DAE notice how bad teams call timeout too early in the final minute?

I watch a ton of college basketball and I swear the biggest choke I see all the time isn't a missed shot, it's the coach burning the last timeout with like 45 seconds left when his team is only down 2. Happened in the Duke game last Saturday, they had the ball down 1 with 38 seconds and their coach called timeout before the play even developed, so then they had nothing left after the miss and had to foul. I played point guard in high school and our coach made us practice end of game stuff every Friday without timeouts, just to see who could stay calm. The thing is nobody remembers the timeout, they only remember the kid who missed the free throw or threw the ball away, when really the coach already took away their best shot at a good look. I think it matters because one timeout is a whole possession in a tight game, you can't get it back. So am I crazy here, or do other people see coaches do this constantly and get no blame for it?

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kelly618d ago

Tbh this drives me nuts too. Watched a game last month where the coach called timeout with 52 seconds left down 3, and I just sat there like why. You still had two chances to score and now you get one bad look and it's over. The worst part is the announcers never say a word about it after, they just blame the kid who had to chuck up a prayer at the buzzer. Your high school coach had it right, practicing without timeouts teaches you to just play. Coaches want control so bad they forget the clock is the one thing they can't stop.

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