LEXINGTON, Ky. — You may think the bane of our existence is rude people, or one open checkout line at the crowded grocery store, or the person who steals the parking spot you were patiently waiting to occupy. To me, it’s an open-and-shut case. The bane of our existence is the replay monitor.
Since it’s the season, we’re talking college basketball here, a sport in which the games keep growing longer. Last Saturday was a perfect example, it being the final Saturday of the regular season, one chock full of televised games, very few of which we saw from start to finish.
Thanks to a pair of preceding games running long, by the time CBS got to Illinois at Ohio State, its 4 p.m. game, the Buckeyes had an 11-10 lead. Same thing on ESPN, where by the time the World Wide Leader got to Virginia at Louisville, its 4 p.m. game, the visiting Cavaliers had a 12-6 advantage. You get the picture. Actually, you don’t get the picture. Not all of it.
How many times has Big Blue Nation waited in front of the television to watch the Cats this season, only to have the tip-off delayed by another game still in progress, or the start shifted to another network? Just where is ESPN News anyway?
You can blame the networks for unrealistically stacking games one after another in two-hour time slots. Or you can blame the game itself because, well, few games are finished in two hours anymore.
For starters, there are too many timeouts. There are already eight built-in media timeouts — four in each half — plus four timeouts per team. One is a use-it-or-lose it timeout in the first half. Now add an additional 30 seconds given to a team when one of its players fouls out. Cut that to 10 seconds. And cut the timeouts to four per game. Total. No use-it-or-lose-it.
But the most annoying offender, by far, is the never-ending march to the replay monitor.
Latest egregious example: Iowa’s 77-73 win over visiting Wisconsin on Sunday. The final 2:16 on the game clock took 23 minutes of real time to play. That’s right, 23 minutes. The final 21.5 seconds of game clock took 10 whole minutes of real time to play. The reason? You guessed it.
With 21.5 seconds remaining, the officials trudged to the monitor to look at a foul call on an Iowa player. After watching and re-watching and re-watching the replay, the officials added a flagrant-1 hook-and-hold call on the Wisconsin player involved in the play.
From the time the whistle blew to the time the first player was handed the basketball at the free throw line, four minutes and 39 seconds had elapsed with everyone standing around waiting.
Then with 10.2 seconds left, it happened again. The officials visited the monitor to determine which player last touched the ball before it went out of bounds. Examining that replay took another three minutes and 37 seconds before the officials decided to stick with their original call.
That’s far too long on both counts. If the decision isn’t immediately obvious, the officials’ call on the floor should stand. Or, in the case of the ball going out of bounds, if it’s too close to call, then go with the possession arrow, or bring back the jump ball. Or something.
Tweeted ESPN’s Jay Bilas, “Wisconsin-Iowa is conclusive proof that replay review is out of control. Change is required.”
Said Wisconsin Coach Greg Gard, “We’re going to the monitor for everything. . . . That’s something that’s got to be addressed because it’s gotten out of hand.”
How about this: College basketball should follow the NFL’s example. Give each coach two challenges per game, and no more than two. That’s not a perfect solution, but it’s an imperfect game. And that’s certainly preferable to what’s happening now — constant disruptions of the rhythm-and-flow by far too many marches to the monitor, making the game longer than it needs or we want it to be.
