All Three'd Out

I'm sure there was plenty of excitement in Sunday's NCAA Tournament games, but I just could not bring myself to watch much of it yesterday.  This is a first for me, because I love college sports--and especially March Madness, with the upsets, buzzer beaters and everyone living and dying on every shot.  But I can't handle seeing anymore three point attempts.

Basketball below the NBA level has devolved into a two-shot game, the 3-pointer and the blow-by layup.  There is little effort made to feed the ball into the low post for big men to take high-percentage shots.  Their only hope of scoring now is grabbing a rebound for a put-back or stepping out to shoot threes of their own.  And the next time I see a kid shoot a pull up ten foot jumper from the baseline will be the first time I see a kid shoot a pull up ten foot jumper from the baseline in this entire tournament.

You don't realize how boring the game has become (from a strategy standpoint) until you watch a lot of it in a condensed amount of time and recognize how limited offense has become.  It started with the high school championship games as Roncalli, Valders and their opponents just kept jacking it up from the outside.  Kaukauna's Jordan McCabe was forcing up 24-footers early in their game against Milwaukee Washington--and nobody questioned his shot selection.  We had the 3-point line when I was in high school and if anyone took shots like that (and didn't make them) they would earn themselves a seat on the bench immediately.  Now coaches just clap their hands and tell their kids to keep jacking it from the cheap seats.

The NCAA Tournament games were just as bad.  Michigan State has no one that can make a three--yet that was more than half their shots against the Syracuse 2-3 zone--which can effectively be attacked from the baseline using passes from the high-post.  Instead, State's post players just kept kicking it out to stationary shooters standing around the three-point line to put up brick after brick.

The game that I think really sent me over the edge in frustration was the D-III title game between UW-Oshkosh and Nebraska Wesleyan--where the two teams combined to shoot 62 THREE POINTERS!!  The Titans alone attempted 40 of them. Wesleyan probably would have shot that many too, if they weren't having such success driving past Titan defenders at the 3-point line so often for layups.  If that had been the first basketball game you had ever watched, you would think that players are not allowed to attempt shots inside the three-point arc and outside of the free throw lane because there were ZERO shots taken from that area the entire contest. 

Just like the pass-happy offenses of football at all levels has decreased the quality of that game, the three-ball focus of modern basketball threatens to turn off fans tired of seeing the same thing over and over and over again.  Hopefully, the Golden State Warriors dynasty will be replaced with something more like the 80's Celtics and Lakers--and kids will think mid-range jumpers and feeding the post players for high-percentage shots is cool again.  Although, having reffed youth basketball tournaments and watching 4th graders never set foot inside the arc--I doubt that is happening anytime soon.