Shot Clock Coming To Georgia High School Hoops, New Events For Track And Field

On Tuesday, the Georgia High School Association held its June State Executive meeting to discuss several proposals on the table including the addition of a 30 second shot clock for all varsity high school basketball games. Talks about adding a shot clock to GHSA basketball have been going on throughout the state for the past couple of seasons and many felt that adding it would be a good for the high school game. Spear headed by several coaches, including Rory Welsh of Langston Hughes and Jesse McMillan of Norcross, the three phase shot clock proposal was met with approval to begin in the 2020-2021 season with phase one at the Executive meeting on Tuesday.

Phase one will feature shot clocks only during approved holiday tournaments and showcases. Phase two will be implemented in the 2021-2022 season and will see the shot clock being added to region play in all region teams are in agreement on the usage. In phase three, 2022-2023, the shot clock will be used in all varsity games, which will include the playoffs. In an interview with Welsh, he said that the proposal was met with a lot of support from "not just from the fans, the schools, school systems but the main one was Georgia High School Association. They really walked us through this process and laid it out for us and gave us some parameters to work around and when we came back to the table today, those parameter GHSA put in place for us proved to be extremely sound".

During the meeting, the board also approved proposals to add the 4x800 event to contested track events and will phase in 4x200 by the spring of 2022. Track runners may also now compete in four events and be listed as one of the eight (8) runners of relay teams. Cross Country meets will no longer have area meets and will now have classes A through 7A participate in region competitions.