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Report: More rules changes could be on the way next season

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There was a major push last offseason to make the on-court product during a college basketball game more palatable. The game had turned into a glorified rugby match, the physicality draining the life -- and scoring -- out of college hoops.

That changed this season, as the new rules that were implemented changed how referees would be calling the game. They took away hand-checking, they limited how much a player could be bumped on a cut through the lane and, once referees and players fell into a rhythm, it helped to increase the scoring and made the game more entertaining to watch.

This year there will be a number of rules changes up for vote as well, according to Pat Forde of Yahoo Sports:


  • Reducing the number of timeouts. The biggest issue with college hoops is that the end of a close game takes forever, between the fouls, the timeouts given when a player fouls out and the fact that the teams get some many timeouts per game.
  • The reduction of the shot clock to 30, or even 24, seconds. I’d be in favor of 30 seconds, but 24 is too short. This isn’t the NBA, you need to allow the teams a chance to run a set otherwise college hoops will devolve into nothing but one-on-one isolations from players that aren’t as good as their NBA counterparts.
  • Eliminating live-ball timeouts, which is a rule that FIBA has in place. The way the current rules are set up, if the defense gets a trap, an offensive player -- or his coach -- can call timeout to save possession. In the international game, timeouts can only be called when the ball is dead.
  • Changing the 10-second rule so that a team has ten seconds total to cross half court. Calling a timeout in the back court currently refreshes the clock.

There are a few other rules on the table -- widening the lane, using the NBA’s continuation rule, no scoring on charges -- but those four are the big four that have been complained about the most.

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