When 40 minutes isn’t enough to determine the winner of a college basketball game, it’s time for overtime(s).

NCAA College Basketball Overtime Rules: Everything You Need to Know
One of the only things in this world greater than college basketball is free college basketball in the form of overtime.
A game can be plenty dramatic enough if it ends in regulation, but there’s just something extra magical about overtime — particularly when it’s a successful buzzer-beater that brings that OT to fruition.
But if you’re relatively new to the world of college hoops, perhaps you have some questions about how this bonus time gets played out. Or maybe you’re just curious about the most iconic overtime moments in the history of men’s college basketball.
Allow us to enlighten you.
How Does Overtime Work in College Basketball?
While the rules for overtime in most sports fundamentally change the way the game is played from that point forward — golden goal in hockey, the ‘ghost’ runner in baseball and all sorts of new wrinkles for football, particularly for the college variety — nothing really changes when a college basketball game is tied at the end of regulation.
For all intents and purposes, the clock gets reset to five minutes, each team is awarded one additional timeout, the ball is tipped again and play resumes where it left off.
In many ways, that simplicity is what makes it so great — no convoluted graphic necessary to explain how what you’re about to watch is going to differ from what you’ve been watching up until that point.
Aside from that, everyone gets a minute to catch their breath after what was surely a dramatic finish to the second half/previous overtime and then they start back up.
Be sure to note the “previous overtime” portion of that last statement, though.
If one five-minute overtime period isn’t enough to determine a winner, then lather, rinse and repeat. The clock gets set back to five minutes and they do it all over again.
As many times as necessary.
That said, most overtime games are decided after a single overtime, and we may well go an entire season without getting a single game featuring four or more overtimes — as was the case for the 2023-24 Division 1 men’s campaign.
NCAA Basketball Overtime Rules
Though overtime in college hoops is really just an unplanned extension of the second half, it's worth mentioning a few key details.
Team Fouls
Team fouls do not reset in any manner for overtime purposes. If a team ends regulation with eight team fouls, it also begins overtime with eight team fouls.
Thus, once a team gets into the double bonus, it remains in the double bonus until the game is finished.
Personal Fouls
Just like team fouls, nothing changes here. If a player fouls out in regulation, that player is still ineligible to return in overtime.
It also remains a five-foul limit, regardless of how many overtimes are played. As a result, games with multiple overtimes often become wars of attrition, with multiple key players likely to foul out for each team.
Timeouts
Any unused timeouts carry over from the end of regulation (or the previous overtime) to the start of the additional period. Plus, each team is awarded one additional 30-second timeout at the beginning of each overtime.
Possession Arrow
Each overtime period begins the same way the game begins: with a jump ball at midcourt. One team gains possession; the other gets the possession arrow in the event of a subsequent jump ball situation.
But speaking of possession…
Replay Review
You know those annoying sequences in college basketball’s endgame when the referees will spend way, way too long at the monitor trying to determine whose fingernail last touched the ball before it went out of bounds?
The good news is those replay reviews only occur in the final two minutes of regulation or the final two minutes of overtime.
There can still be reviews for possible flagrant fouls, shot-clock violations or goaltending in the first three minutes of an overtime period, but at least we get a reprieve from those interminable reviews to determine possession.
Longest and Most Famous College Basketball Overtime Games
North Carolina 54, Kansas 53 (3OT) - 1957 National Championship
Eight times in NCAA tournament history has the national championship game necessitated OT, but the 1957 title game was the only one thus far to go into multiple overtimes.
It was 46-46 at the end of regulation. Each team scored two points in the first OT and no points were scored in the second OT. (There was a skirmish, though, that delayed play for a while.) But two Joe Quigg free throws with six seconds remaining in the third overtime gave the Tar Heels the victory over Wilt Chamberlain and the Jayhawks.
Incredibly, it was UNC’s second consecutive triple-overtime affair, with the Heels also needing 15 additional minutes to outlast Michigan State the previous day in the Final Four.
Kansas 75, Memphis 68 (OT) - 2008 National Championship
Might as well go straight from a Kansas loss to a Kansas win, right?
It might be impossible to pinpoint when the “Should you foul when up by three points?” debate originally became a full-blown thing, but there’s little question that this “Mario Chalmers Game” is when it started to become a mainstream talking point.
After Memphis’ Derrick Rose went 1-for-2 from the free-throw line to give the Tigers a 63-60 lead with 10 seconds remaining, Kansas came down, ran Bill Self’s patented “chop” play and set up Chalmers for the game-tying triple to force OT. In those additional five minutes, the Jayhawks pulled away for a seven-point victory.
Cincinnati 75, Bradley 73 (7OT) - Dec. 21, 1981
During the 1981-82 regular season, both Cincinnati and Bradley played in just one game that required overtime.
They sure made the most of it, though, playing the longest game in D1 history.
‘Longest’ certainly doesn’t mean ‘best’ in this case. They were tied at 61-61 after 40 minutes before playing to a 14-12 near-stalemate over the course of the extra 35 minutes.
Doug Schloemer’s game-winning shot reportedly came with one second remaining, too, so they were that close to an eighth OT — in what ultimately ended up being an otherwise meaningless game, as neither team made the NCAA Tournament that year.
Syracuse 127, Connecticut 117 (6OT) - 2009 Big East Tournament
It’s the singular game that immediately springs to mind anytime you mention multiple overtimes in college basketball.
Unlike Cincinnati-Bradley from nearly three decades prior, all eyes were already on this game, with two ranked rivals squaring off at Madison Square Garden for the nightcap of the Big East quarterfinals. And, gradually, the must-watch attraction turned into a “must text everyone you know to make sure they’re watching, too” situation.
Eric Devendorf jumped on the scorer’s table after he thought he won the game for Syracuse at the end of regulation, but his bucket was waved off, coming a split-second after the clock expired.
By the end of this marathon, eight players fouled out, six recorded double-doubles and three did both. The Orange did not lead at any point in the first, second, third, fourth or fifth OTs. When they finally broke through, though, they ran away for a 10-point victory.
Gonzaga 93, UCLA 90 (OT) - 2021 Final Four
Because this game happened in a mostly empty Lucas Oil Stadium amid a global pandemic — and because Gonzaga turned around and got blasted by Baylor two days later — it feels like this one never fully incubated into the all-timer of a legendary moment that it should have been.
Chasing what would have been the first undefeated national championship in 45 years, No. 1 seed Gonzaga battled No. 11 seed UCLA in quite the ‘defense optional’ Final Four affair, neither side leading by more than seven points at any juncture.
UCLA managed to force the game to overtime and seemed to send it to a second OT when Johnny Juzang hit the game-tying putback with three seconds remaining. But he left just enough time on the clock for Jalen Suggs to bank in a 40-footer as time expired.
Duke 104, Kentucky 103 (OT) - 1992 Elite Eight
Grant Hill. Christian Laettner. 2.1 seconds.
Need we say more?
You could argue that Kris Jenkins’ buzzer beater to win the 2016 national championship for Villanova and Lorenzo Charles’ put-back of Dereck Whittenburg’s airball to give NC State the upset over Houston’s Phi Slama Jama in the 1983 natty were more unforgettable moments in NCAA Tournament lore.
However, even the world’s foremost Duke hater couldn’t put together a list of the five greatest moments in the history of college basketball without including “The Shot.”
And while Laettner, Jenkins and Charles all made their iconic buckets with no time left on the clock, only Laettner’s came in overtime, and only Laettner had to make his to win/extend the game, as the other two were tie-breaking shots that prevented overtime.
How Do Overtime Rules Affect Fantasy Strategies?
If you could somehow predict which games will go into overtime, it would be quite the advantage for fantasy basketball purposes. With those extra five minutes—or 10, or 15, etc.—you just might get the final point, rebound, assist, steal or block that you need in order to win your matchup/pool.
Alas, trying to forecast which games will require overtime is like trying to guess which way the wind will blow.
Frequently Asked Questions
How often do overtime games happen in college basketball?
It’s possible the 2023-24 men’s D-I season wasn’t a ‘normal’ one as far as overtime frequency is concerned, but we’ll look there for an answer to this question.
Of the 6,243 games played that year, 346 (5.5%) featured at least one overtime. There were 50 (0.8% of all games; 14.5% of overtime games) that needed at least two overtimes and nine that took at least a third OT to finally be decided.
Overtime games are a bit more common in March Madness, though. Of the 267 games played in the past four NCAA tournaments, 18 (6.7%) had at least five minutes of free basketball.
Are there ties in college basketball?
There have been a few recorded instances of ties. However, those all came many years ago and were the result of extenuating circumstances, like a discrepancy in the official scorebook that wasn’t discovered until long after the game ended, or broken equipment/lighting which made it impossible to continue play.
By design, though, no, there should never be a tie. Overtimes continue until a winner is determined.
Even if one team commits so many fouls that it is no longer able to put five players on the floor, that team simply has to play short-handed until someone wins.
What is the record for overtimes in a single college basketball game?
Seven.
As noted above, that seemingly eternal game took place in December 1981 between Cincinnati and Bradley.
There have also been a few six-overtime games, most famously the Syracuse-UConn game in 2009.
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