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Home-ball Advantage

Little known fact: ISU had a pretty major advantage over opponents in the early 2000's because when Larry would kick the balls at players in practice they be slightly "out of round", thus leading to odd bounces during games.



I used to play a lot of pick up hoops and I always had a good "game ball" to bring. One day a teenage punted my ball during the game, so I told him he either owed me $80 or he could get the **** off the court. This has always been a pet peeve of mine.
 
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Makes me think of the cheap rubbery ones we used as kids.

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It's a slight advantage, but most schools have a ton of different kinds of basketballs in order to prepare for the basketball they will use the next game. Iowa State has Under Armour, Nike, Spalding, Wilson, European style, etc. Usually the Nike schools have a deal with the company where the basketballs are provided with their uniforms / gear.. same with Adidas and Under Armour. If anyone has played with the Under Armour ball before, you'd know how terrible it is. It feels like a rock and feels weird coming off your hand when shooting.

The Wilson ball is used for the NCAA tournament and the Big 12 Tournament and a lot of teams use that as their primary ball for home games, regardless of whether they are a Nike, Under Armour or Adidas school. I like those a lot and am surprised that more schools don't use that considering it's what you'd use if you made the tournament.
 
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I have always thought those John Deere 5 in 35 balls must be extra heavy. Now we know the truth!
 
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It can definitely make a difference. A lot of people shoot down the theory that a ball can make a difference because a ball is a ball but anyone who has played basketball knows that they all feel different. To me, the Wilson ball is by far the best ball. I always hated the Nike ball. It feels really light and doesn’t have the grip the Wilson ball has. I think every school should be required to use the Wilson ball because it’s the ball used in the NCAA tournament.
 
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The team has a number of non-Nike balls on hand to practice with leading up to any game where the host has a weird ball. Kansas specifically was one that always had the annoying ball. Teams were also required to adhere to the visiting team's beverage sponsors and provide them with an appropriately branded cooler. While I was in school (grad 2009) Texas Tech still had All Sport as a sponsor so the team always had to keep a 5 gallon All Sport branded jug in storage for their 1 visit a year.
 
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I swear we played with this ball at one of the JH games back in the 70's. The old crackerbox gym literally had one of the rims held in place with wire wrapped through and behind the backboard (which was wood of course). Right at home for most of the players from both teams who grew up shooting these kind of balls at wood backboards on farm courts.

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The last time I was tempted to shoot some baskets was last winter after working out and walking by the basketball courts. Had not shot a basket in years, maybe more like at least a decade. Anybody my age trying to play an actual game would be a fool but thought shooting some would be okay. There looked to be nice balls lying around, some men's and some slightly smaller women's. All of them worn smooth like billiard balls. :oops: Dry winter hands of modest size along with those slick balls made me think set shoots would be the best answer. :rolleyes:

#nogrip
 
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We were the only school in our conference to use the Wilson Solution when it first came out. It went away from the "dimples" and had more of a tacky leather surface. They are still my favorite ball to play with, but it always gave teams fits when they'd play us. We'd make a point to play with regular balls when we had a road game, and practice with the Solutions all other times.
 
Thompsonclone said:
It can definitely make a difference. A lot of people shoot down the theory that a ball can make a difference because a ball is a ball but anyone who has played basketball knows that they all feel different. To me, the Wilson ball is by far the best ball. I always hated the Nike ball. It feels really light and doesn’t have the grip the Wilson ball has. I think every school should be required to use the Wilson ball because it’s the ball used in the NCAA tournament.
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In AAU when I saw that classic Wilson ball I knew it was going to be a good day from the field.
 
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The home team always supplies the game balls in basketball. This is news? There are lots of brands. This is news?
 
DurangoCy said:
Little known fact: ISU had a pretty major advantage over opponents in the early 2000's because when Larry would kick the balls at players in practice they be slightly "out of round", thus leading to odd bounces during games.



I used to play a lot of pick up hoops and I always had a good "game ball" to bring. One day a teenage punted my ball during the game, so I told him he either owed me $80 or he could get the **** off the court. This has always been a pet peeve of mine.
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I find it hard to believe that they were using the same balls for practice that they used for games. We had separate balls for games going back to high school and middle school. I would have expected the same in college, especially since most teams would practice in a different facility from where they play games.
 
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