Mark Bradley: College basketball stinks

The points he should have made are how scoring and field goal percentage are down across the NCAA in comparison to previous seasons and decades. I've seen the point made elsewhere. Saying a couple of games were low scoring doesn't show that the entire sport is suffering. Compare this season to previous seasons or decades, and you have your proof.

However, he's right. College basketball stinks.

I can remember when I used to watch games all throughout the week and lived for matchups like Duke-North Carolina. This year, I chose to watch that New Mexico Bowl over Indiana-Butler (although, I did flip to it during commercials).

What was a once great sport is dying. I can't name the top 10 most recognizable college players either. And that disappoints me.

 

Maybe Paul Pierce

Lot of great college players that I knew would not be studs in the NBA - JJ Redick and Tyler Hansbrough come to mind.

 

Curry, Deron Williams, Brandon Roy all stayed around, but it's the small number of these players that limits the college game.

If you were to take, say, 1984's All Americans, let them take the drugs and train for one off season and then play in today's college game, I don't think they would find much competition.

Wayman Tisdale, Oklahoma
Sam Perkins, North Carolina
Patrick Ewing, Georgetown
Akeem Olajuwon, Houston
Michael Jordan, North Carolina
Chris Mullin, St. John's (NY)
Devin Durrant, Brigham Young
Leon Wood, Cal St.-Fullerton
Keith Lee, Memphis
Melvin Turpin, Kentucky
Michael Cage, San Diego St.
Sam Bowie, Kentucky
Lorenzo Charles, North Carolina State
Michael Young, Houston

The 1984 Carolina Tarheels, who did not make the Final Four had...

Kenny Smith - FR
Michael Jordan - JR
Matt Doherty - SR
Brad Daugherty - SO
Sam Perkins - SR

They would not be challenged in today's college game.

1984 Georgetown?

20 Fred Brown '84 Guard*
22 Gene Smith '84 Guard*
24 Bill Martin '85 Guard
30 Michael Jackson '86 Guard
32 Horace Broadnax '86 Guard
33 Patrick Ewing '85 Center*
34 Reggie Williams '87 Forward*
40 David Wingate '86 Forward*
50 Michael Graham '87 Forward

Half of these guys would have never seen their sophomore years.

 

College basketball is weak, but the NBA is stronger than it's been in a long time. That being the case, I now watch a lot more NBA and it's become my favorite sport in recent years after college basketball was my favorite sport for the first 22 years of so of my life. I still get the same enjoyment out of basketball each year, just from a different level of basketball.

 

I did radio PBP for a university a number of years ago. In games that were not televised, we'd have two official timeouts per half because otherwise you might get stuck in a situation where you'd go 40 minutes without a single break.

 

What's hard to describe is how great they both were.

Here is the 1983-1984 All-NBA First Team

Larry Bird, Boston Celtics
Bernard King, New York Knicks
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Los Angeles Lakers
Isiah Thomas, Detroit Pistons
Magic Johnson, Los Angeles Lakers

The finals that season was Lakers vs Celtics.

You literally never stopped watching basketball in the 1980s.

 

http://www.sbnation.com/college-basketball/2013/1/28/3925768/akron-zips-nike-basketball-jersey-twitter-handle

 

As someone else said, Bradley should have used scoring/shooting stats from previous eras to make his point. I miss the variety of styles, the contrast between run-and-gun programs like UNLV and Loyola Marymount vs. half-court, defensive oriented teams like Georgetown and Temple.

Whether it's because of the 3-point line or more zone defense, college offenses aren't very entertaining to watch these days.

The half-court style of passing the ball around the perimeter, then chucking up a 3-point attempt to beat the shot clock gets old fast.

 

3 pt shot has made the college game more one dimensional. Rick Pitino is the guy to blame

 

That was me dick.

 

The NBA is doing remarkably well right now, better than it has in awhile...

 

Kentucky is really the only program going hardcore with the one-and-done players and turning over the roster every year.

The Top 5 right now:
Michigan: Best two players are a junior and a sophomore.
Kansas: Starts four seniors and a freshman
Indiana: Two seniors, two juniors and a sophomore
Florida: Leading scorers are three seniors and two juniors.
Duke: Best three players are seniors.