Posted by: Andrew
in Features, NCAA Basketball 10, Wayback Wednesday
March 17, 2021
0
This is Wayback Wednesday, your midweek blast from the past! In this feature, we dig into the archives, look back at the history of basketball gaming, and indulge in some nostalgia. Check in every Wednesday for retrospectives and other features on older versions of NBA Live, NBA 2K, and old school basketball video games in general. You’ll also find old NLSC editorials re-published with added commentary, and other flashback content. This week, I’m taking a look back at NCAA Basketball 10.
As I mentioned when I took a look back at NCAA March Madness 08 and NCAA Basketball 09, it wasn’t until I was gifted a PlayStation 3 that I’ve been able to import college basketball games. I’ve therefore taken the opportunity to seek out and pick up those North American exclusives that I couldn’t play on my PAL consoles. Although they do show their age somewhat, I’ve still really enjoyed finally being able to play them and make up for some lost time. I’ve also picked up College Hoops 2K7 and 2K8, and I’ll be getting to them in due course.
I have an unusual history with NCAA Basketball 10. Like the other college games, I wasn’t able to play it until I got a PlayStation 3. However, the difference with NCAA Basketball 10 is that I actually covered it on the NLSC during its preview season! Even though I knew I wouldn’t be able to play it or produce any post-release content, we were expanding beyond just being an NBA Live website, and posting news related to NCAA Basketball 10 was part of my efforts to branch out. Over a decade later, I finally have the game and a console to play it on, so let’s take a look back…way back…
Quite frankly, playing NCAA Basketball 10 all these years later leaves me wishing I’d had a PlayStation 3 back then. I don’t regret opting for an Xbox 360 as it was more affordable and it allowed me to collect the entire NBA Live series on the seventh generation, but even at the time I was envious of PS3 users who were able to import NTSC games. As I was posting news about the game in 2009, I felt wistful that I wouldn’t be able to play it when it came out. I’m making up for some lost time now, but I know I would’ve been able to have a blast with it back when it was new, had I been able to get my hands on it. Like NBA Live 10, it’s a great game for its era.
Indeed, NCAA Basketball 10 feels very similar to NBA Live 10 on the sticks, which is a good thing. NCAA March Madness 08 felt more like a polished NBA Live 07 than it did NBA Live 08, and NCAA Basketball 09 – in my opinion at least – wasn’t quite on the same level as its NBA counterpart. NCAA Basketball 10 and NBA Live 10 are pretty close, though. Like NBA Live 10, NCAA Basketball 10 returned to a single shoot button, utilising the sprint control and left stick movement to perform advanced moves and trigger dunks. Bank shots were performed by holding the left stick in any direction while releasing the shoot button, among other shared controls.
Animation quality and fluidity on the sticks was better than in NCAA Basketball 09, reflecting the jump we also saw from NBA Live 09 to NBA Live 10. It also retained its own mechanics, such as the ability to perform distractions during free throws, and game tempo. Tempo wasn’t pushed as strongly as it was when it was a new feature the previous year, but it still had the same impact as far as boosting abilities when you’re controlling the pace of the game, and leading to poorer play when you’re not. The meter still popped up during gameplay along with coaching tips, though the overlay had been redesigned. It was still an effective mechanic that captured the NCAA style.
The major improvement to gameplay in NCAA Basketball 10 was the introduction of proper motion offense. We still had the ability to manually call plays, but by tapping L1 – the Motion Movement Control – it was possible to run a quick play specific to the team’s motion offense. Villanova Wildcats head coach Jay Wright narrated a tutorial video explaining the basic concepts of motion offense, but with the Motion Control Assistance enabled, a pop-up notification encouraged us to tap L1 to get things in motion. Icons above the players’ heads indicated who to pass to and when, as with full playcalling. It was an elegant system, and worth revisiting in a future NBA Live title.
As I said, I wish I could’ve played NCAA Basketball 10 when it was new. It would’ve been a lot of fun switching back and forth between it and NBA Live 10, and both hold up well enough that you can go back and spend time with them today. However, they share some annoying issues. The issue with alley-oop passes being thrown to a player in the midrange resulting in an awkward slow motion layup that ended up plaguing NBA Live 10 was also in its NCAA brethren. There were also some wonky collisions and animations here and there, which are certainly noticeable two generations later. It’s still very accessible and playable though, and still capable of being enjoyed today.
Another major selling point for NCAA Basketball 10 was the authentic presentation for not one but two networks. EA Sports had already established a partnership with ESPN, and this was expanded into full ESPN College Basketball presentation with familiar voices Brad Nessler and Dick Vitale on the call. All of the overlays, music, and other presentation elements replicated an ESPN broadcast down to the last detail. EA also partnered with CBS to incorporate their presentation of the NCAA, with Gus Johnson and Bill Raftery calling those games. In Play Now, the broadcaster was chosen at random. That was fine, though it would’ve been nice to have a choice.
It wasn’t the first time that a basketball game featured authentic network presentation, and it’s obviously since become standard with ESPN in NBA Live. It was far less common to include two networks however, ensuring variety on top of authenticity. Even though Visual Concepts were no longer making college basketball games, it was clear that the team at EA Sports didn’t want to phone things in with NCAA Basketball 10. The gameplay, atmosphere, and presentation were clearly areas of focus, and they delivered a great college basketball experience. Since I’ve mentioned it in previous retrospectives, the MEI Marching Band once again provided a fitting soundtrack.
Many of the same modes and features returned in NCAA Basketball 10. Players could be renamed and modified as usual, with a name auto-generation option to save time. The core modes of Dynasty, the NCAA Tournament, and five pre-season tournaments – the Maui Invitational, NIT Season Tip-Off, Old Spice Classic, Anaheim Classic, and Puerto Rico Tip-Off – all returned. Online head-to-head and its spinoff mode Rival Challenge were still included as well. As far as information menus, School Overview returned, but the Blue Ribbon scouting was now replaced by a listing of the Toughest Places to Play. My Highlight Reel returned, but the record books notably didn’t.
Although the same college campus setting had been recycled from the shootaround in NCAA Basketball 09, new face of the game Blake Griffin took Kevin Love’s place. Similar to The Hangar in NBA Live 10, pop-ups provided tips about the new controls. Dynasty was practically unchanged, apart from the addition of the aforementioned Toughest Places to Play screen. It’s clear that innovation was slowing down with Dynasty by that point. That was unfortunate, but I’d suggest that the mode still had enough depth to be engaging and enjoyable. Still, it stands as an example of how EA Sports titles do get complacent when it comes to further innovating with their modes.
There was a new feature in the form of the Dynamic Update Hub. Logging on would provide gamers with the latest Associated Press Top 25 and RPI rankings, as well as team statistics and new plays. These facts and figures would also show up during gameplay with appropriate presentation, and acknowledgement from both the ESPN and CBS commentators. Obviously this feature has long since been discontinued following the servers being shut down, so it’s not something that we can experience now. Of course, judging by some of the reactions to its announcement over on Operation Sports back in 2009, it wasn’t something gamers were clamouring for.
Classic teams were removed in light of Ed O’Bannon’s lawsuit. It’s often claimed that the lawsuit put an end to college sports games, but that isn’t actually the case (no pun intended). It certainly drew attention to issues with college sports titles that have made developers shy away from them, but no one is actually legally barred from making a new college basketball game. Looking back though, I do wonder if EA figured that the writing was on the wall. The lawsuit (understandably) forced them to remove appealing content, and as they couldn’t be sold worldwide, NCAA titles were limited in their ability to generate revenue. They probably didn’t have a huge team or budget.
If so, it would explain a few things about NCAA Basketball 10. The lack of resources would account for the minimal upgrades to modes such as Dynasty. Also, perhaps knowing that it was or very well could be the last game in the series, the team may have wanted to create a product with improved gameplay and impressive presentation, in order to go out on a high note. Admittedly I have the benefit of hindsight here, with no yearly expectations and disappointments at the time, but if those were indeed the circumstances, then I think they succeeded to the best of their abilities. The game was a marked improvement over its predecessor, and still holds up quite well years later.
NCAA Basketball 10 wasn’t the final college sports title by EA Sports, but it marked the end of a series that had officially begun with NCAA March Madness 98, and traced it roots back to Coach K College Basketball on the Sega Genesis. As with the downfall of NBA Live, it’s a shame to see a long-running series come to an end and leave the basketball gaming space. NBA Live is at least in a position to return though, while it seems far less likely that we’ll see another NCAA Basketball. Then again, the return of EA Sports College Football may be cause for hope. If EA does produce a college basketball game once more, it’ll likely be more accessible worldwide, too.
Obviously there are several other games in the NCAA Basketball/March Madness series – as well as college basketball titles from other developers – that I haven’t yet played. I don’t have the hardware to play them all, and even if I did, tracking them down at a fair price isn’t easy. The NCAA Basketball/March Madness and College Hoops series have become sought after collectibles; a complete-in-box copy can easily set you back hundreds of dollars. Sealed copies can fetch even crazier prices! I managed to pick up the college basketball titles that I now own at surprisingly good prices, though they were still more expensive than most other old hoops games.
I’m glad to have found those games and added them to my collection, though. I’d always wished that I could’ve played college basketball games when they were new. Naturally, they have issues of their own, especially borrowing tech from a generation of NBA Live games that were trying to rebuild. However, it’s a different experience when you take NBA players and all the minutia of the league out of the equation, and replace everything with an in-depth representation of collegiate basketball. I’m a fan of gameplay mechanics such as tempo, Motion Movement Control, intensity, and other features that make EA’s NCAA games much more than a re-skin of NBA Live.
When I revisited NBA Live 10 for our 25th Anniversary of NBA Live retrospectives, it struck me that despite its issues, it’s a really good game that holds up respectably well, and one I wish I spent more time with over a decade ago. Having finally played it, I have a similar opinion of NCAA Basketball 10, and wish it had been possible for me to enjoy it back then. With that being said, if there’s one game from the series to dust off and enjoy today, I’d suggest it’s the prime candidate. Don’t expect perfection if you do, but you can expect very solid gameplay, a reasonably deep Dynasty mode, and awesome presentation. I know that I’ll be revisiting it whenever the mood strikes.
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This season, 8 Russians play in the NCAA. How are they? - The Interception - Blogs
Editor's Note: You are reading the user blog Interception, which talks about European basketball. Don't forget that pluses are still the best way to thank the author.
Before the start of last season, I wrote this text. Then I talked to almost all the Russians who were preparing to compete in the NCAA - there were 11 of them at that time - and tried to understand why Russian youth began to leave more massively for American universities. There have never been such a number of Russians in the NCAA.
A year and a half has passed since then, and half of the guys have parted ways: Konstantin Dotsenko is now playing in the Loko farm club, Zakhar Vedischev plays at the base of Krasnodar, Mark Tikhonenko signed a contract with Astana, Andre Toure recently played in Maykop in the second Super League, and Samson Ruzhentsev moved to the Serbian "Mega".
But some remained in America. They were joined by a few more guys who either just left Russia or got into the NCAA from American schools or the NJCAA. In this text, I will talk about all the Russians who play in the first division of the main student league in the world. If last season I wanted to explain why exactly they are leaving, now I have focused on their career.
If you prefer reading, then below is a large text with comments from the players themselves; but this time you have the opportunity not only to read, but also to watch a video about all of our in the NCAA. Inside is my story and a video interview with the guys.
If you watch a YouTube video, don't forget to thumbs up and leave a comment. This will help promote the channel. Subscribe if you love Russian basketball and want to know more about it.
And now - the promised text about our guys in America.
What is the NCAA
The NCAA, or NCDA, is the National Collegiate Athletic Association in the United States and Canada. It includes almost 1300 schools, colleges, universities and other educational institutions. The teams of these universities are represented not only in basketball - the NCAA also has competitions in American football, wrestling, fencing, bowling, softball, gymnastics, tennis and God knows what else.
But basketball is a very popular sport in the association. Both guys and girls have three divisions, which are ranked by strength. This text is only about those Russians who compete in the first, strongest, division.
The NCAA has a playoff called March Madness. When knockout games start, the whole country switches from professionals to students. Although during the season, the teams also have enough attention from fans: the clubs play in large and good arenas, many people come to the matches, the games are shown on television, and sometimes on national television. There are even universities whose fans spend the night in front of the arena in the hope of having time to buy a ticket.
So the NCAA is a really serious tournament, albeit a student one.
How many Russians are there
I have spent an hour and a half of my life checking the composition of all the colleges that are represented in the first division. There are 358 of them. I broke my eyes, learned about the existence of several countries and even about the presence of basketball in these countries, but still I counted all the Russians.
I got eight people, and now we will get to know them better. The sequence on my list doesn't mean anything, it's just that way because I talked to the guys in that order.
I hope I haven't missed anyone. Please write in the comments if you know someone whom I have overlooked.
Evdokimov is the newest member of the NCAA Division I. He joined the Charleston Cougars - the name of the team of the University of Charleston from South Carolina - in early December last year.
This university belongs to mid-major. In the American system, there is a gradation of universities by strength - from low-major to high-major. Mid-major is the middle level. Most Russian guys perform at universities that fall into this category.
Before moving to the USA, Nikita played for the youth team of Lokomotiv-Kuban and for the national team. Last summer, the defender represented the Russian under-20 team at the Euro Challenger, although he himself was only 18.
Evdokimov has an interesting story about how he fell in love with basketball. In fact, it is strange that he did not go to handball, because his dad is the famous Russian handball player Yegor Evdokimov. Six-time champion of Russia, champion of Spain, champion of Belarus, champion of Ukraine, participant of the 2008 Olympics in Beijing. At the dawn of his career, Yegor Viktorovich played in his homeland, in the Chelyabinsk region, the city of Snezhinsk. Nikita was born there.
- I fell in love with basketball when I was 9 or 10 years old. My cousin and grandmother and I went on vacation to the Crimea. There was a playground where I constantly ran and played. Grandma suggested trying to sign up for basketball. And before that, I didn’t consider basketball as a sport at all ... But I went to a training session and instantly fell in love. Didn't miss it at all. Then Lokomotiv saw me at the Russian Championship. Together with a team from my city, from Chekhov, we took fourth place, and everyone was very surprised. I was seen by coach Petar Marinkovic, who called me to Loko, ”recalls Evdokimov.
He says that he could have been in the red-green system even earlier. He was invited to the Yug-Basket camp - this is a camp organized by the club and within which it looks for players in its youth system - but then Evdokimov was with relatives in the United States and could not come.
He ended up in the Loko system in 2017. True, Evdokimov says that, even while playing for Krasnodar, he often thought that he actually wanted to try his hand at American basketball. He has relatives living in the USA, he has been there more than once, and when the chance to move to the university appeared, he did not hesitate for a long time.
Evdokimov learned about the university's interest in him in advance, so he spent the summer with benefit: he trained individually with personal trainers in Moscow and Cyprus, where his father plays handball. There, the defender, at the request of the university coach, worked hard on three-pointers and performed at least 500 long-range shots a day.
Evdokimov will be coached at the College of Charleston by Pat Kelsey, a strong specialist who is widely known in college basketball. He once worked with Jeff Teague and Chris Paul.
Alex is not short for Alexander, but his passport name. He was not born in Russia, but in Canada, his parents went there to give birth to Alex. In this country, he lived the first year of his life, after which he left for Moscow. In memory of Canada, Alex has citizenship (he has a double one).
But he started playing basketball in Russia.
— I started playing basketball at Gloria when I was 10-11 years old. People came to my school - and I studied at an ordinary secondary school - who were looking for young guys who were ready to play basketball. They came into my class, saw that I was tall, did a couple of tests, asked me different questions and invited me to practice. I studied at Gloria for a long time, then I got into the MBA Junior Junior League, from there I was taken to the Super League. I played there for literally a year, and after graduating from high school I decided that it would be wise to go to the United States. I contacted Skryagin (Alexander Skryagin, ProFuturo Sports, - note "Interception"), because he was the only person who knows more about moving to the USA than me. We talked to him, I dropped my highlights to him, and he helped me find a school, - says Kotov.
Alex arrived in the US in 2017 and entered the Montverde Academy. This is a very famous program that prepares players for the NCAA. Kotov spent a year in Montverde and won the championship with this team, the result for the season is 35-0. Alex's partners then included, for example, RJ Barrett, who now plays for the New York Knicks in the NBA, and Turkish Efes center Philip Petrushev.
Alex left Montverde not immediately for the NCAA, but for the NJCAA. It is an association of junior colleges and is also often referred to as Juko. A common story for those who feel like they're not ready for the NCAA yet, but want to play hard and improve. Kotov spent two years in this association, after which he moved to the NCAA, to the Illinois State Redbirds team. This is also a representative university of the mid-major category.
Alex has six months left to study at the university, but he can play in the team for another two and a half years. This happened because the players have the right to use the redshirt option. In fact, this is the right of the player to extend his career at the university, even if he has already graduated from the university. Plus, there's also the "cancellation" of the season due to the coronavirus (this happened last year), which also doesn't count, as well as the "cancellation" of the season due to injury (this happened to Alex in his second year in the NJCAA).
In general, these rules are very complicated.
- Due to an injury in my second year at the NJCAA, I opted to save the year. That's plus one season. In addition, this year I had a lot of misunderstandings with the coach, it all started last year. I thought that it would be possible to influence it somehow, to establish relations with him in the summer, but it turned out to be much more difficult than I thought. Therefore, after a huge number of meetings, we came to the conclusion that this year it would be easier for me to also take the option to save the year. So this year I'm graduating from university, getting an education, but I still have, roughly speaking, two seasons to play in the NCAA, - says Kotov.
Lakhin is the only Russian who represents a high-major university. This means that the university where Vitya plays often goes to the "March Madness" and has a tangible chance of winning the NCAA.
And the story of Lakhin began in Anapa. The parents wanted to send their sons - Vitya and his brother Vasya - to some kind of team sport so that they would play together. And chose volleyball. But because of the coach, they did not last long in the volleyball section and eventually went to basketball.
Lahin started in fourth grade but quickly rose to the city team. And in the Krasnodar Territory, if you play for the city team, then you are in full view of the Lokomotiv scouts. Vitya did not play Loko on a permanent basis, but by the 7-8th grade he was regularly on the team to participate in the Russian championships. The Railroaders took him as a reinforcement player - this is a common practice in children's competitions.
Further - a matter of chance. Loko juniors played in the final stage of the Russian championship and met CSKA twice - in the group stage and in the semi-finals. Lakhin gave two good games and ... received an invitation from the "soldiers".
At first he did not think of moving anywhere and stayed to finish the season in the south. But summer came, and he still went to see it. He was offered to stay after the first practice. Vitya talked to his parents and a month later he arrived at CSKA.
- The first season was probably the most emotional, full of some moments, memories. Because my brother and I arrived for the first time in a big city. On the one hand, this is a great freedom, because there are no parents nearby, but, on the other hand, this is also a great responsibility. Because you have never done the things that your parents did for you before, like laundry, cleaning, all sorts of small things. Even a waste of money: you never thought about it before, you were given - you spent it. And here you have money, and you know that if you spend everything, then at the end of the month you won’t have any left, ”recalls Vitya.
Lakhin reached the final stage of the youth Euroleague with CSKA and spent a pretty good season overall. Alexey Zhukov, the head coach of the “army” CYBL, left to work as an assistant in Nizhny Novgorod, and Maxim Sharafan came to CSKA from Lokomotiv. He worked with Vitya for three years, and during this time Lakhin managed to understand that he wants to play in Russia only at the highest level - in CSKA - and if it doesn’t work out, then it’s better to leave.
- I realized that it would be very difficult for me to get into the base. This is a top club with the highest goals, and as a young player I need to be not even the same as everyone else, but better, because I have no experience. It was necessary here and now to show some level and bring results. Let's be realistic, there were no players who can immediately enter the CSKA system and show something like that for a long time. Probably the Swede was the last one. I realized that I can’t do that, and since my dream is to be in the NBA, I decided to move closer to this league, this Wednesday, to America. That's why I'm here, - says Vitya.
But not everything was so simple. Back in Russia, Lakhin managed to get injured. He fell in the game moment, and his knee hurt. The medical staff did not suspect anything, and Vitya continued to train. The state of health worsened, but then the pandemic came, everyone went into self-isolation, and the center just went home. The knee was still swollen, but the pain was slowly receding. Vitya did not train and therefore did not feel any signs of deterioration. He already knew that he was leaving for America, and just waited for all the permits.
The injury happened in February and the departure was due in September. In the summer, Lakhin himself did an MRI, which showed that he had ... a torn meniscus. He took the results of the examination to the surgeon who scheduled the operation. Vitya went for it and began to recover in Russia, and he came to the USA with an already operated knee.
Everything should have been fine, but when he started running, the pain returned. Lakhin did another MRI, and it showed that the same meniscus was completely torn. The doctors said that it would take six months to recover. Therefore, Vitya simply missed his first season in the NCAA.
— All this time I didn't train, but I was always with the team: in scouting, in the locker room, in training. All lessons were online, and we lived in an apartment with the team. So that year helped me a lot, because even though I didn’t play, I was in the system and I knew the guys. It was my year of adaptation - to a new culture, to people, to new faces, to food. I had the same feeling as when I came from a small town to Moscow. You leave Russia for any other country - even to America, even to Italy, even to Spain - and you go through the same thing, Lakhin believes.
He adds that the Cincinnati had a new head coach at the end of last season and it was a difficult moment. A new specialist was appointed the day before Lakhin's departure to Russia, when he did not yet understand whether he would remain in the team for the next season or not. Whether to leave it, decided the new head coach. But in the end, the center managed to meet with him before departure and find a common language. The coach wanted to protect the Russians in the squad.
During the summer Vitya worked in the USA on his body and improved his skills. The season began in October, and in December, Lahin was the best freshman of the week in his conference. By the way, he has a situation similar to Alex: academically, Lahin is a sophomore, but he is considered a rookie in the team.
Andrey Savrasov, Georgia Southern Eagles
2021/22 stats: 14 games, 23.7 minutes average
11.9 points (51.5% 2-point, 30% 3-point, 73.1% free throws), 6 rebounds, 1.1 assists, 0.4 block shots, 0.9 interceptions, 1 loss Andrey's first coach is a well-known Russian specialist Oleg Aktsipetrov.
— I remember that at first I had very different hobbies: football, basketball, taekwondo… But after the first two or three years of training, I realized that basketball is really mine, that I want to do just that. Slowly, I began to play for the sports school of the Admiralteisky district, for the Zenit Junior Junior League, played for the Russian national team U16, U18. We went to different tournaments, and somewhere the scouts saw my game and invited me to the USA, says Savrasov.
Andrey moved to America three years ago - in January 2019of the year. Now he is finishing his third year at the university, in the American education system it is possible to start studying in the middle of the academic year and, accordingly, then graduate also in the middle of the academic year.
Savrasov managed to play for the Texas Tech team, where he spent a year and a half. The first six months he did not play, he spent in redshirt mode - he trained, worked on his body, was with the team, but did not play for it. But the next season already played in the status of a freshman, that is, a freshman.
Andrei didn't get much playing time, but he still wanted to stay at the university. It was a high-major, and Savrasov wanted to prove that he deserved another role.
But then I talked to the head coach, and together they decided that it would be better to change the university in order to continue their career. The coach even helped find a new team, and that's how Savrasov ended up in Georgia, in the Georgia Southern Eagles team. This is a mid-major university.
Now in his second year with the new team, he is in the starting five and generally has a good role on the court. In theory, Andrei can play for the university for another two years, although he graduates from the university in a year.
Vladislav Goldin, Florida Atlantic Owls
2021/22 stats: 14 games, 16.5 minutes average
5.7 points (47.9% 2-pointers, no 3-pointers, 52.2% free throws), 5.5 rebounds, 0.4 assists, 0.6 block shots, 0.4 interceptions, 1.3 losses He played with his 2001, but at some point the team just fell apart and disappeared.
Goldin was sent to play by the year 2000, and the coach of this team turned out to be familiar with the coach of CSKA-DYuBL. Vlad and another guy were offered to the "soldiers" - just to look at them. But the screening went well, and after one of the training sessions, Vlad was offered to move to Moscow. New school, new surroundings, heavy loads, training twice a day - Vlad says that the first six months in the capital were the most difficult time in his life.
- At that time, I probably did not quite understand where I was moving and how much it changed. To be honest, I didn't even really know what DUBL was. Wasn't very knowledgeable. Youth League, Junior Team, Superleague… I knew the tournaments where we played: first the Southern Federal District, then the Russian Championship. When I found out that I was already in Moscow and had to go to the CYBL team for a tryout, I even got scared. But they left me, and I trained at CSKA for another four years. Then he played for the Russian national team U18 and U19, after which he received an offer to try himself in America. I decided to take a chance and moved there to the Prep school,” says Goldin.
Prep school is short for preparatory school. In essence, this is an opportunity to play basketball in the USA before going to university.
In October 2019, Vlad entered Patnam School in Connecticut. This is a small private school about an hour from Boston. Together with the team, Goldin became the champion of America in the championship among preparatory schools.
After that, Vlad was called to Texas, to the Texas Tech team - to the same team where Andrey Savrasov played for a year and a half. Goldin saw that this was a big and serious high-major team, saw the conditions for training and accepted their invitation without hesitation.
— In Texas, things are a little different. The way we played there was not like the way I played before, so the first experience was difficult. And then the head coach left us, replacing TexasTech with Texas. Most of the coaching staff left with him, and our team did not quite understand what to do. Only the assistant coach remained with us. And in the end, I decided to move to another team, to Florida, - say Goldin.
Due to the coronavirus, Vlad has the same situation as most student athletes: academically he is a sophomore, but the last sports season did not count, so he is a freshman in the team. Goldin has three years left to study, and he can play four more.
He himself says that his current team plays more European basketball, so he feels great there.
Alexander Glushkov, Appalachian State Mountaineers
2021/22 stats: 7 games, 4.7 minutes average
2 points (60% 2-pointers, 0% 3-pointers, 33.3% free throws), 1 .1 rebounds, no assists, 0.1 blocks, 0.1 steals, no losses
Born in Vladivostok, Glushkov started playing basketball at the age of 13 when he went to summer camp. I came home and told my father: "I want to play basketball." Parents sent Sasha to the section.
Glushkov's first coach is Eduard Sushko. After a year of working with him, Sasha was invited to the Spartak-Primorye system. He played in the Junior Junior League for a year, after which the entire management of the team and almost the entire squad moved to the PSC Sakhalin. At the same time, the base of the club remained in Vladivostok. Glushkov spent a year in the new club, after which he received an invitation from Moscow, from the IBA. His coach Alexander Antipov invited him.
And then it was a matter of chance, and a year later Sasha was already flying to the USA to study at school.
— I came to Moscow and played there for a year. When we were preparing for the Summer Spartakiad in Krasnaya Pakhra at the Trinta base, a coach from the USA arrived there. He was familiar with Alexander Antipov, because before that our guy had already played at the same school. He came just to relax, but he also wanted to look at the players. He probably liked me, and he invited me to school. I took the chance and got into high school. I spent 11-12 classes there, received several offers and decided that I would play in Appalachian State, says Glushkov.
Now Sasha is in his second year, but as you know, last year doesn't count. So Glushkov is considered a “freshman” in the team and can play for the university for another three and a half years, while he has two and a half to study.
When Sasha arrived at the university, he weighed about 90 kg. But now he has noticeably added muscle mass. He began to grow muscles during the last season, but he did the main work in the summer. Due to problems with visas, he could not go home to Russia, and he went to a friend in Houston. There he lived for a month, ate a lot and rocked. As a result, he entered the new season in excellent physical shape. True, the coach still does not really trust him.
Glushkov University is a mid-major who, last year, entered March Madness for the first time in 20 years. Sasha was not released then, but he nevertheless felt the atmosphere of the main student event of the year. Here's what he says about it:
- It was ... unbelievable (unbelievable - approx. "Interception"). Very cool feeling. 64 top teams, all at the highest level. We had two or three hotels, each floor was dedicated to a specific team. I don’t know how much it could be called the same “March Madness”, because, of course, all the measures were taken anyway. We had a quarantine, we had to be tested every day. And so everything was at the highest level,” recalls Glushkov.
David has probably the most atypical fate among all our guys who now play in the first division of the NCAA.
Didenko was born in the north, in the city of Yakutsk. He remembers his childhood quite vividly: he says that the city authorities allowed not to go to school at -45 degrees Celsius, and if the thermometer was only -43, you had to pull yourself together, stick yourselves into a thick down jacket and stomp to school.
— I had a healthy down jacket, maybe five centimeters. I walked around like a big bubble. When I was 8 or 9 years old, we had -57 degrees in winter. Very cold. I didn’t leave the house for two days,” Didenko recalls.
In 2010, David ended up in the USA even before he started playing basketball. He was 10. His older sister was leaving for New York to study English, and David just went with her for a month.
While still in Russia, they found him something to do in the USA. On the classifieds website, the family looked at a message from a Russian coach who lived there, his name was Boris Karebin. The coach was needed so that David would not just mess around in the States.
But the boy got so caught up in basketball that he eventually wanted to stay. Parents allowed, and he went to an American school. Karebin trained him in Brighton Beach, this is a Russian-speaking area, so immersion in American culture was gradual.
— I first lived in New York, where I arrived, and then I traveled. Lived in Florida, then studied in Georgia, in Tennessee. I travel a lot around the country - sometimes I live there, sometimes there. Somehow I quickly learned English, apparently because I was still young. Literally in a year. In Russia, I studied English for three classes, but could not learn it. Here I first lived with my sister, she pushed me to talk to people, and somehow everything turned out by itself, - says Didenko.
David spent his first year after school in Juko. Remember the story of Alex Kotov? This is the same league that prepares players who have not yet grown up to the NCAA. But already in the second year, Didenko ended up in the first division, at the University of Georgia.
He is currently a UT Martin Skyhawks player, where UT is the University of Tennessee. Accordingly, David now lives and studies in this state. He has a year and a half left at the university, and he can still play the same amount at the university level.
At the same time, he is 21 years old and automatically enters the NBA draft next year. In mocks - that is, expert predictions - he is not drafted, but he still has to play the whole season, so everything is in his hands.
Last on the list - not by value, but simply because he is the only Russian I could not contact - Pavel Zakharov from California Baptist Lancers.
Zakharov was born in Sør-Varanger, Norway. In Russia, Pasha played for the Zenit youth team and helped CSKA play in the youth Euroleague, and in 2018, after playing for the Russian U18 team at the European Championship, he left for the Montverde Academy. We talked about it a little earlier.
He was considered a four-star recruit. In American sports, when they want to talk about the prospects of a particular player, they talk about him in terms of stars, and four stars is very good. Such an assessment helped him get into the Gonzaga College in the NCAA - this is one of the top programs, which, for example, reached the NCAA finals last season, having suffered its first loss of the season in this very final. Pasha then did not go to the parquet. A year before, the team did not get into the "March Madness" only because the championship was stopped due to a pandemic.
Zakharov spent two seasons at this university and moved to the California Baptist Lancers in the summer of 2021. Most likely due to playing time, because, obviously, it was much more difficult to get it in Gonzaga. But even at the new university, he still has an average of 10 minutes on the floor and one and a half rebounds. By the way, about playing on the shields: the height of the Russian center is 213 centimeters, in America these guys are called seven-footers.
This is almost all I know about Pavel Zakharov.
It seems that the Russians in the first division of the NCAA are over. If you know someone else that I forgot, please write in the comments.
Thank you for your attention! I will be glad if you share the text or video with your friends who are interested in young Russian players. Well, thumbs up, comments, subscriptions to YouTube - everything is traditional.
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Photo: official websites of clubs, personal archives of players; twitter.com; instagram.com; cskabasket.com
NCAA basketball league betting features
The second most popular basketball league in the US is the NCAA. This is a tournament of student teams with its own characteristic features that radically distinguish it from the NBA. Consider the features of betting on the NCAA (National Collegiate Athletic Association) basketball league in bookmakers.
NCAA Basic Rules
First things to know:
The match consists of two halves of 20 minutes;
teams are given 30 seconds to attack;
10 seconds are given to transfer the ball from one's own half to another's.
The NCAA championship is divided into three different divisions according to the status. The best universities are collected in the first, respectively, less successful - in the third. On the sweepstakes, they regularly offer to bet on the confrontation in the first division, less often in the second, you are unlikely to find quotes for the third.
The games in the American Collegiate Championship are rather unpredictable. The reason is that the youth championship. Teams lack stability in the rhythm of the game due to the fact that basketball players are at the stage of formation of their work ethic. Here, outcomes for large odds are played much more often than in the NBA. The reason is that bookmakers are not always able to give correct quotes due to various circumstances, especially if the championship has just started.
Statistics in this case is not particularly significant, because after the end of the last season, many young stars went to the NBA draft. The composition has changed dramatically and it is difficult to predict exactly what to expect from the guys who have recently entered the university. Therefore, it is best to bet on the NCAA online, when you can visually assess what is happening on the site.
As in any basketball competition, in the National Collegiate Athletic Association league, first of all, you should pay attention to the total. It is often distributed unevenly - the first half is less productive than the second. And the difference is pretty big. Bookmakers give an average of five points more in the second half than in the first. This is due to the fact that at the end of the match the teams try harder, give their best to achieve the desired result.
Bet on the NCAA league
It is also interesting how the teams perform on the floor. If there is a clear favorite, for which quotes are around 1. 30, basically, at the beginning of the game, he gives a result that allows you to play in economy mode. In such a situation, it makes sense to bet on total less than in the second half, since the teams in it will simply serve the number. Well, in case of an equal fight, the total will be measured.
If the teams made a lot of three-pointers in the first five minutes and the total went up, there is an option to check this trend in the future. You can bet on total over in the first half, and then look at the situation. In case of a big gap, most likely, the second half of the teams will dry up, and if the fight is equal, the total will be higher, as the basketball players will gnaw out the victory. If in the first game segment the leader defeated the outsider by 15-20 points, it makes sense to bet on the underdog with a handicap, since the leader in such cases slows down and allows the opponent to catch up in numbers on the scoreboard.
Factors affecting NCAA match results
Home court play is a big advantage.
In the NCAA, some fans care for their clubs even more than in the NBA. For example, the kind of support that Duke fans give their players would be the envy of many professional clubs. The schedule of matches in the student league is drawn up in such a way that teams play series - away and home.
During the period of games at home, teams almost always strengthen their positions in the standings. And the three-point handicap laid down on the host by bookmakers is often biasedly small. It makes sense to take it when the notorious leader of the championship does not come to visit.
Pre-match mentality is paramount.
In the away series, when basketball players can cover the west and east coasts in a week, you should not expect them to fire in the eyes (of course, if there is no special tournament motivation). Even mature NBA players don't benefit from traveling, let alone young talents. Team coaching staffs can deliberately let the leaders rest in deliberately losing matches on the road, so that they shoot to the fullest in games at home with direct competitors.
In mid-February, you should pay attention to outsiders.
They can be roughly divided into two types - dull bottom and biting bullies. Both the former and the latter no longer formally claim to participate in the March Madness, but if the former have resigned themselves to their fate and dream about the next season with tears in their eyes, the latter, based on personal motivation, are ready to fight to the end.
The role of a coach in the NCAA is much more important than in the NBA. And everything depends on how he slanders his wards. Expect surprises at the end of winter, when the leaders are slowly preparing for the playoffs, and the guys from lower ranked clubs are trying to shine brighter on the eve of the NBA draft.
Personal relationships are of great importance in students' games.
While professionals are generally comfortable with personal grudges, trash talk and dirty play, young guys can hold grudges.
As I was posting news about the game in 2009, I felt wistful that I wouldn’t be able to play it when it came out. I’m making up for some lost time now, but I know I would’ve been able to have a blast with it back when it was new, had I been able to get my hands on it. Like NBA Live 10, it’s a great game for its era.
It also retained its own mechanics, such as the ability to perform distractions during free throws, and game tempo. Tempo wasn’t pushed as strongly as it was when it was a new feature the previous year, but it still had the same impact as far as boosting abilities when you’re controlling the pace of the game, and leading to poorer play when you’re not. The meter still popped up during gameplay along with coaching tips, though the overlay had been redesigned. It was still an effective mechanic that captured the NCAA style.
Icons above the players’ heads indicated who to pass to and when, as with full playcalling. It was an elegant system, and worth revisiting in a future NBA Live title.
All of the overlays, music, and other presentation elements replicated an ESPN broadcast down to the last detail. EA also partnered with CBS to incorporate their presentation of the NCAA, with Gus Johnson and Bill Raftery calling those games. In Play Now, the broadcaster was chosen at random. That was fine, though it would’ve been nice to have a choice.
It’s clear that innovation was slowing down with Dynasty by that point. That was unfortunate, but I’d suggest that the mode still had enough depth to be engaging and enjoyable. Still, it stands as an example of how EA Sports titles do get complacent when it comes to further innovating with their modes.
It’s often claimed that the lawsuit put an end to college sports games, but that isn’t actually the case (no pun intended). It certainly drew attention to issues with college sports titles that have made developers shy away from them, but no one is actually legally barred from making a new college basketball game. Looking back though, I do wonder if EA figured that the writing was on the wall. The lawsuit (understandably) forced them to remove appealing content, and as they couldn’t be sold worldwide, NCAA titles were limited in their ability to generate revenue. They probably didn’t have a huge team or budget.
The game was a marked improvement over its predecessor, and still holds up quite well years later.
The NCAA Basketball/March Madness and College Hoops series have become sought after collectibles; a complete-in-box copy can easily set you back hundreds of dollars. Sealed copies can fetch even crazier prices! I managed to pick up the college basketball titles that I now own at surprisingly good prices, though they were still more expensive than most other old hoops games.
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/ Columbia, Mo. / Rock Bridge HS / RS Junior / 
Y. / Blair Academy / 
/ Birmingham, Ala. / Oak Mountain HS / Freshman / 
] / 
Center 
/ Super-Senior / Yukon, Okla. / Yukon HS / Missouri Southern State / 
Don't forget that pluses are still the best way to thank the author. 
If last season I wanted to explain why exactly they are leaving, now I have focused on their career. 
Last summer, the defender represented the Russian under-20 team at the Euro Challenger, although he himself was only 18. 
Then Lokomotiv saw me at the Russian Championship. Together with a team from my city, from Chekhov, we took fourth place, and everyone was very surprised. I was seen by coach Petar Marinkovic, who called me to Loko, ”recalls Evdokimov. 
There, the defender, at the request of the university coach, worked hard on three-pointers and performed at least 500 long-range shots a day. 
They came into my class, saw that I was tall, did a couple of tests, asked me different questions and invited me to practice. I studied at Gloria for a long time, then I got into the MBA Junior Junior League, from there I was taken to the Super League. I played there for literally a year, and after graduating from high school I decided that it would be wise to go to the United States. I contacted Skryagin (Alexander Skryagin, ProFuturo Sports, - note "Interception"), because he was the only person who knows more about moving to the USA than me. We talked to him, I dropped my highlights to him, and he helped me find a school, - says Kotov. 
This means that the university where Vitya plays often goes to the "March Madness" and has a tangible chance of winning the NCAA. 
Lakhin gave two good games and ... received an invitation from the "soldiers". 
Alexey Zhukov, the head coach of the “army” CYBL, left to work as an assistant in Nizhny Novgorod, and Maxim Sharafan came to CSKA from Lokomotiv. He worked with Vitya for three years, and during this time Lakhin managed to understand that he wants to play in Russia only at the highest level - in CSKA - and if it doesn’t work out, then it’s better to leave. 
Lakhin did another MRI, and it showed that the same meniscus was completely torn. The doctors said that it would take six months to recover. Therefore, Vitya simply missed his first season in the NCAA. 
Whether to leave it, decided the new head coach. But in the end, the center managed to meet with him before departure and find a common language. The coach wanted to protect the Russians in the squad. 
Slowly, I began to play for the sports school of the Admiralteisky district, for the Zenit Junior Junior League, played for the Russian national team U16, U18. We went to different tournaments, and somewhere the scouts saw my game and invited me to the USA, says Savrasov. 
Vlad and another guy were offered to the "soldiers" - just to look at them. But the screening went well, and after one of the training sessions, Vlad was offered to move to Moscow. New school, new surroundings, heavy loads, training twice a day - Vlad says that the first six months in the capital were the most difficult time in his life. 
And in the end, I decided to move to another team, to Florida, - say Goldin. 
He played in the Junior Junior League for a year, after which the entire management of the team and almost the entire squad moved to the PSC Sakhalin. At the same time, the base of the club remained in Vladivostok. Glushkov spent a year in the new club, after which he received an invitation from Moscow, from the IBA. His coach Alexander Antipov invited him. 
"Interception"). Very cool feeling. 64 top teams, all at the highest level. We had two or three hotels, each floor was dedicated to a specific team. I don’t know how much it could be called the same “March Madness”, because, of course, all the measures were taken anyway. We had a quarantine, we had to be tested every day. And so everything was at the highest level,” recalls Glushkov. 
Lived in Florida, then studied in Georgia, in Tennessee. I travel a lot around the country - sometimes I live there, sometimes there. Somehow I quickly learned English, apparently because I was still young. Literally in a year. In Russia, I studied English for three classes, but could not learn it. Here I first lived with my sister, she pushed me to talk to people, and somehow everything turned out by itself, - says Didenko. 
In mocks - that is, expert predictions - he is not drafted, but he still has to play the whole season, so everything is in his hands. 
Such an assessment helped him get into the Gonzaga College in the NCAA - this is one of the top programs, which, for example, reached the NCAA finals last season, having suffered its first loss of the season in this very final. Pasha then did not go to the parquet. A year before, the team did not get into the "March Madness" only because the championship was stopped due to a pandemic. 
30, basically, at the beginning of the game, he gives a result that allows you to play in economy mode. In such a situation, it makes sense to bet on total less than in the second half, since the teams in it will simply serve the number. Well, in case of an equal fight, the total will be measured. 
