This is the forth installment in a world of incredibly fun sports games played with dice. In the first installment I taught you how to play the college version of Dice Football. Then in the second you learned the Pro Football dice game and the third dice game was, Dice Baseball. Now we are going to learn the Dice College Basketball Game. Unlike the football games you will need eight dice, notebook paper and a pen or pencil to play dice basketball.

Box Score Example

You will recall that in the college football game you got your box score set up so that you can begin the game and just take turns for four quarters. In the dice basketball games you will have to make a box score sheet that has two boxes split in half. These two halves represent the home team and the visitors. It does not matter who rolls first in dice basketball.

In the college version of dice basketball each team only gets two halves to roll for their scoring. In the coming pro version there are actually four quarters per team.

Scoring is pretty simple. Each team gets to start their first half by rolling all of the eight dice once. Once rolled, count up the total of all eight dice. As an example let us assume that the Home team rolled the following dice totals; 4, 3, 1, 6, 5, 6, 1, 2. In all, these total 28 which would represent 28 points. At most eight dice would only total 48 points per half…which is a little better than average, in terms of college basketball. However, one would have to roll eight dice that all hit sixes in order to get to 48 points.

This is where you can choose what kind of game you wish to play. If you like low scoring games then keep the score as originally rolled. If you like a lot of scoring then you can re-roll the lower dice to achieve higher scoring games. I like to use 1, 2, and 3 as re-roll dice. So what we will do is take the four dice which are 1, 1, 2, and 3 in the above example and re-roll them. Those four dice come out as the following; 2, 4, 4, 5. This re-roll total equals 15 points. Now all we have to do is add the 15 points to the original 28 points for a first half Home team score of 43 points. Not bad at all. Remember, you get to choose what re-roll dice you want to use, if any at all.

Now the Visitors get to strike back. Their dice totals are; 2, 3, 3, 4, 6, 4, 5, 4. This equals a total of 31. Now the Visitors re-roll the 2, 3, and 3 and come up with 4, 5, and a 1; for a total of 10 points. The Visitors add this 10 points to their previous total of 31 for a final first half score of 41. Thus the first half basketball game ends with the Home team winning by a score of 43 to 41 over the Visitors.

The team who is behind always goes first in the second half. If the score is tied then the Visitors have to go first in the second half. So let us say that the Visitors roll the following; 2, 4, 5, 3, 3, 5, 6, 1. That is a total of 29. Now the Visitors re-roll the 1, 2, 3, and 3 which results in 4, 5, 3, and 6 for a total of 18. They add the previous 29 to the 18 and their second half score totals 47 points. This score is added to their first half total of 41 points. The game ends for them with their score of 88 points.

The Home team responds with a roll of 3, 3, 3, 5, 5, 4, 4, and 3 for a total of 30 points. Then they re-roll the 3, 3, 3, and 3 which results in dice totals of 6, 5, 4, and 6. That is a total of 21 points! When they add the 21 to their previous roll of 30 we see that they have a total second half score of 51 points. When added to their first half score of 43 points the Home team has come back to win the game by a score of 94 to 88. 

Now if a game ends in a tied score then both teams play an overtime quarter. For overtime, both teams roll only four dice and the re-roll dice rule is equally in play. Again, if the score ends in a tie then you just keep playing overtime quarters until a winner emerges.

Handicapping College basketball dice games can be a snap. Let us say that you have the Home team advantage. How this advantage can be enacted is to allow the Home team to get re-rolls on all 1, 2, and 3 dice rolls. The Visitors will get to re-roll on the dice rolls of 1 and 2 only. This handicapping can be fun if you have several teams in some sort of tournament set-up. Try it and see for yourself what fun tournament play is. Especially when an underdog knocks off a favorite.

Till then, keep on rolling.