If you look at just about every offense in basketball there is always at least one post player. At the college level, post players are usually 6'5" and taller. There are obviously exceptions to that but it is rare. Another reason to have bigs is because other teams do and you want to simulate what they have in practice, even if you don't use that kind of big on your team.
Let's go ahead and look at a few basketball bluebloods and take a look at their rosters. At Kentucky, ten of their 12 scholarship players are 6'6" or taller. At North Carolina, nine of their 13 scholarship players are 6'5" or taller. At Duke, eight of the their 11 scholarship players are 6'5" or taller. At Florida, eight of their 13 scholarship players are 6'5" or taller. The D2 National Champs, Central Missouri had nine of their 16 players were 6'5" or taller. The D3 National Champs, WI-Whitewater had five of their 16 players were 6'5" or taller.
Even Villanova, who made small ball famous in the mid-2000's and would play 6'3" Randy Foye at power forward had a roster that had six of their 13 players were 6'5" and taller. Most teams have taller wings than what Villanova had but they were still successful because they created major matchup problems for other teams. Still, more than half of their recruited scholarship players were over 6'5".
Just because they have taller players doesn't necessarily mean wins but it doesn't seem to hurt when looking at these teams' rosters. D1 and D2 teams tend to be a little bigger than D3 teams but it's pretty obvious that being tall doesn't hurt your cause when trying to play college basketball.
One thing that having taller guys does to your roster is that it shrinks the floor defensively. What I mean by this, is with height and length on a team, the court seems much smaller to other teams and the gaps that are normally there either aren't there or don't seem as big. Syracuse has always done a great job with 2-3 zone this way and from watching Kentucky in the Bahamas this summer, they will look to do the same this year.
Now, the true question is, why are coaches enamored with guys that are 6'9" and can't walk and chew gum? Every coach thinks they can develop a "big guy" over the course of five years (including their redshirt year). Plus, big guys tend to develop a little bit later than guards/wings do because they still aren't completely comfortable with their bodies yet. Their upside is generally much higher than any guard.
I'll give two other examples from other sports that end up being similar to big guys in basketball. In football, a scholarship to a 5'7" wide receiver is not nearly as likely to a wide receiver that is 6'4". If you make a mistake on a 5'7" receiver, you probably will be ridiculed for it. In baseball, a coach is much more likely to send a scholarship to a 6'5" pitcher rather than a 5'10" one.
If a coach makes a mistake, he is more likely to make a mistake with a big. So...be 6'8" and a potential scholarship offer could come your way. Don't think because you are 6'8" that you are guaranteed to receive a scholarship but it certainly won't hurt.
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