Super Seniors The Secret to NCAA Tournament Success?


If this year’s NCAA basketball tournaments look a little bigger—just a little older—your eyes aren’t fooling you.

Call it the silver lining of the pandemic.

Before the pandemic intervened, college students had five years to complete four seasons. For various reasons, among them injuries, one-time transfers or exemptions from competition, athletes have always been able to find ways to extend their eligibility. But after the pandemic wiped out many conference tournaments and entire 2020 national tournaments, the NCAA has added a special bonus year: any athlete who loses playing time in the 2019-20 season can extend their college career. up to a full season.

Now, every team that makes it to the Final Four this weekend in both the men’s and women’s tournaments will include players who take advantage of this option.

The additional season even meant the playground, but some rosters are filled with more super seniors and grad students than others, and the trickle effect can last for years.

“I don’t think there’s any question that any of us in college athletics would see the benefits of a more experienced team,” said Tom Burnett, Southland Conference commissioner and chairman of the Division I men’s basketball selection committee.

A handful of athletes are older than their NBA counterparts this year. Just look at Kansas. Against Providence last Friday, 24-year-old Mitch Lightfoot, a veteran bench player and sixth grader, had four blocks and 23-year-old Arizona State transfer Remy Martin came out of the bench to lead the Jayhawks by 23 goals. point. Neither would have returned to college if it hadn’t been for the pandemic last weekend, Coach Bill Self said, “I actually think Mitch is the best ever.”

Kansas’ super veteran guard Jalen Coleman-Lands is 25 years old. So is Devin Booker, who is in his seventh season with the Phoenix Suns.

And there are many more seasons. “If you just look at our beginnings, those beginnings have relevance,” Self said. “Even though we’re an old team, technically they can all come back next year.”

Self noted that Providence also has a handful of players who have passed the standard eligibility period.

“If they didn’t have these four cats, they would look so different,” Self said. “Without Remy, we would look so different. In Villanova, they would have looked very different without Gillespie.”

Collin Gillespie, a 22-year-old guard, is the youngest of three Villanova grad students playing this weekend.

However, parity concerns aside, Self said the bonus year contributed to “the excellent quality of this year’s ball.”

That was the case in the Horizon League, where 23-year-old Macee Williams, a super veteran center for Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis, won the third division Player of the Year Award for the 2020-21 season. He chose to return for the 2021-22 season, his fifth year, and once again won the award.

“This is an example of how our women’s basketball programs are really taking advantage of this opportunity,” said Julie Roe Lach, commissioner of the Horizon League.

13 in the NCAA tournament, IUPUI lost to Oklahoma 4 with just 6 points in the first round.

Depending on who you ask, an additional year of eligibility might come across as a glass half full, half empty topic. It allows college athletes to reclaim lost playing years, and a bigger, older team can mean an extra layer of commitment.

“Once athletes are top graders, there’s a certain maturity that comes with leading the team and handling the pressure when you’re in the end-of-season moments,” said Roe Lach.

But some officials are concerned about the long-term impact of filled positions on recruitment. If athletes choose to use the extra years of fitness, this can limit points for fresh faces.

“Many of us ask the question: Are the opportunities still there for high school student-athletes?” said Burnett.

That’s exactly what worries Adam Berkowitz, executive director of New Heights Youth, a nonprofit sports-based youth development organization in New York. The additional season of eligibility has been added to an already complex system in light of the NCAA’s decision in 2021 to repeal the rule that required athletes to sit for one season post-transfer, which had the effect of “doubling and tripling” the number of players in the league. transfer pool, said Berkowitz.

He added that both factors have created a “changing landscape” when it comes to college admissions, which has resulted in complete “mixing”.

“Last year was the hardest year I’ve had to get students into schools,” said Berkowitz, who has worked with transfer students for 20 years. “If you have an offer on the table, you should strongly consider it, because otherwise it might not be there.”

As a result, Berkowitz said, students increasingly felt “unemployed” and preferred to attend lower grade schools in both Part I and Part II before attempting a transfer. When Berkowitz spoke to college coaches last year, he said many of them don’t look at high school students, preferring to return to the transfer portal and then back to junior colleges.

Berkowitz said he expects a few more years to be the case, while athletes have the option to play an extra year. High school sophomores will be the first to be unaffected by the change.

“Many places just have congestion,” he said. “If 200 boys are entering fifth grade, that’s 200 less places for high school graduates.”

Mitch Smith contributing reporting.



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