. Whatever works, just keep them off the line.

The two things that hurt watching a basketball game are walking to the free trow line every 45 seconds and seeing the best players sitting on the bench because of early foul trouble.

 

It'd cause players to be even more directed toward drawing fouls than they already are. Possibly increasing fouls.