Should There Be A Running Clock In Blowouts?

In our area youth league (grades 3-6), the clock runs when one team is up by 15 or more in the 2nd half.

Running clock isn’t just a youth basketball thing. The Ohio High School Athletic Association (which oversees athletics in grades 7-12) has a running clock rule. It says that if a team is up by 35 points, the clock runs.

These rules were passed with sportsmanship in mind. No one likes getting blown out. In those situations, the thought is, it’s best to finish the game quickly and minimize the damage.

I never questioned that thinking until recently, when I had the following thought:

Aren’t the teams that are getting blown out the most in need of extra reps and game experience?

If your team is getting blown out, chances are that your players are lacking in some combination of skill and experience.

By shortening the game, we unintentionally exacerbate that issue.

If your child was struggling with a concept in school, would their teacher give them LESS practice at it? Of course not!

And yet, that’s what we are doing in sports.

At the youth level, the score really isn’t even that important. If it was, we’d recommend teams play zone defense, press, and only play their top players. Instead, the primary goal should be development.

I understand the mental toll of lopsided losses, and that’s where our responsibility as coaches comes in. If we are getting blown out, we need to stay positive and look for small victories within the game.

Generally, when we stay positive, our players do as well. And if that’s the case, wouldn’t more playing time be better?

I’d even argue that there might be merit to continuing to play when kids are frustrated, as the ability to persevere when things are going badly is a crucial life skill.

I’ve thought quite a bit about this recently and am not sure where I stand. I’d love to hear from some of you!

Please reply to this email with your thoughts - should basketball games use a running clock in blowouts?

Comments Most Likes First   Oldest First   Newest First RP says: 2/21/2025 at 1:15:48 PM Coach, while I follow the logic of your argument, you're ignoring one key concept here: the Zone of Proximal Development, aka the "Sweet Spot Theory of Learning". None of us would take a 3rd grader new to the game and teach them to shoot by having them take threes on a ten foot rim. Why? It's simply too hard for them. When a team is getting blown out they are not in the ZPD. In fact, neither team is in the ZPD. The task for the losing team needs to be regressed and the task for the winning team needs to be made more difficult. The best way to do that is to get the game over with and let each team move onto competition better suited for their current level. Now, if you tell me that the winning team is going to play only their worst players, the ones most in need of development, then I would strongly agree that we should not use the running clock. Like     login   register Dan S says: 2/21/2025 at 1:14:02 PM Basketball games should definitely not use a running clock for all the reasons you mentioned. It''s funny that I saw this article because we were just getting blown out in our last game. The officials asked the coaches if we wanted a running clock because they just wanted to go home early. I said absolutely not, because our kids needed to play and get more game experience. We have a hard time getting games as it is because several schools in our league dropped BB for lack of participation. We''ve only had 4 games in two months. The winning teams should be subbing in their less talented players anyway which allows the losing team to have a better chance to have some success. Like     login   register

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