NCAA Men’s Basketball is seeing a lot of changes this year, and it’s not just in the incoming athletes. The NCAA Men’s Basketball committee has approved several rules for the 2015-2016 academic year. The NCAA hopes to “improve the pace of play, better balance offense with defense and reduce the physicality in the sport.”
Back in the 1993-1994 season, the shot clock was reduced from 45 seconds to 35 seconds. Now, the shot clock is again being reduced, this time to 30 seconds.
Teams will now also have one less timeout in the second half. The NCAA wrote, “Officials will focus more on resuming play quickly after a timeout and will issue a delay-of-game warning when a team does not comply and a 1-shot technical foul on subsequent violations.”
Coaches will no longer be able to call a timeout during a live ball, having 15 seconds to replace a disqualified player.
Officials are now allowing only 10 seconds to advance the ball to front court. All of these changes are aimed at improving the pace of play.
Division l programs will be expanding the restricted-area arc from 3 feet to 4 feet in the 2015-2016 season, followed by Dll and Dlll programs in the 2016-2017 seasons. This is intended to reduce contact at the basket. The Florida Gulf Coast University men’s team saw this extended arc while playing in the 2015 postseason NIT games.
Along with reducing collision, the NCAA is also looking to reduce faked fouls; officials are now allowed to penalize players who fake fouls. “The NCAA Men’s Basketball Rule Committee felt that players trying to draw fouls by deception is a growing issue,” wrote the NCAA.
While physical violations become harsher, the NCAA has declared that Class B technical fouls, such as hanging on the rim, only grants the opposing team two technical foul shots rather than one.
While, originally, players would turn over the possession after being closely guarded for five seconds while dribbling the ball, that rule no longer stands. Changes also allow for dunking during pregame warmups and halftime.
The NCAA has also approved an “experimental rule” that will allow each player six personal fouls instead of five. This will be tested in the 2016 postseason tournaments with exception to the Division l Men’s Basketball Championship.
With all of these new rules and policies, players and officials will be relearning NCAA play this 2015-2016 season.