Rule change to help underclassmen get NBA evaluations

The changes are effective immediately, and the changes will give players more time to acquire information about their draft prospects and make informed decisions about staying in the draft pool or returning to college. Players will have until 10 days after the combine to remove their name from consideration if they wish to return to school.

A student invited to the combine will be allowed to work out with his college coaches from the time he receives his invitation until he withdraws from the draft.

Today’s decision won’t sit well with many college coaches who fought to maintain the old rules and even sought tighter regulations on underclassmen leaving early for the draft. That often left players with little time to decide if entering the draft was a smart move or not, but now they’ll have more time to evaluate what the best possible decision is.

“The cooperation between the NCAA, NBA and (National Assn. of Basketball Coaches) was vital to the success of this idea”, UCLA athletic director Dan Guerrero, the chair of the Men’s Basketball Oversight Committee, said in a statement. “We all worked toward the same goal – providing students and their families with the opportunity to assess their future professional sports prospects in a realistic timeline”.

When guard Vander Blue entered the National Basketball Association draft after his junior year at Marquette in 2013, he thought he had an outside chance to be a late first-round pick. But this later date for college players is a positive development for players, and the NCAA deserves credit for making it happen. If a player is allowed to put themselves in environments directly associated with NBA teams, the hope is that they will end up getting the necessary feedback. According to the release, this is by design to allow students to complete their coursework while also training for the draft, and also help prevent the exchange of improper benefits from agents and the accompanying eligibility issues. After the combine, early entrants should get the proper feedback to know if they have what it takes to get drafted.

Kansas coach Bill Self said the change was needed to help the athletes.

Previously, the deadline to withdraw from the draft was the day before the start of the April signing period, which was almost a month before the draft combine.