Fixing College Basketball: What Rules Need To Be Changed For Next Season

Freshmen Marcus Smart (left), Ben McLemore and Anthony Bennett are all expected to be in this June's NBA Draft, but should the one-and-done rule be changed? (espn.com)

Reputations are powerful, especially bad ones, and right now college basketball's reputation is heading south. This reputation isn't about cheating or steroids. It's about the on-court product, although the NCAA does have its own issues to work out in terms of "amateurism."

A brilliant and entertaining national championship game wasn't enough to mask months of low scoring and poor officiating. Now that college basketball has entered the offseason, it's time to make the changes necessary to improve the game. If the NCAA needs some suggestions, how about starting with these:

One-and-done rule
This should be first and foremost on the NCAA's to-do list. It is difficult for the casual fan to become attached to the game when the teams go through complete overhauls each season because the star players sprint to the NBA Draft just as the country gets to know them. Imagine this – Kyrie Irving, Austin Rivers, Bradley Beal, Anthony Davis, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, Tristan Thompson, Brandon Knight and others all entered the draft as freshman and if not for the rule, they could all still be playing college basketball. What a March this could have been.

Six freshmen from this past season have already put their names in the draft, two of which, Ricky Ledo and Norvel Pelle never even played a game in college. Some players are talented enough to be ready for the NBA out of high school. That's fine, let them go. LeBron James, Kobe Bryant and Dwight Howard did not need college. But most do. Josh Selby left Kansas as a freshman and now has been jumping back and forth from the D-league. So let those leave out of high school if they are projected lottery picks. Otherwise make them stay in college for three years. The players will develop their games, mature and the fans get players and teams they can look forward to watching for more than one season.

Charge/block rule
The addition of the charge arc under the hoop, as seen in the NBA, is meant to protect offensive players from defenders laying out for a charge under the basket. If the defender is on or inside the arc, it can't be a charge. The problem lies in the focus on the arc. Officials are paying more attention to the defender's feet in relation to the arch that they are missing crucial factors such as if the defender is shuffling his feet or leaning into the play or if the offensive player was out of control.

The charge/block call is the focal point on an overall issue of officiating as the game has become more physical. The whistles constantly blowing breaks up the flow of the game. Part of this is poor defensive principles by the players, but too often are officials the story of the game and eventually players need to be able to make plays when the game is on the line.

Shot clock
Those 35 seconds on the shot clock in the college game can feel like an eternity, especially when teams like Wisconsin slow the game down and play a low-scoring, grind-out game. You could make dinner and do your taxes in the time Wisconsin has the ball for one possession when they grab offensive rebounds and throw the ball back out to start again.

There is no reason why college offenses should need 11 more seconds to hit the rim than NBA teams get with a 24-second clock. Take the college clock down to 24 seconds, or 30 even if 24 is a little too extreme. This will speed up the game, increase scoring and keep fans from falling asleep when those teams that play at the pace of a geriatric league don't bore people into turning the channel.

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NCAA vs. NBA: Could the Top-Seeded Louisville Cardinals Defeat the Charlotte Bobcats?

Peyton Siva wrenches the ball away from Kemba Walker in the 2010-11 season. (Frank Franklin II/AP)

The Charlotte Bobcats' 15-52 record is the NBA's worst. The roster is built with former NCAA stars Kemba Walker, Michael Kidd-Gilcrist and Gerald Henderson and most of the team's players could still be part of an NCAA tournament team. Myself and BDD pose the question: could this year's NCAA tournament's top seed, the Louisville Cardinals, defeat the Bobcats in a head-to-head battle?

When comparing an NBA and NCAA team, there are a two huge differences to take into account. The NBA plays four, 12-minute quarters. NCAA games are two, 20-minute halves. NBA teams abide to a 24-second shot clock, while NCAA teams have 35 seconds to put up a successful shot attempt. Kemba Walker leads the struggling Bobcats by scoring only 17.2 points per game. Louisville junior guard Russ Smith scores 18.1 ppg for the Cardinals. Even with fewer possessions and shot attempts, Louisville's top scorer outscores Charlotte's by almost a full point.

Winners of only two of the past 10 games, Charlotte has failed to win more than three consecutive games all season. The Cardinals are winners of their last 10, most recently overcoming a 16-point deficit in the Big East Championship to defeat the talented Syracuse Orange. 

The Bobcats dwell at the bottom of almost every relevant statistical category.

BasketballReference.com

It's only fair we show the Cardinals' numbers, too.

The statistic that should pop off the page should be DRtg. 85.5 represents the number of points teams score against the Cardinals per 100 possessions. The Bobcats rank last in this category, holding a rating of 111.7. According to this, the Bobcats average nearly 96 possessions per game. Scoring at a rate of 93.1 ppg, the Bobcats manage to score a mere 1.02 ppp (points per possession), which is less than the Cardinals' average of 1.06. Keeping in mind possessions are more valuable because they are less frequent, a game where both teams abide by the same shot and game clock length, Louisville will both score and defend at a higher rate.

Where the Bobcats struggle, the Cardinals thrive. Only four teams have totaled more turnovers than Charlotte, while only one team has created more than Louisville. The Bobcats also have allowed their opponent to steal the ball away 455 times (only the Knicks have allowed more), ranking Charlotte second to last in the category. Who ranks second best in college hoops? You guessed it, the Louisville Cardinals.

The Bobcats are still professionals. The roster contains several veteran players with at least five years of experience in the league. Ben Gordon is one of those veterans who is prolific at scoring the basketball.  He also has experience playing for England at the Olympic level. An average front-court rotation contains 'quality' minutes from Byron Mullens, Bismack Biyombo and Josh McRoberts, all who are at least 6-9, with Mullens reaching 7-foot. Rick Pitino's front-court would be looking up. Only four Cardinal players are taller than 6-6 and none of them reach the 7-foot mark. Gorgui Dieng is Louisville's tallest player at 6-foot-11 and is the team's best rebounder. Chane Behanan, listed at 6-6, has tallied the second-most rebounds for the Cardinals. It is a tough match-up physically for Louisville as they also weigh 20 pounds less per player than the Bobcats. Charlotte is taller and larger before tip-off and even more experienced afterward. 

Kids are kids and professionals are professionals.  Both teams play very different basketball. That being said, it is still the same game. If the ball bounces the right way enough times, could the Cardinals score and steal their way to a victory? First, we'll see if they can defeat the competition at their own level, and maybe we could discuss it afterward.

Stats from: BasketballReference, TeamRankings.com, 

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Will Calipari's System Be Questioned Again After Kentucky's Slow Start?

Is Kentucky's rough start leading to questions about John Calipari's freshman strategy? (yahoo.com)

The system of coaching in college basketball changed after John Calipari and Kentucky won a national title last season. Or at least that's what we thought.

The idea of senior leadership and building players has been exchanged in Lexington for the year's best recruits (and maybe a few old sophomores and juniors). And before last season, the formula had proven to produce positive results, but never the ultimate result, which made it easier for people to dismiss Cal's methods.

Anthony Davis, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist and the rest of the young Wildcats proved what raw ability can do with a season of preparation. Naturally, the same was expected of this year's group. UK has highly touted freshmen in Nerlens Noel, Alex Poythress, Archie Goodwin and Willie Cauley-Stein, who have even higher expectations and more pressure on them than last year's squad.

Kentucky just lost its second game in a row and third of the season, which is more losses than the 2011-12 team had all season and keeping them barely above .500 at 4-3. The 2011-12 team's first loss was on Dec. 10 to Indiana and then it didn't lose again until the SEC Tournament Championship game against Vanderbilt.

Freshmen are supposed to go through growing pains, and that's exactly what is happening to UK this year. The talent is there, but adjusting to the pace of the college game and facing hostile environments, not to mention building team chemistry, takes time.

This season's start is making last year look more and more like a once-in-a-decade group, rather than the new norm in the college game. Who else has found a team, led by freshmen, that only lost one game in the regular season (on a buzzer-beater 3-pointer in a loud Assembly Hall), go perfect in conference play and win a national title, all while looking like it was the best team in the country? If there were growing pains, they didn't show up in the final score. The starters rarely looked like the stage was too big for them and the chemistry was as good as it could be for players working together for the first year.

It was just assumed that since Cal pulled this feat off last year, of course he could do it again this year. That's what the system entails; come in for one year, be one of the best teams in the country, compete for a title and then go make money in the NBA. The most difficult part is the recruiting, and Cal has succeeded with flying colors.

But now we're seeing why coaches and analysts preach senior leadership and chemistry. Trust me, any coach would take the most talented freshmen if he could get them, and Cal shouldn't be faulted for that. There just also happens to be a down side to the approach, and we're witnessing it as Kentucky will most likely drop out of the top 25 this week.

This doesn't mean Kentucky is going to flop or remain in neutral all season. They'll be a dangerous team to face in the NCAA Tournament because a lot can be learned in four months. This is more about how special last year's team was, and that Cal hasn't discovered a fool-proof secret to the game, he has just crafted another way compete.

Other teams still have a fighting chance and the college basketball apocalypse can be put on hold until the next super-frosh team makes all of us rethink our team's strategy.


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