35 second shot clock

But I've been to plenty of games where they couldn't even get the game clock working correctly, or the person running it doesn't know what in hell he's doing. Adding a shotclock would lead to an epic clusterromance in those cases.

 

One of the reasons we see fewer fast-breaks isn't control-freak coaches ... it's the defenses.

We rotate one player back to halfcourt on every shot to prevent a fast-break, and work on transition defense a lot. As a result, we give up very few fast-break baskets.

Most teams look to break first, but if it's not there, then they run their offense. The lack of a clock allows a smaller, slower HS team to at least have a chance to compete with a larger, faster team based on being able to handle the ball and break down a defense. Most HS teams can't hold the ball past a few passes. If you have a clock, you will see worse offense -- most HS teams don't have kids that can break people down off the dribble, and to be honest, the "spread-the-floor-and-break-'em-down-or-pitch-for-the-3" offense that a short shot clock begats can be unwatchable.

I hate the 3-out, 2-in, come-out-and-get-us dribble-weave offenses, but a good motion offense run well for 1-2 minutes against solid defense that ends in a layup is much more enjoyable to watch than everyone standing around to get into position to run one set play in a 30-second span.

 

It is not about fastbreaks - it is about players learning how to create their own offense, which they never do when they are told to run through long drawn out sets on every possession and are forced to play that way.

There is nothing worse than teams being allowed to milk the clock for two or three minutes at a time -- and nothing worse that kids who can't create their own offense and can't score unless they are coming off a back door cut and pick and get a perfect pass for a wide open lay-up.

When "running some clock" is considered sound strategy -- in the first fucking half of the game -- then we're not teaching kids how to play basketball.

 

I just must not be watching the same college games that some of you are. I watch mostly ACC and Big 12, but I see plenty of teams (Kansas, Mizzou, Texas, Baylor, K-State, UNC, Duke, Clemson, etc.) that want to get up and down the court. Teams such as Kentucky, Villanova, Syracuse and BYU are also scoring a lot of points. Georgetown scored 103 the other day.

Sure, sometimes there are teams like Nebraska or Colorado that want to run the clock because they are outmatched, but it sure doesn't seem like a major issue to me.

 

This.

We have a woman here who always gets to run the scoreboard. She's always afraid of not being ready to buzz in the subs and so always has one finger on the horn button, which she frequently ends up pushing while the ball is in play because she reacts whenever someone comes up to the scorer's table.

At the juco, we have a guy who's prone to entering the wrong player on a foul. And since it's one of those scoreboards that automatically tabulates each player's number of fouls for you, the wrong number of fouls appears by a player's number several times a game. The place where the shot clock guy sits — it's too close to the visitor's bench and his sight gets obscured if anyone stands up — leaves him unable to tell if a player has shot an airball sometimes, so he resets the shot clock when he shouldn't. He says that he sometimes has to wait for the sound of the ball hitting the rim. I don't know why the college doesn't move him to a better spot.

 

Agreed ... outside of some Big 10 sludgefests, I see plenty of entertaining up and down hoops in college.

 

Bullshit.

I would much rather watch Magic Johnson or Steve Nash play with his head up looking for the open man than Iverson putting his head down and dribbling into three defenders or trying an unmakable jumper over a much taller defender.

You want to dribble and drive, do it after to have been set up with a screen or some type motion. Thinking that catching the ball, standing still for two or three seconds and then trying to drive is a good offense is just wrong.

Get the defender running at you when you make the catch; that is when you should drive. And that is set up by a set play.