Out too deep
The deeper three-point line is tripping up some former marksmen
This article appears in the March 8 issue of ESPN The Magazine.
Who knew a mere foot would be such a giant leap for so many shooters in the college game? Perhaps the NCAA did when it pushed the three-point line back from 19'9" to 20'9" before last season. In the last year before the jump (2007-08), teams took an all-time high 19.1 threes per game and made 6.7 per contest, the most in NCAA history. But NBA evaluators weren't always impressed. "We used to call the old line fool's gold," says one Eastern Conference scouting director. "When they moved the line back it smacked a lot of guys in the face, because it turned out they weren't as good as they thought."
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