It’s time to talk about this. I love stats and teams and players breaking records as much as the next guy, but not like this.
When someone nationally inevitably posts “best KenPom offense ever” or “most efficient team in history,” like they have in each recent year there’s one thing that keeps getting glossed over:
College basketball is juiced right now.
And it’s not because of the three-point shot or that offenses are really that much better.
We’ve had as high three-point rates years ago. We’ve had better three-point percentages before. In 2017 and 2018, teams were shooting 35%+ from three. In 2019, 3PA rate was actually higher than in 2024. That’s not what’s driving this offensive explosion.
What’s driving it is rim efficiency, and it’s because of the block charge foul rule change and how it’s called and that’s changing everything. Beginning in 2023–24, officials were instructed to judge legal guarding position based on whether the defender was established before the offensive player planted their last foot prior to leaving the floor. Previously, the emphasis centered more broadly on whether the defender was set before the shooter became airborne. That split-second reinterpretation drastically reduced the viability of the “secondary charge,” particularly from help defenders sliding in late. The downstream effect was immediate: offensive fouls declined, rim attempts became safer for drivers, and finishing percentages rose. It didn’t change spacing. It didn’t increase three-point accuracy. It simply removed one of the most powerful deterrents to downhill play — and the efficiency spike has followed.
The Scoring Environment Has Shifted — Dramatically
Look at the efficiency curve on Kenpom especially since 2024 when the rule was implemented:
2020: 100.8
2021: 101.4
2022: 102.0
2023: 103.2
2024: 105.2
2025: 106.2
2026: 108.3
That’s not normal growth — that’s a clear offensive spike tied to a structural change.
Yes, college basketball has evolved. Super seniors, the transfer portal, and NIL have helped consolidate talent and keep older players in the sport longer. That absolutely raises the overall level of play. But this jump is too sharp, too immediate, and too concentrated in one area to chalk up to roster construction alone.
This is being driven at the rim. The surge in efficiency isn’t coming from better three-point shooting — it’s coming from safer, more efficient downhill attacks and higher finishing percentages inside. The data points in one direction.
Points per possession set an all-time record at 1.05 in 2024 — then immediately broke it at 1.06 in 2025 and is destroying it now.
But here’s what matters:
3P% in 2025: 33.8%
3P% a decade ago: 34.7%
3PA rate in 2019: 38.7% (higher than 2024)
This isn’t a three-point revolution.
It’s a rim revolution.
2P% has climbed steadily:
2022: 49.7%
2023: 50.1%
2024: 50.3%
2025: 51.0%
2026: 51.7%
At the same time, turnover rate has fallen from 18.9% (2020) to 16.9% (2026).
More makes at the rim. Fewer turnovers. More free throws.
That combination is nuclear for efficiency.
The Rule That Changed Everything
The catalyst? The refinement to legal guarding position — specifically the “last foot” interpretation.
Previously, a defender had to be set before the offensive player left the floor.
Now, the defender must be set before the offensive player plants their last foot prior to takeoff.
It sounds subtle.
It isn’t.
Offensive fouls dropped by roughly 37% in 2024. The secondary charge — once the backbone of “No Middle” defenses — is nearly extinct.
The old blueprint worked. In 2018, Texas Tech neutralized Zion Williamson by forcing eight charges in a single game.
That blueprint doesn’t exist anymore.
Now:
Defenders play square instead of extreme no-middle angles.
Coaches emphasize verticality over sliding under drivers.
The low man has shifted from midline help to strong-side lane line positioning to stop drives earlier.
But here’s the bottom line:
Drivers are finishing more. Help is later. Risk tolerance favors offense.
And the numbers reflect it.
The True Shooting Leaderboard Tells the Story
If you look at the all-time team true shooting percentage list, something jumps out immediately.
Yes, you see the old Princeton teams at the top — the masters of efficiency:
1987-88 Princeton – .654
1990-91 Princeton – .639
1989-90 Princeton – .638
But once you scan the rest of the list, the modern spike is impossible to ignore.
Since 2024 alone:
2025-26 Miami (OH) – .645
2025-26 Liberty – .632
2025-26 Bellarmine – .630
2025-26 Saint Louis – .627
2025-26 Colorado State – .623
2025-26 Belmont – .621
2025-26 Cornell – .618
2025-26 Michigan – .616
2025-26 Akron – .615
2025-26 St. Thomas – .614
2025-26 Tulsa – .614
And that’s just one season.
2024-25 Cornell. 2024-25 Duke. 2024-25 North Dakota State. 2024-25 St. Thomas.
Since the rule shift, these teams are flooding the all-time efficiency leaderboard.
This isn’t random variance.
It’s environment.
We are watching the most efficient offensive era in college basketball history.
Eighteen of the top 48 true shooting team seasons of all time have happened since the rule change three years ago.
Three seasons.
Seven of the top 24 are happening right now. This season alone. Six of the top 20.
That’s not organic evolution — that’s distortion.
When that many “all-time” seasons are compressed into a tiny three-year window, it stops being a reflection of greatness and starts being a reflection of environment. The integrity of historical comparison — especially across the entire three-point era — depends on relative difficulty. If the baseline shifts dramatically and we pretend it hasn’t, the numbers lose meaning.
All-time efficiency lists are supposed to tell us who separated from their peers.
Right now, they’re telling us who played after the whistle changed.
The Consistency Problem
Here’s the part nobody wants to say out loud:
This is warping historical comparisons.
If we don’t adjust for environment, modern teams will dominate “all-time” lists simply because the math is easier now.
It mirrors what happened in the NBA two years ago during its offensive explosion. When rules tilt toward offense, efficiency spikes across the board.
That doesn’t mean players aren’t great. It means the baseline moved.
And if the baseline moves, evaluation has to move with it.
At some point, this has to be curbed — because consistency across eras matters.
Why Our Model Still Works
This is exactly why ADJeff is season-normalized.
Not because the bar is arbitrary.
Because the math is unforgiving.
A 7.0 season represents a level of pace-adjusted, efficiency-weighted, competition-aware dominance that very few players ever reach.
And here’s the key:
ADJeff moves with the season, not against it.
Every year is graded against its own statistical environment.
Scores are adjusted to that season’s distribution.
There is no fixed historical baseline dragging values up or down.
If offense explodes? The average rises. The curve shifts. Dominance becomes harder again.
That’s why you can compare a player from 2014 to one from 2026 under different rule interpretations — because each is measured relative to his environment, not a static historical constant.
And here’s why this matters beyond just stats and record books. When people talk about the first player to average a certain number of points, or the first team to hit a new efficiency mark, they’re framing it historically. And if the environment is juiced — just like the steroid era in baseball — those milestones start to lose context. It’s not that the players aren’t talented. It’s that the baseline for success has shifted, and if we ignore that, every “first” starts sounding more impressive than it really is. Historical comparisons have to account for context, otherwise we’re celebrating numbers instead of dominance.
This Isn’t About Nostalgia
This isn’t “old basketball was tougher.”
The data says something very specific:
Three-point shooting isn’t better than peak spacing years or much different than it’s been the last 15 years.
Turnovers are down.
Rim efficiency is up.
Charges are down.
Offensive rating is at an all-time high.
When everyone talks about “best KenPom offense ever,” the conversation has to include the context.
We are in the most offense-friendly period the sport has ever seen.
And unless the rules rebalance again, the record books will keep getting rewritten — not just because teams are better, but because the environment allows them to be more efficient than ever before.
That distinction matters.
Because dominance isn’t just about numbers.
It’s about how hard those numbers were to achieve.
