Slow pace, low scores damage college hoops' watchability, visibility

There are — and will always be — die-hard fans of college basketball; they'll watch whatever product is put on the floor.

For casual sports fans, though, the quality of the product matters. And this season, it's particularly poor.

Scoring is down (again). We're on pace to have the slowest season in the sport's history. There are far too many ugly shots, bad misses and endless timeouts that kill any sort of momentum a game has.

For a sport that already struggles to gain visibility during a regular season that heavily overlaps with college football and the NFL, a nearly unwatchable on-court product is a problem.

(It's also a problem that might not seem so bad were it not for a similar yet drastically better product available nightly — with household names to boot. Say what you want about the NBA's regular season, but you can't deny it's nice to watch guys make baskets.)

On Saturday, it took Wyoming and Fresno State until their second overtime period for both teams to crack 60. That same afternoon, in two of the day's marquee matchups, No. 7 Louisville (which lost at home to Duke) and No. 8 Utah (which lost at Arizona) failed to score more than 52 points. No. 15 West Virginia made just 13 field goals in its game against Texas, the second-lowest total for the team since 1951.

"It's a bad trend," said Ken Pomeroy, founder of the advanced statistics site KenPom.com.

"This seems to be the state of the game," said Belmont coach Rick Byrd, who is also the chair of the Men's Basketball Rules Committee. "I'm not sure I've inherited this role at the best time."

Byrd laughed, but he's well aware how serious these issues are, and how multifaceted they are. He said the rules committee is worried about them. There are plenty others in the sport, like those on the Men's College Basketball Officiating Competition Committee, who are also concerned about game's current trends.

"They don't want the game to slide into a point where it's not enjoyable, where it's sluggish, where it's ugly — use all the words you want to," Byrd said.

Multiple teams have had the distinct honor of single-digit scoring halves this season. (Cough, UCLA, cough.) Final scores in the 80s and 90s have been rare — and when they do come, they feel like a treat.

Yes, scouting has improved significantly because of technology, and there are some extremely good defensive teams, most notably No. 1 Kentucky and No. 2 Virginia. But too often, we're crediting teams (and lauding defense) for an opponents' offensive ineptitude.

Why are these offenses struggling so much? Let's start with the rules.

Two seasons ago, pace of play was the slowest it had ever been, with just 65.9 possessions per 40 minutes, according to KenPom.com. Scoring was the lowest it had been in more than 60 years, with teams each scoring an average of 67.5 points per game.

In response, the Men's Basketball Rules Committee and officiating community reacted in a decidedly pro-offense way, limiting contact with the ballhandler and interpreting the always-murky block/charge call in a way most favorable to the offensive player. There was an adjustment period, sure, but most in and around the game felt the changes were for the better, and that after a flurry of early fouls, teams would learn to play defense with their feet instead of their hands, and offensive players would have more freedom of movement.

By the middle and end of last season, officials reverted back to the status quo. Conference play was as physical as ever. This season, with yet another interpretation of the block/charge rule, the advantage has returned to the defensive player. Physicality remains a problem, particularly in the paint.

Many involved in the sport believe there won't be a true shift in college basketball until there are significant rules changes to benefit scoring.

Right now, Byrd isn't so sure exactly what changes would actually help offenses — he personally believes that shortening the shot clock could help defenses more and would also cause the sport to lose its unique styles of play — and is hesitant to suggest changes just to try them out.

"The job the committee has is to make college basketball the best game it can be," Byrd said. "If you're going to make a rule change, you better make sure it's the best for the game."

But for now, coaches know how the game is officiated and what their players can get away with.

"I think in some ways, coaches are very crafty in terms of taking advantage of how much contact is allowed," Pomeroy said. "If officials are going to allow more contact over time, that's an advantage for the defense. All those things kind of come together to create this situation."

Pomeroy said there's also more incentive to play zone or a pack-line defense, at least with the rules the way they are. Those types of defenses typically lengthen possessions, which slows down the game and limits scoring opportunities. At the same time, teams are forgoing offensive rebounds to get back in transition. The days of running and gunning are a quaint memory.

"Zone defenses are more popular than they were two seasons ago," Pomeroy said. "There are lot more three-pointers being shot this year than last year, for instance. … Whether it's zone or pack-line, that's the trend."

Even Duke went zone against Louisville last week; its famous man-to-man defense had been getting shredded in previous games.

But there are other factors, too, that help explain why college basketball's offense is deteriorating, and why it has been deteriorating over the last decade or so.

In an era of player transience marked by one-and-dones and transfers, many players rarely spend enough time in college or with one team to truly develop their skills.

Some coaches say incoming players have a different skill set than they have had in the past in general, with grassroots basketball emphasizing ball handling and creating shots, as opposed to pure perimeter shooting.

Others point to the post. In recent years, teams have given up a traditional low-post threat for more of a pick-and-roll, pick-and-pop type of player. Instead of a consistent post game, featuring a go-to scorer and high-percentage shots, teams are now more affected by hot and cold shooting nights.

That's a laundry list of factors that combine to produce a product that's causing people to change the channel. An ESPN spokesman said Sunday there's been a slight decrease in audiences this year compared to the last few years at this point in the season.​

These are the same teams and players that will almost certainly have fans glued to their TV sets come March.

But they need something more enticing to watch from November to February. Otherwise, they simply won't.