Inspired by last night’s NCAA final game, but also with “hack a Shaq” in mind…
When I am named commissioner of all basketball, I am going to add one or both of the following two rules to the rulebook to address intentional end-of-game fouling. Please tell me why I’m wrong about this…
Intentional fouls are treated like technicals. The fouled team gets to pick its shooter, and they are awarded an extra shot. So…it becomes a potential 3-point hit against the fouling team instead of 2, and the likelihood of the shots being made goes up.
An intentional foul causes a run-off from the game clock equal to one shot clock. That way fouling can’t be used effectively for time management.
If you’ve got a better idea, let’s hear it. If you like intentional fouling, well… :dubious:
I can see being frustrated by fouling when a team is doing it while trailing by eight points with 15 seconds left. But last night, intentional fouling was unquestionably the correct strategy for Kansas. While discouraging teams from pointlessly dragging the game out isn’t so bad, this rule would have deprived us of that comeback last night and made it harder for losing teams to get back in the game. I have to vote nay on this one.
Refs have the authority to call flagrant fouls and technicals at their discretion. I think this would be easier because deliberate fouling is pretty obvious…one team inbounds the ball, or gets a rebound, and a member of the other team grabs the guy with the ball immediately to get a whistle and stop the clock. It’s not like it’s subtle.
Not a Memphis fan, but a fan of the game who’s frustrated with this tactic. IMO, if being 10 points down with a minute to play is no big deal because you can use intentional fouling as a “strategy,” then there’s something wrong with the rules. It’s not a strategy. It’s a loophole.
You’re way off: it almost never works, so it’s not a loophole. It’s a strategy that works on rare occasions. And had Memphis even been a fairly bad foul shooting team it wouldn’t have worked last night. But they were terrible, and they were certainly terrible in the clutch.
Don’t get me wrong, I get annoyed when a team can’t possibly win and is dragging out the game with fouls. But that’s not what happened last night. If Kansas was still down by nine and fouling with 20 seconds left, I would have been grumbling or changing the channel.
And unless my memory is failing me, intentional fouls are ALREADY technicals if the official determines the player was not going for the ball. So I’m not sure how much this rule can even be altered to fit this situation.
My thoughts exactly. You should never be rewarded for intentionally fouling.
I like your clock-eating idea; maybe tweak it to be the converse of the NFL. In the NFL, during the final minute of play, if you commit a penalty while the clock is running and you have the ball, it’s a 10 second run-off. In the NBA, it would be something like during the final minute, if you don’t have the ball and commit a foul while the clock is running, there is a 10 second run-off.
I didn’t know that. How come it’s never called? The “wrap the guy up and hug him to get a foul call” move is pretty much de rigeur at the end of games, especially in the NBA, these days. Is there just a gentleman’s agreement not to call the technical?
The problem is;
The leading team made it’s points during regulation clock, by setting up plays, by executing those plays and by outplaying the other team. The flow of the game is completely disrupted.
The trailing team denies the leading team the three point shot during these fouls whereas the trailing team has the opportunity to make the three. The trailing team also forces the leading team to make twice as many baskets to equal one of theirs (two free throws = one basket) and the trailing team can make up more ground if they can bomb in some threes while allowing the leading team to score one or two points at a time down the stretch from the line.
Would you find it acceptable if a trailing team were down by 20 with 5 minutes left and started playing hack-a-shaq?
I hate it. I’m all for the OP except the 2nd rule needs to be amended so that the clock (shot clock rule) can only be run down if the trailing team is the one that fouls, not the leading team as one poster mentioned.
The flow of the game will be disrupted regardlessly. If you make those changes, do you think the leading team will spend the last couple minutes “setting up plays, by executing those plays and by outplaying the other team”? No, they will spent it hogging the ball, so that the other team doesn’t have enough time to do anything.
No, if the changes are made the trailing team won’t foul and the leading team is still bound by the 24 second shot clock.
Howzabout if the trailing team went to a full court press? That makes for more exciting b-ball then hack-a-shaq.
And I think 10 seconds off the clock would be more appropriate than the full 24.
First of all, Kansas has erased most of their 9 point deficit BEFORE Memphis started missing their free throws. They started fouling with over two minutes left, but got the game within two (I think) while Memphis was still making all their foul shots. The steal on the inbounds which lead to a quick three had more to do with them getting it to overtime than their early fouling strategy.
That said, I also hate it when games turn into free throw shooting contests. My solution would be to eliminate the bonus. Or at least give the fouled team the option to take the ball out of bounds instead of shooting free throws. I think it would make for quicker and more exciting endings, but I’m sure there are some potential drawbacks. But the way the game is now is pretty lame, I think.
I like this idea. It puts the fouled team in control of the situation. If they’d rather have easy points, they can shoot the foul shots. If they’d rather use some clock, they can have a possession.
The team in the lead has the option to allow only 1-2 point trips too. Lots of people think that Calipari should have called for a foul on the last possession by Kansas before they got close to shooting it.
