As you prepare for the start of the Maine Principals’ Association high school basketball tournament, here’s an almost-annual reminder to guide you when some of the product falls shy of your expectations.

A shot clock would not improve or benefit the game at that level in any way, shape or form.

It’s a band-aid solution and a logical fallacy in a historical epoch where we adore both. It ignores the real problem and its root causes while embracing the idea that enhanced government will solve it.

No, no, a thousand (or 24, 30 or 40) times, no.

Don’t get me wrong. The game in Maine needs an overhaul. It was in a steady decline for the two decades before I left.

Some of that, of course, is due to diminished fundamentals at all levels of the game.

There is too much reliance on a 3-point shot that is a one-in-three proposition for the even the best high school players. Also, an overemphasis on dribble, drive and kick out tactics, leading to a symphony of obligatory block/charge calls that leave the game with absolutely zero flow. And, of course, a catering to the one to two percent whose parents believe this game might pay for some or all of their post-secondary indoctrination.

It all conspired to turn Maine high school hoops into a shadow of its former self. Still an activity that’s a fun way to stay engaged in your community and while away the interminable, intolerable winter, for sure. But by golly, there are stretches of almost every game that are almost unwatchable.

A mandated amount of time for each possession won’t fix Maine high school basketball any more than taking a pill every day to lower your blood pressure or cholesterol will magically make you healthy. It takes behavioral change and a commitment to changing bad habits.

Too many symptoms already exist that Maine’s policy makers have been willing to accept under the heading of “times change.”

Pine Tree State pick-up games no longer exist. Yes, I attended school back in the dark ages of no internet and basic cable. OK, maybe after this week’s outages up yonder, that’s a faulty comparison. But when we weren’t riding that big, yellow horse to another town to represent our school, we were playing church ball, driveway ball or community center ball. Crazier still, if we were bored stiff and our friends were tied up, we’d go to the nearest pavement or worn dirt path and fire up free throws and jumpers on our own.

Everything now is painfully structured, and whether we like it or not, some to all of that is our own fault. We allow the athletes in our homes to pursue sedentary activities when they’re not playing games run by other adults.

School gyms are chained shut during non-school hours. There are any number of reasons for that phenomenon. No grown-ups willing to supervise. Leeriness of liability and lawsuits. Or perhaps most daunting, a fear that the sanctioning body will get wind of an out-of-season activity and mete out punishment to the fullest extent of the law.

It all mirrors the rest of society, because it serves to eviscerate the middle class. Except from Thanksgiving week to Presidents’ Day and a tight window during the month of July, the vast majority of Maine high school basketball players never lace up their sneakers or get within shadow’s distance of a ball rack.

Meanwhile, the upper crust are playing in AAU tournaments almost year-round, all over creation. They’re becoming teammates and bonding with their peers from rival schools while rarely seeing the kids in their own neighborhood.

None of that is inherently bad, of course. Those athletes are growing their skill sets and staying fit. They’re chasing the dream (hopefully their own) and improving their chances of a higher education, a longer career, and maybe a splashier travel itinerary down the road.

All those things are fine. Let’s not pretend they’re improving the game as a whole, however. Everybody who’s on a watch list or an all-star team eventually returns home for the traditional basketball season to third, fourth and fifth starters in their school’s lineup who have been left behind.

The game, by nature, became less of a team enterprise. And coaches, out of self-preservation, employ zone or other junk defenses that complicate already questionable ball control and shot selection, leaving y’all with scores such as 18-16 and average point totals in the 30s and 40s.

Moreover, Maine’s regular season of 16 to 18 games is just too dang short. I’m well acquainted with another state that plays nearly twice as many. Your over-emphasis on conferences and limitations on play dates preclude travel, holiday tournaments, and other elements that used to stretch players and coaches, exposing them to different styles.

Perhaps worst of all, when that season’s over, it’s over. Being married to that February vacation week leaves winter and spring sports dormant for nearly a month. Open gyms and optional workouts for basketball in spring and fall aren’t permitted. I promise you that they work elsewhere, and that common sense prevails.

As the corner of the world that’s known far and wide for barely allowing the slam dunk, you’ve already regulated yourself into a corner, in other words.

Want to catch up with other states (all but eight of which also don’t have a shot clock, by the way)? Loosen the strings that are constricting the growth of,your players, their grasp of offensive and defensive skills, and the development of your game.

Kalle Oakes attended every Maine high school basketball tournament from 1980 to 2016, including 27 years as a member of the Sun-Journal staff. He is now sports editor of the Georgetown (Kentucky) News-Graphic. Keep in touch with him by email at kaloakes1972@yahoo.com or on Twitter @oaksie72.

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