Award races, pro draft, Hall of Fame, and a deeper dynasty across the board.
Biggest update Hardwood Empire has had. Award races run all season now. Pro draft is in with 30 fictional franchises and a full draft history. The History section got rebuilt with Hall of Fame and all-time leaderboards. The sim itself got noticeably deeper across rankings, recruiting, transfers, and long-save stability.
New Features
Award Race Pages
- Track national award races game by game as the season goes on.
- Track conference award races throughout the season.
- Includes Player of the Year, Defensive Player of the Year, 6th Man of the Year, and Freshman of the Year.
- Mid-season races show the projected leader plus the top challengers.
- End-of-season view still shows final award winners.
Player of the Week
- Added National Player of the Week.
- Added Conference Player of the Week.
- Added Freshman Player of the Week.
- Weekly honors are tracked in player bios.
- Player of the Week counts are saved into History.
Pro Draft
- Added 30 fictional pro franchises, each with its own name and colors.
- Drafted players now show round, pick, and pro team.
- Draft info appears in player bios.
- Pro Draft happens during the offseason draft step.
Draft History
- Added full league-wide Draft History.
- View drafted players by season.
- Draft board tracks every pick from each draft class.
- Draft results are saved into long-term dynasty history.
History & Legends
- Rebuilt the History section into cleaner pages.
- Added Records, Awards, Draft, and Legends sections.
- Added Hall of Fame tracking.
- Added all-time leaderboards for points, rebounds, assists, awards, championships, and draft position.
- Cleaner long-term tracking for players, coaches, programs, awards, and records.
Stat Leaders UI
- Full UI cleanup on the Stat Leaders page.
- Top 3 leaders now stand out with larger premium cards.
- Ranks 4-30 use a cleaner compact list.
- Stat filter pills were resized and restyled.
- Includes PPG, RPG, APG, SPG, BPG, FG%, 3P%, and OVR.
RIM Metric
- Added RIM, the game's NET-style resume metric.
- RIM ranks teams by resume strength instead of only record.
- Adds more context to team profiles, rankings, and postseason discussion.
National TV Games
- Ranked vs ranked games can now become National TV games.
- Winning a National TV game can give your program a prestige boost.
- Big regular-season matchups now feel more important.
Story Events
- Added Off / Normal / In-Depth event settings.
- In-Depth adds more player-driven events.
- Events can include avatar popups, morale effects, attribute changes, availability changes, and interactive choices.
- Added events like veteran leadership, frustration, extra work, practice knocks, under the weather, hot/cold streaks, and missed class decisions.
Push Notifications
- Added push notification support across iOS and Android.
- Cleaner notification setup for both platforms.
- Supports broadcast updates for game news and announcements.
Sim & Gameplay
Sixth Man Logic
- Better sixth-man usage.
- Bench players can play more realistic rotation minutes.
- 6th Man of the Year now better reflects true bench impact.
- CPU teams now use strong bench players more naturally.
CPU Rotation Polish
- Smarter CPU minutes.
- Better bench usage.
- Cleaner role distribution during sim.
- Advanced roster roles plug more directly into sim usage.
CPU Progression
- Cleaner CPU player progression across sim paths.
- CPU development stays more consistent during fast sim.
- Better long-term roster development across the league.
Morale & Player Events
- Live sim and mass sim now handle postgame morale more consistently.
- Player event popups are cleaner and easier to understand.
- Breakout and regression moments now use avatar popups.
- Attribute changes now use clearer labels like "+1 Rebounding."
Overtime Display
- Live games now show OT, 2OT, 3OT, and so on.
- Overtime labels are cleaner across clock, scoreboard, and win probability views.
Rankings, RIM & Tournaments
Rankings
- Improved Top 25 ranking logic.
- Better handling of ranked wins.
- More realistic mid-major movement.
- Stronger resume-based evaluation.
- Better balance between record, roster strength, schedule, and performance.
- Rankings stay more consistent across reloads and season flow.
RIM & Resume Logic
- Added more realistic resume weighting.
- Teams are evaluated with more context than just win-loss record.
- Strong teams, ranked wins, schedule quality, and roster quality now matter more naturally.
Seeding
- Improved tournament seeding logic.
- Better head-to-head handling.
- Better conference tiebreakers.
- Better avoidance of early conference matchups.
- Better avoidance of early rematches when possible.
Conference Champions
- Regular-season conference champion logic now handles tied teams more cleanly.
- Head-to-head results are used more naturally in conference tiebreakers.
Tournament Tracking
- Cleaner NCAA tournament flow.
- Cleaner conference tournament flow.
- Cleaner postseason invitational tracking.
- Tournament results stay more consistent across brackets, schedules, team cards, records, and history.
- CPU tournament schedules now update more cleanly as postseason games are played.
- Runner-up finishes are tracked more cleanly.
Schedule Polish
- Conference schedules now balance home and away games more consistently.
- CPU schedules include conference tournament, NCAA tournament, and postseason invitational games more cleanly.
- Tournament tags display better across team schedules.
- Long team names fit better with CT / NT / PI tags.
Recruiting & Transfer Portal
Auto-Recruiting
- Auto-recruiting now targets players that better match your program prestige.
- Blue bloods chase higher-level recruits more naturally.
- Smaller programs target more realistic classes.
Recruiting Feedback
- Clearer feedback when recruits choose another school.
- Recruiting outcomes are easier to follow.
- More recruiting news and toast feedback added across decision paths.
Transfer Portal
- Cleaner transfer signing flow.
- Better offseason transfer handling.
- Transfer signings carry more cleanly into the next season.
- Better transfer labels.
- Cleaner JUCO / transfer display.
- Improved roster full messaging.
JUCO & Transfer Polish
- New JUCO and transfer players are handled more cleanly when they arrive.
- Transfer backgrounds and school labels display more naturally.
- Transfer portal signings stay better connected through offseason flow.
Player, Roster & History Polish
Player Bios
- Cleaner player bios.
- Better award tracking.
- Better draft info.
- Better weekly honor tracking.
- Player cards now show more complete long-term history.
Career History
- Cleaner long-term career history.
- Better school labels.
- Better season-by-season tracking.
- Cleaner career rows across transfers, old saves, and long dynasties.
Draft Tracking
- Draft History and player cards now stay aligned.
- Drafted players show full round, pick, and pro team info.
- Active players and departed drafted players are separated more cleanly.
Redshirts & Eligibility
- Redshirts display more clearly in lineups.
- Redshirt players are marked and locked properly.
- Eligibility flow received a polish pass.
- Player counts are clearer on redshirt screens.
Coach Records
- Cleaner coach record tracking.
- Better long-term coaching history.
- Coach record books now stay focused on the correct coaching stop.
GOAT & Records
- Cleaner GOAT score displays.
- Cleaner record book logic.
- Better long-term leaderboard tracking.
NIL, Saves & Stability
NIL
- More stable NIL values across reloads.
- Cleaner NIL flow throughout the season.
- NIL amounts stay more consistent between sessions.
Save Support
- Improved older save support.
- Stronger save recovery.
- Cleaner long-term dynasty stability.
- Better season transition handling.
- Better Selection Day and postseason recovery support.
Season Flow
- Cleaner offseason transitions.
- Cleaner tournament entry points.
- Cleaner season-complete handling.
- Better recovery for unusual long-save states.
General Polish
- Coach setup screen UI polish.
- Better layout support across small phones and tablets.
- Cleaner schedule tags.
- Cleaner tournament tags.
- Cleaner UI spacing on Stat Leaders.
- Cleaner award race layout.
- Cleaner player event popups.
- Cleaner news feedback.
- Cleaner recruiting feedback.
- Cleaner roster flow.
- Cleaner offseason flow.
- Cleaner history pages.
- More long-save stability improvements.
- More overall bug fixes and quality-of-life improvements.