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Local coaches support NCAA rule reform

05/28/2015, 5:00pm EDT
By Josh Verlin

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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It looks like college basketball could be in for some big changes--depending on who you ask.

Last week, the NCAA Men’s Basketball Rules Committee approved a set of changes to various rules and regulations to “significantly improve the pace of play, better balance offense with defense and reduce the physicality in the sport,” per the organization’s release.

In laymen’s terms: scoring in college basketball is down--way down--over the last 20 years, and they’re trying to reverse that trend by increasing the speed of the game and tweaking a few other things.

So that’s why the rules committee made the following recommendations (and a few others), which will be heard by the NCAA Playing Rules Oversight Panel for final approval on June 8:

  • Shortening of the shot clock from 35 seconds to 30 seconds
  • Expanding the restricted arc under the basket from three feet to four feet
  • Coaches can no longer call live ball timeouts
  • One fewer timeout per team per game (from five to four)
  • Any timeout called within 30 seconds of a media timeout becomes a media timeout
  • Elimination of the five-second “closely guarded” rule while dribbling
  • Allow monitor use for shot clock violations during entire game (currently only available during final two minutes)
  • “Stricter enforcement” of defensive rules

CoBL spoke with a number of Division I coaches from the various schools in our coverage range, and while the majority were certainly supportive of the changes, it’s clear that they believe there’s plenty of work to be done.

Here are the seven we spoke with: Pat Chambers (Penn State), Steve Donahue (Penn), Fran Dunphy (Temple), Bruiser Flint (Drexel), John Giannini (La Salle), Phil Martelli (Saint Joseph’s) and Brett Reed (Lehigh). All seven had plenty to say about the current state of college basketball and whether or not the proposals on the table would

In addition to sharing their thoughts on the rule changes, quite a few coaches also had thoughts that were related to the state of basketball itself and other proposals they had to fix or save the game they loved. Several of CoBL’s senior staff tackled these issues in a series of columns:

Here are the coaches’ thoughts on the rule alterations themselves:

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Shortened shot clock
“As long as it’s the same for everyone, I’m not worried about it. I don’t think five seconds is going to make a world of difference. I don’t see a lot of teams getting a shot in seconds 32, 33, 34, so I don’t think those five seconds are going to have a huge impact. I just think that there’s a lot of pressure on coaches to win, and if there’s a lot of pressure on you to win, you’re going to emphasize defense and I think that’s what you’re seeing more than anything else.” --John Giannini

“I don’t think that we’re looking at the salvation of the game because now there will be more scoring and all of that; there’s not necessarily going to be any more scoring, because the shots that will now be taken will be a little more rushed. It was something that people thought we needed to do for our game, I don’t know that we had to, but I’m a guy that likes trying things, so let’s see what a 30-second shot clock does.” --Fran Dunphy

“I think it’s a pretty dramatic change. I’m doing the math, it’s almost 20 percent less. That’s a lot. I think it helps the game, I think what it does it it forces teams to start playing faster, and teach they game and try to give tips to make quicker decisions and play faster, I think you’ll see some growth in the offensive side.” --Steve Donahue

“The 30 second thing is awesome, I thought 24 would be better...I wish it was more universal, because these kids are playing in FIBA, they’re playing international, their dreams are to go to the NBA, you just think 24 would have been better.” --Pat Chambers

“I believe the shortened shot clock still allows enough versatility of play, going to 24 seconds would have streamlined basketball considerably at the college level and probably created a lot of cloning of basketball styles. I think within 30 seconds there’s still a reasonable enough time to have a little offensive versatility, but still accomplish the goal of increasing the number of possessions per game.” --Brett Reed

“I’m ambivalent about it. I think if people are honest, the debate started this year, when scoring went down again, and some of the games weren’t that enjoyable to watch, but the numbers are the numbers, they did it in the postseason NIT, and it didn’t increase scoring. So if they want to try something to get the blood flowing in basketball, I’m all good with that.” --Phil Martell

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Removal of the five-second close guarding call
“I like it because your five seconds is different than my five seconds, and your closely guarded is different than my closely guarded, so I think anything to change that is great. It’s just too hard a call to make, and I’m not a proponent of that.” --Fran Dunphy

“I like that, and the only reason I like that is I think it makes it a lot easier on officials. As long as it’s the same for everybody, I’m fine with it and I think it makes it easier for officials, so I like that one." --John Giannini

“No one, not just referees but coaches, we don’t know six feet compared to five and a half feet on the court in the middle of the action. You already have a clock that dictates play, so let’s eliminate the counting and let’s get the referees to call fouls. That’s going to help the game more than anything. Call fouls.” --Phil Martelli

“I don’t think anybody’s going to allow their point guard to dribble 27 times, so I think we all want a little bit of movement, we all want to get the ball reversed and share the basketball as much as we can because we know the benefits of that. Personally, I don’t think it’s a big deal.” --Pat Chambers

“If we’re going to go to 30 seconds, I don’t think the five-second closely guarded is a big deal either way. It’s a hard thing for refs to call anyways, I’d love to see the amount of calls that were actually made. If it’s going to go down to 30, I don’t have a problem if they eliminated that.” --Steve Donahue

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Defensive rule emphasis
“I just think the thing that will change the game, whether other people should be with more scoring, is just call more fouls. It’ll slow the game down but the kids will make an adjustment, the coaches will make an adjustment and it’ll be more wide-open.” --Fran Dunphy

“They didn’t go far enough here, strict enforcement of defensive rules, providing offensive players same principles of vertical protection as defensive players. Look, I think they should put out a list of four or five or six absolutes--if you do this, this is a foul. If you put a hand on a dribbler it’s a foul. If you put two hands on a low-post offensive player, it’s a foul. If you’re an offensive player and you dislodge the defense, it’s a foul. Not stricter enforcement, I think they should come out stronger on the game is too physical, there’s too much fouling, there’s too many collisions and there’s not enough calls in my opinion.” --Phil Martelli

“I think there’s some things we can take from the NBA, I think when teams are trying to foul at the end of games, so let’s say I had four fouls and we have fouls to give, we’ll just go okay we’re going right to the one-and-one instead of going through fouling three or four times to get there. I think there’s rules at the NBA that we can take from those guys and utilize to speed up our game a little bit, because it’s all about flow it sounds like, it’s all about the two-hour window to try to get it in.” --Pat Chambers

“Freedom of movement comes from how the referees call it. If they’re letting people chuck people, you’re going to get chucked. If not, you’re going to have more freedom of movement. You’re going to have to change the rules of defense if you’re talking about freedom of movement. In the NBA they have illegal defenses, you don’t have that in college. That restricts some of the movement.” --Bruiser Flint

“The NBA’s got a very good model: 32 teams, full-time officials, they can educate them and do all the same things. College basketball has 350 (teams), there’s so many different levels of basketball, so many different arenas, no full-time officials. I think it’s very difficult to think that we’re going to be able to make dramatic changes in how the game’s officiated.” --Steve Donahue

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Timeout changes
“For some up-and-coming teams, I think it might hurt, for teams that are rebuilding, I think it could hurt, teams that are young, I think it could hurt. But I get it, they want more flow, it’s too choppy, the end of the game takes an hour. So I think it would just hurt those situations, but when you have a veteran team and a veteran coach, I don’t think it’s going to make a difference.” --Pat Chambers

“I love it. I’d be in favor of three timeouts the whole game. I just think with our media timeouts already, you get four a half already and then you get four for one team, four for another, it’s plenty. I think it’s a good move, and if anything I’d be in favor of making it three.” --Steve Donahue

“You better be more well-prepared for late-game situations, where you don’t need timeouts to know what you want to get for a 3-point shot in the last possession or whatever shot you want, you better be prepared to get it without having to take a timeout…when you see teams not as well-prepared for that last minute, it’s because that preparation has to come at the expense of something else. Now, if you can’t call a timeout to set something up, you absolutely have to spend more time on late-game situations.” --John Giannini

“The games are too long...you want to engage fans, you want to engage viewers, there’s enough stoppages in the game to ‘coach,’ so I don’t have a problem with that. I just think it’s part of the strategy now, it’s a coaching strategy. To me, use of timeouts it the same as use of man-to-man or zone. You have to get a feel for what you want, how you want to use them.” --Phil Martelli

“I’m sure from a fan standpoint and the overall length of the game...I could see where you would go in that direction. It’s nice as a coach to have control, to be able to handle special situations, but there’s going to be more of an emphasis on controlling runs within the game so you can save some timeouts towards the ends of games.” --Brett Reed

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Four-foot restricted arc
“I think they needed a little bit wider, higher arc...because there’s more space for the referees to see it, to be honest with you. I think it’s a little too far underneath the basket, another foot will give the referees a little more space to operate.” --Bruiser Flint

“I think they’re just trying to prevent those collisions, everybody’s getting hurt. I think it benefits us because we’ve got great shot-blockers, we’ve got Jordan Dickerson, Brandon Taylor, Donovon Jack...but I get it. I think we took less charges this year than we’ve done in years past because typically they’re calling blocks. I think you’re going to see more block calls, more offense, more free-throw shots.” --Pat Chambers

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Increased shot-clock review
“I think we’ve got to be careful there. After doing a year of TV, the game is very choppy. I think we’ve got to make the game more viewable. Shot clock violation in the first half isn’t a big deal to me. Last two minutes, it’s a big deal.” --Steve Donahue

“I don’t like increased use of the monitor, I think it allows a less-than-confident, I think it gives a crutch to a less-than-confident referee. And the only thing I want is a confident referee, I want a guy out there that has conviction and he will make his calls with conviction, he will communicate with conviction. The better the referee the more communication because they’re confident in their abilities. The less communication I think a guy’s trying to hide.” --Phil Martelli

“I think it’s fine and accuracy is really important, but it seems a little bit counter to the other rules that were proposed...Right now we can review something at a media timeout that is either a 2-point field goal or a 3-point field goal, and that goes pretty seamlessly into the game, the officials are working while the timeout takes place. To add monitor review all the way through, I think it’s important to get it right, but I think it is a little bit counter to some of the overall emphasis coming out in these rules.” --Brett Reed

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