Any of you agree with the people who say College basketball is better than the NBA?

[dhsilv2]

I really have no idea. I know that with the NIL stuff that star players are being compensated but I really have no clue if there’s trickle down or what boosters are paying. I’ve just been under the assumption that it’s mostly star players making money on their image and name…

Food for thought, I haven't read too much. But 65k average PLUS a college education? That seems awfully awfully good.

When breaking out the average NIL earnings by sport, the big thing that stands out is that men’s basketball players are the most well-compensated athletes, on average, in the NCAA, with $65,853 in average earnings per player through July 2024.

https://painttouches.com/2024/08/01/ncaa-nil-data-shows-mens-basketball-players-highest-earners/

That's not how averages work though. If you, me and bill gates are all in a room, the average is billions of net worth per person. If you look down in that article, it shows the median. That's where half the players get more than that number and half less. For basketball, it was $3,700. The regular players are getting very little from this and the stars can make significant money.

A good point, but there are 350 or so division 1 college basketball teams. Only maybe 50 of these schools are raking in big bucks. I'd assume we'd see better and more useful numbers if we focused on just the major schools...but I didn't see that data. It does show "P4" which I didn't fully dig into being significantly over that 65k.

[shi-woo]

I think their is a huge difference between the regular season and post season of both. When people say this I think they are focusing on a lot of the positives from March Madness that the NBA personally lacks.

1. It is a 1 and Done tournament where every play matters. That creates the tension that people watch sports for, and makes the games feel more important. It's why the NFL is so popular here, 17 games where every lose matters, and any team getting hot at the right time can win it all. Creates more fan engagement, as people have a reason to watch

2. Upsets. There is nothing better in the basketball world outside of a crazy Olympic run, than watching a team make a Cinderella story in real time. My personal favorite was watching Florida Gulf Coast shock the world, upset Porter Jr's Georgetown, and do it with dunks and ally-opps. George Mason, Kemba's Big East run and run in the tourney...The NBA WISHES it had moments like that.

3. Buzzer Beaters. We've already saw a few this tourney, and those moments are the biggest of their lives. I already mentioned Kemba's BE run, and we all remember that famous step back against Texas. My god, that 3 to win it all by Nova? Again, the NBA WISHES it had moments even half as cool as those. Closest was Ray Allens shot, but their was still another game to play.

4. Community matters. People rep their colleges hard, it's a generational bonding thing for a lot of people, and brings people together. Whole communities get into it. I live in UConn, and their is just a different vibe when the Huskies are good and when they are bad. In 2004 it was a big deal and all the talk of the town. In 2012 I found myself hugging kids I never talked to before and celebrating with people I grew up with but had not seen since highschool.

5. The game is an actual team game, and the teams with the best players don't typically win. Guards and rebounding is what wins the tourney, and the only time I can recall the best players winning it handedly was AD and Melo's teams and a few other Duke and KT/KU/NC teams. It's not always pretty, but it's rare to see a team just give the ball to Edey and say go to work for 40 like you see in the NBA. These guys, for better or worse, are running the plays the coach wants every single time down the floor. As a UConn fan with Hurley and Cal as the main/only coaches i've watched, it's actually a nice stand in for the pick and roll heavy NBA.

[liquidswords]

College Basketball is so much closer to high school than the NBA in terms of quality that its virtually unwatchable for me. Despite the flaws of the NBA, i just can't sit through most college games because its a piss poor impression of the NBA. The defenses in college appear to be fiercer but in large part because there's almost no individual offensive talents that can create on their own.

[puja21]

College players don't miss many games due to calf contusions.

They miss plenty of shots though

Exhibit A: 2011 NCAA Championship Game
UConn (Kemba, Lamb, Napier) vs Butler (Shelvin Mack, Matt Howard):

UConn shot under 35% and an amazing 9.1% on 3PA
Butler shot 9.7% on 31 two-point attempts

Totals
FG = 31/119 .261
2P = 21/75 .280
3P = 10/44 .227
FT = 22/30 .733

Final Score: UConn 53 Butler 41

https://www.sports-reference.com/cbb/boxscores/2011-04-04-butler.html

[ItsDanger]

College players don't miss many games due to calf contusions.

They miss plenty of shots though

Exhibit A: 2011 NCAA Championship Game
UConn (Kemba, Lamb, Napier) vs Butler (Shelvin Mack, Matt Howard):

UConn shot under 35% and an amazing 9.1% on 3PA
Butler shot 9.7% on 31 two-point attempts

Totals
FG = 31/119 .261
2P = 21/75 .280
3P = 10/44 .227
FT = 22/30 .733

Final Score: UConn 53 Butler 41

https://www.sports-reference.com/cbb/boxscores/2011-04-04-butler.html

So what? Giving a 1 game example from 14 years ago? There are a lot of teams in NCAA. WTF

[Saints14]

The NBAs problem is that outside of game 7s they don’t have any win or go home games. Makes it hard to consider any single game an important, high leverage event, whereas March Madness is the greatest thing in sports because every game is win or go home.

I think the NBA is correct to use best of 7 series to determine its champion as that’ll more often result in the best team winning, but it’s just not as exciting

[Nuntius]

I think that people often talk past each other when it comes to those "X is better than Y" stuff. Better when it comes to what? The assumption that everyone is talking about player skill, for example, is a misplaced one.

A lot of the time what people mean by saying stuff like "college is better than the NBA" they mean that the viewing experience is better. And that can definitely be true and is 100% true during March Madness. One-and-done games are simply way more fun to watch than game #68 of a 82-game season. The stakes just aren't the same. It's natural for people to gravitate towards the more interesting game.

[Red Robot]

If I’m just catching a random game, they're pretty much the same to me. The lower skill level in college doesn’t really bother me--you're just enjoying different aspects of the game. In that sense, basketball is actually pretty fun to watch even down to the high school level. A good game is a good game.

But when it comes to being a fan? The NBA wins in a landslide. Player transactions, off-court drama, historical comparisons, etc. I'm like 100 times more interested in the trade deadline or the draft than I’ll ever be for college recruiting or the transfer portal.

[ballzboyee]

A few years ago, NBA was definitely superior. Now, I am not so sure. NCAA pushed back the 3-point line. As a result college game has evolved in that college lineups have some guard skills from 1 to 5 now. Game has become more spread out like the NBA, but there is way more balance. There is still a lot of good post play in the NCAA and offenses built around dominant bigs. Just based upon diversity of style of play, for a lot of basketball fans NCAA is probably more entertaining the 3-point chuck fest that is the NBA now. I say that as somebody who hated the Eddie Sutton beat-em-up brand of physical college ball that dominated the game back in the day. The college game has evolved. Enjoying the NCAA tourney right now. Some good basketball is being played.

[Hoop Hunter]

The NCAA basketball tournament is exciting, sometimes.

The NBA has a few exciting games every night. The talent level in the NBA is insane. I much prefer the NBA. I've watched less and less college BB over the years.

[meekrab]

The experience of being a fan at a March Madness game is a lot more exciting than a March NBA game, but obviously the play is not as good. An average January NCAA game would probably put most NBA fans to sleep.

[Clav]

No ... but March Madness is fun! I do a bracket each year with my friends, but that's about it. I check out maybe a short handful of NCAA games before the tournament each year, and watch a few of the tourney games especially the Final 4 on, but that's about it.

A nice thing about the NCAA Tournament is that there's kind of a mythical feel to every champion because they have to end their year on a win streak to win the Championship. I went to many NCAA games when I was in university and they're really great for the atmosphere of the crowd -- live band, the school chants and a more defined colour pallette for fans. Actually, the NCAA stadium feel for most teams is way more engaging than an NBA stadium game which is often using canned SFX and no live band, just music through speakers. I like that students are courtside, it feels great to have an amped up section of fans compared to the generally disinterested or rich people that don't cheer in unison at NBA games.

However, the NBA game on court has a way better feel and the playoffs are much higher basketball level. I am a big fan of a few other sports, but I rarely follow amateur levels in those sports. I watch GL over NCAA because the teams are mostly equal and the flow of the game is way more natural

A few small changes would make US-college basketball a lot more entertaining for on-court play, not just for entertainment sake, but for flow.
1) 4 quarters, 10 minutes [like the NCAAW game]
2) no mandatory "After 4 minutes" media timeouts. Teams have Timeouts like NBA teams do, and if they CHOOSE to call a timeout, triggering a mandatory media timeout. It's so bizarre to have time-based timeouts in a game of ebbs and flows like basketball. These are like rocks jutting out of the tide.
3) 5 fouls per quarter, no gimmicky 1+1 bonus. You get the bonus, you get 2 FTs.
4) "tie-ups" do not result in offensive arrow possession switch (this rule bugs me the most) -- just jump the ball at the nearest circle (FT-line or half-court). We like the jump-ball, let's see more of it.
5) shot clock to 24. Game is way too slow with passing and plodding offense.

[liquidswords]

The NBAs problem is that outside of game 7s they don’t have any win or go home games. Makes it hard to consider any single game an important, high leverage event, whereas March Madness is the greatest thing in sports because every game is win or go home.

I think the NBA is correct to use best of 7 series to determine its champion as that’ll more often result in the best team winning, but it’s just not as exciting

So do you watch high school basketball? They have win or go home playoffs.

To me, and a lot of posters, having to see your opponent 4-7 times is more exciting. You build rivalries and its a true exercise in game planning.

[azcatz11]

I don't understand why it's a competition. What if someone is like me and likes both? What a stupid OP

[Nate505]

I don't know what "better" is supposed to mean.

More skilled? No way. A more enjoyable product to watch? For me it is. The games are shorter, and the guys out there actually seem to care. Then again this is their postseason, so comparing it to the regular season is apples/oranges. There's less 3s, which is a massive plus, but they play less time so it's possible it's roughly the same per minute of game.

[MrBigShot]

There are some exciting games here and there with crazy finishes, but for the most I think college basketball is a pretty bad product. Not fun watching teams pass the ball around for 30 seconds.

[HotelVitale]

I mean watching your local HS team struggle and biff their way to a 35-28 win over the next town over can sometimes be WAY more fun than either. Liking sports is all about the culture around a game and the investment you're making in a game, none of these things are that fascinating if you're not invested and/or following for some socio-cultural reason, or at least not enough to hold your interest for a super long time.

If you do have those things then good competition with people who are trying hard can often be exciting, and you can have a better watching/cheering experience with your nephew's AA playoff game than with much better or more talented players.

[ForeverTFC]

It's objectively worse. Worse players, worse style of play, worse refereeing. The NCAA has 2 things going for it: the 1 and done format of the tournament, and the nostalgia and memories of the college years.

[ForeverTFC]

I don't know what "better" is supposed to mean.

More skilled? No way. A more enjoyable product to watch? For me it is. The games are shorter, and the guys out there actually seem to care. Then again this is their postseason, so comparing it to the regular season is apples/oranges. There's less 3s, which is a massive plus, but they play less time so it's possible it's roughly the same per minute of game.

There is less 3s because they can't generate good looks or hit them at a high clip. I'll never understand why a tranche of basketball fans hate 3s so much that they would prefer objectively worse shots.

[Nate505]

There is less 3s because they can't generate good looks or hit them at a high clip. I'll never understand why a tranche of basketball fans hate 3s so much that they would prefer objectively worse shots.

Thank god. That alone makes it a lot better. The 3 ball era is horrible.