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There are very few star college hoop players who play more than two years in college. The really big stars are usually one and done----they take their game to the NBA.
I still enjoy college hoops, but it has been diluted a little by the disappearance of the great phenoms to the pros----it was ever worse a few years ago when they could go the NBA right out of high school.
In a way this has made college hoops a little more balanced----the trek to the pros has left mid majors who can develop players for four years, a threat to go to the ncaa tournament----see Butler and VCU.
There are very few star college hoop players who play more than two years in college. The really big stars are usually one and done----they take their game to the NBA.
There are a lot of guys that play more than two years. Only 64 guys get drafted into the NBA and with the emergence of international players in the draft, it is even more competitive to get drafted at all. Only the top underclassmen will leave early and some even decide to play their junior year, the Morris twins did and it helped them out tremendously. Thomas Robinson also stayed for his junior year and not he might be a Top 5 pick.
I haven't followed college hoops in years. Back in the days of Grant Hill, Bobby Hurley, Christian Laettner at Duke, lol. There were some great teams and players back then.
-I think tradition is a big selling point for college ball. Like Duke. You really can't replicate that in the pros. It seems like there use to be more personalities back then...i.e. jerry tarkanian at unlv.
Maybe it was the way that era was marketed.
-I agree, I think its been diluted by so many going pro.
But I don't like the mystery and secrecy of college sports in general. It makes the whole thing almost look like a magicians act, or like its taking place on stage....with a curtain behind you. I.e. Reggie Bush in football.
I am of the opposite opinion. I could care less for the pro's. The pro athletes (a majority of them) get payed and play like they could care less. There are a few exceptions. The intensity on defense is not there in the pro's. In college, you get sell out crowds that go nuts from start to finish..It's more intense because players are giving it their best so that they can make it to the league. I understand the notion of losing the best players to the league. Atleast we have them for one year. I don't think that matters too much. In the past freshman didn't even play no matter how good they were. Now, in some programs freshman are starting all over the country. So there's that balance. Heck, I remember the fab five in Michigan. Five starting freshman. Now, you have that in many teams.
I have a hard time watching pro athletes who get paid millions of dollars to play a sport who can't even make free throws. Or they don't even have an outside shot. The athletes today are so overhyped and overpaid. I'll take college anyday. I love the intensity of almost every game. The pro's I used to love, but could care less. It's the same teams winning all the time in the pro's. That gets old too.
I think pro basketball is a product that has gradually become better, and college basketball is a product that has gradually become worse.
On one side of the coin, pro basketball has become more balanced, with the coaching and talent more evenly distributed than at any time I can remember. Moreover, the style of play has become more fundamentally sound. The 1980s and 1990s were all about physical play, which at times seemed more like hockey than NBA basketball. But the rules changes, more wide open offenses, and just better, more skilled players with emphasis on passing and shooting, it's an easier game to watch now.
On the other side of that coin, with more and more talented players skipping college and going straight to d-league or the NBA, I think college has gradually lost some of the talent pool that it once had. Consequently, the college game is just not as exciting to watch. Last year's national title game did it for me: it was brutal to sit and watch Butler heave it up and miss shot after shot. That was just bad basketball. And UConn wasn't all that much nicer to watch, either. It used to be interesting to watch NCAA and to guess which stars were going to excel in the pro game but there's less of that now. It's just more like watching a more amateurish version of the product.
I would not expand the NCAA tournament either. I think that will backfire and dilute the one thing that college basketball has going for it, and it would all be destroy the meaning of the regular season. If anything, they should make the tournament smaller. I know that economics won't let that happen, but in the long run they might want to revisit this possibility.
On one side of the coin, pro basketball has become more balanced, with the coaching and talent more evenly distributed than at any time I can remember. Moreover, the style of play has become more fundamentally sound. The 1980s and 1990s were all about physical play, which at times seemed more like hockey than NBA basketball. But the rules changes, more wide open offenses, and just better, more skilled players with emphasis on passing and shooting, it's an easier game to watch now.
Those new rules favor the offensive player. 3 steps don't get called. The player can practically run over the defensive player and the defensive player gets the foul. Let's not forget the "Paul Pierce" (i.e. launch yourself into a player autofoul). Let's take the other side of the ball... the "Manu" i.e. flopping aka an academy award for acting.
All these scenarios took a great 80/90s NBA and destroyed it.
The other thing you brought up... "talent more evenly distributed"...
Are you serious? It is all stacked on what 5-6 teams leaving some teams with zero players the casual person could even recognize i.e. bobcats, cavs, nets, toronto, etc.
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On the other side of that coin, with more and more talented players skipping college and going straight to d-league or the NBA, I think college has gradually lost some of the talent pool that it once had. Consequently, the college game is just not as exciting to watch. Last year's national title game did it for me: it was brutal to sit and watch Butler heave it up and miss shot after shot. That was just bad basketball. And UConn wasn't all that much nicer to watch, either. It used to be interesting to watch NCAA and to guess which stars were going to excel in the pro game but there's less of that now. It's just more like watching a more amateurish version of the product.
I guess you have seen the Kentucky Wildcats. Calipari brings them in for 1 year and watches them go pro i.e. John Wall, DeMarcus Cousins, soon-to-be Andre Davis, etc. So yes, the talent has always existed.
As for your last sentence, I actually think the NBA is more amateurish. In college, they actually run full court press (I saw it for the first time in a very long time in the pros the other night... looked out of place). They run different defensive schemes (do they even run any in the pros??). Offenses set up schemes by running screens, etc. The NBA is about rushing the points vs setups. In addition, the only things ran (for the most part) are high pick/rolls and isos.
P.S. Kemba Walker has been the only shining point to the Bobcats i.e. UConn's star in March Madness last year. No talent... hmm...
Fun Fact: Ex-Butler star Gordon Haywood has been doing alright in Utah this year.
I enjoy the college game more than the NBA myself and I am not sure the NBA is all that healthy right now. Unlike the NFL, where there was much interest in avoiding a lock out and missing a season, when the NBA went weeks without playing, there didn't seem to be all that much public pressure to get things settled and get back to playing. Not a good sign for the NBA.
Those new rules favor the offensive player. 3 steps don't get called. The player can practically run over the defensive player and the defensive player gets the foul. Let's not forget the "Paul Pierce" (i.e. launch yourself into a player autofoul). Let's take the other side of the ball... the "Manu" i.e. flopping aka an academy award for acting.
All these scenarios took a great 80/90s NBA and destroyed it.
The other thing you brought up... "talent more evenly distributed"...
Are you serious? It is all stacked on what 5-6 teams leaving some teams with zero players the casual person could even recognize i.e. bobcats, cavs, nets, toronto, etc.
I guess you have seen the Kentucky Wildcats. Calipari brings them in for 1 year and watches them go pro i.e. John Wall, DeMarcus Cousins, soon-to-be Andre Davis, etc. So yes, the talent has always existed.
As for your last sentence, I actually think the NBA is more amateurish. In college, they actually run full court press (I saw it for the first time in a very long time in the pros the other night... looked out of place). They run different defensive schemes (do they even run any in the pros??). Offenses set up schemes by running screens, etc. The NBA is about rushing the points vs setups. In addition, the only things ran (for the most part) are high pick/rolls and isos.
P.S. Kemba Walker has been the only shining point to the Bobcats i.e. UConn's star in March Madness last year. No talent... hmm...
Fun Fact: Ex-Butler star Gordon Haywood has been doing alright in Utah this year.
The NBA is definetely not more amatuerish than the pros. The level of play in the pros is vastly superior to that of college. Nobody presses in the pros because the full court press only works on mediocre college point guards. Alot of these "sophisticated" plays you refer to in college are just gimmicks that only work on mediocre college players but that don't work on nba players. Point guards in the NBA are too good of ball handlers to be pressed as on example. The only reason those players went to Kentucky is because they were forced to by the rule changes. In the near future those players may decide to play in europe instead of playing in the NCAA.
College basketball has deterioated drastically in the past couple of years, and now with these teams switching conferences every year, it is almost unwatchable.
Nobody presses in the pros because the full court press only works on mediocre college point guards.
I guess the point guards have gotten better because in the early 90's the Bulls teams with Jordan & Pippen pressed a lot... Detroit did some too... even the Knicks did it.
Games like yesterday's Syracuse-Louisville fiasco certainly won't bring back the college game.
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