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Three Point Shooting Against IU


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I made the post talking about tracking IU's 3 point shooting throughout the year and mentioned the fact that it seems that although there isn't much of a correlation between us shooting a high percentage from deep and winning games, there has been a trend of us losing games when our opponents shoot well from deep. Might sound incredibly basic and common sense that when opponents shoot well they beat IU, but it is interesting to see how teams have shot threes vs IU compared to their individual seasons.

 

Not going to outright say it's bad defense because it is probably a combination of guard/perimeter defense, three-point shooting being a weakness to the pack-line, and opponent skill/luck...but I think we would all say that defense hasn't been fantastic recently and the opponent three point shooting does kinda show that. I don't think there is any public data for CBB that shows whether shots were contested/open and there is no way I'm going to re-watch or track all of the games to find out myself so I just have 3PT shooting vs IU, outcome/margin of each game, 3PT shooting for season, and KenPom adjusted offensive efficiency rank as of today to give a little color to what kind of offenses we've been facing (did go through the Purdue game highlights shortly after that game because of how hot they were from 3 though, and in just the 11 threes Purdue made I'd say 8 were open to wide open). Kenpom Offensive Efficiency rank might seem a little out of place considering the rest of the data is 3 pointer focused, but felt that it provided some context if a team had an efficient offense that couldn't be shown through their shooting percentages. The rows with red text are games that opponents shot above their season 3PT% against IU.

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A lot of you probably know that IU has rated pretty well all year in adjusted defensive efficiency, but as Assembly Call tweeted out after the OSU game, in conference games we have been 10th of the 14 Big Ten teams in defensive efficiency allowing 105.5 points per 100 possessions. Big Ten teams average just under 35% shooting from three this season and against IU, Big Ten teams are currently shooting 37.5% so far (38.37% if you just averaged the three-point percentage against us each game). I don't know if the fact that 4 of our last 6 games have been against top 10 offensive efficiency teams in the nation means much or not with every Big Ten team playing everyone at least once by the end of the season, but it might be worth noting if there is a noticeable improvement in our defense or 3PT% Against in upcoming games.

 

To end this post on a positive note though, the bottom four of the Big Ten in 3PT% from 11th-14th is Rutgers, Michigan State, Nebraska, and Minnesota (IU currently 9th at 34.52%). Of our 5 remaining games scheduled, we have 3 games (4 if the postponed MSU game gets made up) against teams in that bottom 4 (vs MINN, vs MSU, at RUT, maybe at MSU). Here's the 3PT%, Attempts/game, and adjusted offensive efficiency rank for our remaining opponents. 

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TLDR: When teams shoot well from deep vs IU, typically ends in loss. Upcoming opponents though, not great shooting from 3 for the most part.

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Thanks for sharing this, interesting stuff. I'll have to look at this more in front of a computer. 

I will say that one of the red lines is a bit misleading. FSU technically shoot better than their season average but only by 0.18%. I'd consider that right at their season average but I understand how excel tables work and 40% is still greater than 39.82%. That said, IU still allowed them to hit 40% of 20 attempts which will result in losses quite often. 

You can also see the rate at which they allow opponents to shoot better than their season average has gone way up in conference. They've allowed that in 7 of 13 conference games (53.8%) versus 2 of 7 (28.6%) in out of conference games including FSU or 1 of 7 without that one counting.

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I like the statistical breakdown. It reinforces a lot of what we're been seeing.

The #1 vulnerability of the pack line is the three pointer. You're basically hoping you can force contested shots and the opponent won't hit a high enough percent to beat you. I think Archie is trying to add size at guard to address this going forward. But there's more to it.

Interestingly enough a positive of packl ine is supposed to be rebounding. That is an issue they've struggled with and Archie has admitted it's a problem. My guess is they correlate - three point defense and rebounding. 

One thing I notice is the back side guard drops down to help in the post. When the ball comes to their guy they struggle to recover. Pack line works off a 16 foot sagging line when not on the ball. IU has guys dropping much further down. Why? They dont have the size/depth to compete and have to cheat down to help.

Add size/depth = solve the problem. 

 

 

 

 

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