By RICH STEVENS

richbeyondmeasure.com

Issues surrounding the adoption of a shot clock for West Virginia high school basketball are well-documented and connected with implementation.

Pace of play has not been a wide-ranging concern for most. I prefer an up-tempo attack fueled by full- and half-court pressure designed to speed up the opposition and produce steals and run-outs.

If I have a problem with a team holding the ball for extended periods I would have my defense guard – extend a 2-3, switch to man – enough to get the ball moving.

Easier said than done, to be sure.

Most teams would rather not expose their weaknesses against more talented opposition.

Beginning with the 2022-23 season, the National Federation of State High School Associations began allowing state organizations to adopt a 35-second shot clock. That same year the NFHS upped the ante, requiring “two timepieces that are connected to a horn that is distinctive from the game-clock horn, and using an alternative timing device, such as a stopwatch at the scorer’s table, for a shot clock malfunction.”

State associations in California, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, North Dakota, Rhode Island, South Dakota, and Washington approved a shot clock without authorization of the NFHS, thereby losing their voting power with the organization.

As of the 2025-26 season, 22 states use a shot clock, three are in a trial year, one will implement it next season and another state will do so beginning in 2028. The remaining 23, including West Virginia, have not.

What exactly does that mean for West Virginia Secondary School Activities Commission members?

Absolutely nothing.

Middle school and high school principals, not WVSSAC administrators, make the decisions. However, I know executive director Wayne Ryan is not in favor. Bernie Dolan, who was head of the SSAC when the NFHS authorized shot clock adoption, also gives it a thumbs down.

Midland Trail head coach Curtis Miller would also vote against it.

“Competitively, it would limit small schools like mine,” Miller said. “It takes away fundamentals that most high school kids don’t have anyway. If you watch most games, nobody holds the ball for the whole game.

“There’s the argument that it gets them ready for college but how many are going to play in college anyway?”

The answer? A precious few.

According to the NCAA, there were 540,769 high school basketball players in the United States in 2020. Of those, only 1 percent will play at the Division I level, 1 percent at the Division II level, and just 1.4 percent at the Division III level.

Paul Neidig, the commissioner of the Indiana High School Athletic Association, said his organization will look into it but implied that no such change is imminent. Three years later the Hoosier state hasn’t budged.

“We have the best coaches and players in the country,” Neidig told the Indianapolis Star. “We have a tournament that every school in Indiana gets to play in. The object of the game is to put your team in the best possible position to win. Possession control is certainly a strategy utilized by many coaches in Indiana. I do not see a reason to take a strategy used to win from our coaches. But the debate will certainly be the center of conversation for a while.”

Kevin Garner, a former high school basketball coach and an assistant executive director of the Missouri State High School Activities Association, has evidence that it does the opposite of what it intends.

“The empirical data we have shows that a shot clock increases scoring by four points per game, and it decreases shooting percentages by quite a bit,” he told the Quincy, Ill.-based Herald-Whig newspaper in April of 2018.

In the era of AAU programs when fundamentals are ignored in favor of run-and-gun offenses and rosters made up of stars from here, there, and all points in between, high school teams run the risk of having more turnovers than points with a shot clock.

We could be looking at teams using half of the court’s 84 feet, trading missed shots and volleying turnovers for 32 minutes.

Sound dramatic?

It isn’t.

A clock will speed up high school teams splintered in the offseason by travel programs yet lack the mechanics to be consistent shooters and scorers. We want our players to play but it’s more important they learn. So few are fundamentally sound when they reach high school.

MaxPreps.com, which provides teams with a free format to document scores, statistics, and other data, revealed in a 2014 report that the states with a shot clock averaged 101.4 combined points per game. Those without scored 2.8 points more.

Dr. Gregory Merrick is the director of Wheeling Hospital’s Schiffler Cancer Center and was the founder and director of the Cancer Research Classic, billed as the “Nation’s Premier Catholic High School Basketball Tournament,” a two-day basketball showcase in Wheeling (2008-20) benefiting cancer research.

He once tweeted that “There should be no controversy regarding HS shot clock. HS basketball is about player development, not just W/L’s. SC improves players & coaches. The rest of the basketball world can’t be wrong. If coaches can’t prepare for 30 sec increments, they are in the wrong sport.”

Fair enough, events like the CRC involve primarily private schools, in-season travel teams, and star-studded programs not restricted by rules of geography. These high-flying circus acts are appealing, and atypical. Most fans can deal with a plethora of turnovers if tempered by the occasional slam dunk or behind-the-back pass.

All bets are off in the wild, wild West Virginia. Thanks to our legislative body’s misguidance in 2023, public school students in grades 9-12 were granted one free transfer.

Grassroots basketball would hit another pothole in a long line of West Virginia bumps in the road. From a competitive standpoint, our state’s talent has dwindled with the population, and the current transfer rules have created a chasm in the haves and have nots.

Then there’s the matter of money.

In 2023, a sporting goods provider local to the Indiana-based Herald-Whig newspaper told the publication that mounting a clock above each backboard costs anywhere from $2,000-$4,000 per basket. Clocks on a stand in the corner of the gym would save money. However, the representative also said that the cost would increase if the clocks were not adaptable to the current scoreboards.

Then there’s the matter of clock operators.

Volunteers typically maintain the home scorebook — an official account of the game — as well as the scoreboard and possession arrow. While most do a standup job, these positions are typically unpaid with those not always adept or dependable.

Do we want to ask programs to find another volunteer at an already space-challenged scorer’s table to maintain a shot clock?

I have done all these things. As a sportswriter for more than 25 years, I have seen point guards — ball on hip — stand in the backcourt as the clock ticks away and a defense remains behind the 3-point line. Stat-keeping has never been so easy.

This is a strategic cat-and-mouse game, and a rarity. Fans attempt to regulate the decision-making of coaches who don’t really like to hear the crowd chant, “boring, boring …” for four quarters.

If you think high school coaches don’t succumb to their fans demands, you haven’t been paying attention.

As for evidence of performance and the impact of no shot clock, I am giving you the 2012 Hedgesville High boys basketball team. Stalling was a necessary tactic to protect player rotation, not a normal tactic by Hedgesville coach Kelly Church. The Eagles averaged 72 points entering the tournament before averaging 44.7 in three tourney games – which included a 39-37 overtime quarterfinal victory against Wheeling Park.

They were 7-0 in games in which the winning team scored fewer than 50 points. The fact is that most players prefer to press. A pass-free fast break or steal and runout are as gratifying as dunks.

“Two of our best players were in foul trouble and we decided to hold the ball,” Church told the Charleston Gazette-Mail. “I’m proud of our kids. It’s not easy to do, just pass the basketball. It’s not easy to get the kids to buy into that.”

His decision resulted in a state championship that is much less likely with a shot clock.

Preventing a team from stalling also requires strategy. Any full-court press or trap can force an opponent’s hand — and stalling isn’t much of an option when trailing.

It should be no surprise that some of the most outspoken advocates of a shot clock are those who have spent little to no time as traditional high school coaches:

• Paul Biancardi, who spent three years as coach at Wright State University and is now the ESPN National Recruiting Director for Boys High School Basketball.
• Rob Fulford, whose prep coaching experience is at Mountain State Academy and Huntington (W.Va.) Prep, neither of which are traditional high school teams.
• John Lucas, whose coaching career is on the professional level.

As for college preparation, keep in mind that only .03 percent of high school seniors will play college basketball.

The lack of a shot clock didn’t hurt the development of Q.J. Peterson, Hedgesville’s star in 2012. He played professionally overseas following a successful college career at Virginia Military Institute.

There are vocal proponents of a shot clock, but few understand the limitations of some programs.

I concede that casual observers might attend more high-scoring games, which could impact the bottom line with more money at the gate and concession stand.

A shot clock would not contribute to this end.

There’s no reason to sacrifice strategy for a rule change that wouldn’t help anyway.

The United States and the shot clock (2025-26)

Shot clock – Arizona, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Iowa, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, New York, North Dakota, South Dakota, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Utah, Washington. 

No shot clock – Colorado, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, New Jersey, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Wyoming.

Trial – Alabama, Kansas, South Carolina.

2026-27 – Illinois.

2028-29 – Pennsylvania.