The Renegade's Final Picks & Thoughts for 2003-2004 Boys B-ball

The Renegade's Final Picks (and thoughts) of the 2003-2004 IHSAA Boys Basketball Season

A USA-365.com Special Report

(3-28-2004)

FOOTBALL (complete) 138 of 184, 75.0%

BASKETBALL
Regular season: 77 of 126, 61.1%
State Tournament : 51 of 68, 75.1%

The Pick	The Result
(1A) Waldron 70, Blackhawk 55	RIGHT...Waldron 69, Blackhawk 54
(2A) Brownstown 66, Jimtown 56	WRONG... Jimtown 63-59
(3A) Bellmont 48, Mater Dei 45	WRONG... (Evansville) Mater Dei 63-45
(4A) Lawrence North 52, Columbia City 35	RIGHT... Lawrence North 50-29

The state finals saw yet another private school (Mater Dei) win the title. Bellmont, with four juniors, may have choked in the state finals. Look for them to return next year. Jimtown and Waldron are senior dominated and wont be back. Waldron was just the 9th undefeated state champion the 94-year history of the state tournament.

Now, the bad news. Lawrence North's top two players are 6-1 guard Michael Conley and 7-foot center Greg Oden who, barring injury or transfer, both return for the next two seasons. The Wildcats were the top-ranked team all season and will start 2005 as one of the top-10 teams in the nation. There is no one on the horizon who matches up with them and it will be interesting to see if anyone calls them to try to schedule a game.

Meanwhile, it's time to again offer some season-ending thoughts on how to improve basketball. Not leagues or formats but the game itself. Some foolish rules have been installed over the past 20-30 years and some rules have gone stale.

Just non-fundamental rule changes that would make the game more fair. The only factor that ever stays the same is continuous change. It's always coming.

This change screams out to be done. The reason that a precision slowdown team like Columbia City can reach the state finals is that everyone else has gone 3-point happy. Before the line was there, do you remember teams taking twenty 20-footers in a 32-minute game? I don't. Teams believe they can sink enough three-point baskets so they don't have to shoot 50% from the floor. And it works until you run up against a precision team that limits YOUR possessions.

In college, St. Joseph's almost reached the semifinals of the national championship shooting 30 three-point attempts every game. But were they really a strong team?

The bottom line is that picking and screening is fundamental basketball. Passing and dribbling are the basic skills of the game. It takes less of those four skills to shoot 3-point baskets than it does to get a high-percentage shot. Ironically, scoring has gone down in all levels of basketball since the institution of the 3-point shot.

I do not want to eliminate the 3-point shot. Shooting is a skill as well and distance shots can be rewarded. But the present 3-point high school and college shot is like a free throw. It allows players who can't really play to play.

The distance should be the NBA line, almost 23 feet. Not the candy shot (just under 20 feet) that it is in high school.

I want to see players go hard and sometimes a couple of offensive fouls (admittedly a very difficult call for referees) take away aggressiveness. I also like to see hand checking called as fouls but officials don't want to foul everybody out so they let it go. Here's the solution. Six fouls for each player. Five fouls was an arbitrary total that was decided on in another era. That era is gone forever.
Players are bigger, faster and stronger and there will be three officials for every game next year in high school. Go to six fouls and create a triple bonus (15 fouls in a half), allowing three free throws for every foul at that point. Let the best players play. This is a rule that has been discussed for decades and its time to do it. You'll see more points and a better, more athletic game.

Whoever decided this rule was a good idea should be taken out back and whipped. The idea that you can be called for a violation while dribbling the ball goes against the basic spirit of the game. Players who can keep the ball while dribbling it in the front court should be encouraged to do so, not called for a violation.

Somehow this rule got credited for eliminating the stall, which some fans don't like and, I guess, was assumed to be caused by good dribblers. Teams still stall as much as they ever did. No one really stalls by dribbling the ball. That's a delay game and the delay game is good basketball and should not be limited.

Don't misunderstand. A player who is NOT dribbling should be called for a violation after five seconds. But good dribblers are what people come to see. They are the show.

That's what kids go to basketball camp when they're eight years old to learn how to do. Please don't penalize skill.

I believe in the delay but make a team earn the right. Instead of 10 seconds to cross midcourt, give a team EIGHT (8) seconds. That encourages more teams to press full court and it emphasizes ball-handlers. There will be more turnovers and transition scores, but skilled teams can still stall, which is what separates high school basketball from basketball at every other level.

An eight-second backcourt limit will increase scoring. It will take a non-dribbling, shooter off the floor and put an added ball-handler out there. It will encourage three-guard offenses which will speed the game. Most high schools use three guard offenses anyway.
The more skilled team, best coached team, will avoid turnovers and win. Not just the tallest and fastest. This is a move that prevents a team from walking the ball up the floor and it favors the little guy. Big people who are not skilled don't figure in getting the ball across the time line. That's what you want.

That's just a silly rule made for bad referees. It was decided since refs couldn't throw the ball up fairly that the jump ball would be eliminated and possessions would alternate on held ball or jump ball situations. That logic is almost too embarrassing to even discuss.
When the defense forces a jump ball, the defense should get the ball. At the start of the quarter, have a jump ball. It is a dramatic part of the game and many teams used to run set plays off the jump ball.

I secretly believe that if the jump ball call gives the ball to the defense 100% of the time, referees won't be so quick to call jump balls.

If the defense can get the ball by forcing jump balls, more players will dive onto the floor for the ball. That's better for the game. Fairness isn't giving each team the ball half the time.

What do YOU think? Would these non-fundamental rule changes make the Indiana high school basketball game more fair? Write 'The Renegade' at usa365@ameritech.net. We'll post some of the more creative responses and alternative suggestions the weekend of the NCAA Final Four.