fasbjd

I’m not sure if there is any attempt to put a schedule together that tries to balance out level of competition (ie try to make the above number as close to 50% for each team). Clearly, it would be an impossible task as there would be no way of seeing NW being this good and OSU this bad. In reality, the best thing for the conference as a whole is to try to get all the top tier, NCAA tourney quality teams to play each other twice. It would boost their NET and give additional opportunities for Quad 1/2 wins. Though the schedule as it is, helps Rutgers’ conference record and seeding in the BTT, it does their overall portfolio an injustice - which puts extra pressure on them to win that game at Mackey.

We all know that the unbalanced schedule of the B10 has put IU at a disadvantage in the conference standing - IU 6 single plays include 5 vs the bottom 5 teams in the standings and the only upper tier team we only play once is Maryland who we had to play at Maryland (where they are undefeated in conference) vs getting them on the road (where they have played poorly). I set out to actually quantify how skewed the schedules are. I took each teams single play games and looked at the opponent conference records with regards to the venue played (home vs road), totaled them up, then looked at the opponent win %. The higher the win %, the better the opponents are that the team did not have to play due to the unbalanced schedule, and vice versa. The results as of posting, listed in order of lowest opponent win % (the most difficult schedule) to highest (easiest schedule): Win % of opponents not played due to unbalanced schedule Team Opponent Win % Indiana 32.6% Northwestern 33.3% Ohio State 36.7% Nebraska 42.6% Michigan State 44.9% Michigan 46.8% Wisconsin 49.0% Illinois 55.1% Maryland 55.1% Penn State 56.5% Minnesota 58.3% Iowa 61.2% Purdue 63.0% Rutgers 64.0% Pretty much confirms what we expected - IU has the worst unbalanced schedule and Purdue one of the most favorable. NW's success is even more surprising seeing the difficulty of their schedule compared to some of the other top tier teams.

I think that is accurate. Here is another version of the graph that is a bit fairer of a comparison and hopefully makes that clearer: First I'd like to explain the difference in the graph here and the one above (as you can see our positioning is a little less favorable in this one). The most important change is that this graph represents the Pre-tourney data, so a more useful comparison. The biggest change in our position, though, is due to this graph point is from Bart Torvik's T-rank where the prior was from KenPom. While similar, T-rank uses a different adjustment for SOS. The data used in building the Arcs (all those data points) were also from T-rank. I had switched to T-rank as it led to a graph with stronger correlation to tourney results. It also has the advantage of ease of separating data on the website, and is also free to use. (I had forgotten I had switched when I made the first graph, so my bad.). Lastly, this graph does away with the A/B/C boxes. This was also done because correlation analysis showed it, while being as strongly correlated with results as Tournament seeding, actually reduced the correlation coefficient of the Arc sectors alone. Now in regards to were we currently stand, as you can see, we sit just outside the #2 arc. The 3 Sector has had 206 teams in the 14 tournaments represented and of these teams has had 1 champion (0.5%), 3 teams play in the final (1.5%), 8 in the Final Four (3.9%), 18 in the Elite Eight (8.7%), and 47 in the Sweet Sixteen (22.8%). Teams in this Sector average 0.94 wins/tournament with an average seeding of 6.4. Before getting TOO worried about our current position, keep in mind that with only 10 games in, we only have a small fraction of the final set of data. As such, outliers carry a heavier impact on the efficiency averages and we currently have clear one-game outliers for both the offense (Rutgers game) and defense (Arizona). Without the outliers, the aOE rises 2.2 points and aDE drops 1.8 points - that positioning is the second "X" on the grid. Now those games obviously happened and cannot be ignored, but given the smallish collection of data it is fair to assume that where this team properly sits is somewhere between these two Xs. Finally, in regards to what 5Fouls said, looking at this graph it is fair to say our defense as it stands currently has been championship-worthy where our offense still needs improvement. While our defense is not as strong as the average championship D (represented by the yellow circle), it is better than a majority of the championship teams (represented by the yellow/white diamonds) - 8 of 14 had worse aDE. Every championship team, however, had a better offense with the championship average aOE being far better than our current aOE (the two closest teams being the '13 Louisville team who had a punishing defense and the '14 UConn cinderella team that won it all as a 7 seed).

A little late in responding and things have changed a bit in the last few games but for some prospective, here is where IU sits on the Arc graph as of 12/12: Now this is comparing our current standing with the final standings of prior years, so not quite apples to apples, but it gives some general assessment of where things stand. Our current location in the grid puts us in the 2B area: For reference, in the 14 post-seasons accounted for ('08-'22), there have been 113 tournament teams that plot into this area. Of those, there were 2 champs (1.8%), 7 teams in the title game (6.2%), 14 in the Final Four (12.4%), 32 in the Elite Eight (28.3%), and 65 in the Sweet Sixteen (57.5%). Teams in this area have an average win total 0f 1.96 games in the tournament, average tournament seeding of 3.7, and performance-wise fall between the success of 2 and 3 seeds.

The deadline for declaring for the Transfer Portal and receiving the sit-out exemption is May 1...so we shall know how it all shakes out soon enough.

Welcome Aboard Malik

In anticipation of the Final Four, here is an update of the Grid. UNC made the Final Four while starting just outside the Final Four Arc. Kansas is the only Champs Arc team standing but Duke and 'Nova both sit just outside the Arc. UNC's success will help refine the FF arc while a win by 'Nova or Duke may do the same to the Champs Arc. That said, I've been working on a much more robust project using the larger volume of data available via KenPom (after this year there will be 20 years of Tempo-free data available). KenPom-driven Arcs: As you can see, there is a massive amount of information in there. With that, the new Arcs were derived - some basic principles guided their creation. First, the grid is divided into 7 sectors - just as there are 7 "finishing spots" in the NCAA tourney - Champs, Runner Up, Final 4, Elite 8, Sweet 16, Round 32, and Round 64 (note that the First Four games are essentially ignored with losses counting as R64 losses). Secondly, it is known that Seeding has a strong correlation with the way teams finish (in part due to the fact that, in general, better teams get better seeds and in part due to the inherent advantage seeding gives via the bracketing process). In creating the sectors, I wanted to make a system that has at least as strong a correlation and after several versions, this one does. There is a really strong correlation between seeding and the sectors but it's not a perfect correlation (with 2 3-seeds, 2 4-seeds, 1 5-seed - Houston will be a second - and 1 10-seed [Witchita St in '17] among the 1 Sector crowd) which allows it to be paired with seeding to have even stronger predictive power. And finally, Sector 1 size is ~6% of the total teams which is around the number of total 1-seeds (6.3% versus 6%) which I think allows for better direct comparison between the 2 groups. As far as some preliminary information from the above data, here are some Sector Facts (using '02-'21 data): Along with the aforementioned seeds, Sector 1 has included 55 1-seeds and 19 2-seeds. It accounts for 73.7% of the championships and 57.9% of teams playing in the Finals. That's despite only accounting for just over 6% of the teams. Sector 1 teams have a 17.5% chance of winning the title (versus a 1-seeds 17.1% chance). If you are a 1-seed in Sector 1, your chances go up to 23.6%. As can be seen above, all of this year's Sector 1 teams have been eliminated. This includes 1-seeds Gonzaga and Arizona (gone in the Sweet 16) and Baylor (gone in R32). The final Sector 1 team was Houston who made the Elite 8 (well outperforming their 5-seed, which would average only 1.12 wins/tournament). This year, 3 of the 4 Final Four teams come from Sector 2. Sector 2 accounts for 15.8% of the championships and typically only about 1/3 of the Final Four. Sector 2 has been made up of predominantly 2-seeds (44) such as is the case with 'Nova and Duke. It's also housed 16 1-seeds (like Kansas this year) along with 33 4-seeds, 14 5-seeds, 11 6-seeds, and a handful of 7/8/9-seeds and 1 11-seed. A Sector 2 team has a 2.6% chance of winning it all and 13.2% chance of making the Final Four. Interestingly, of the 16 1-seeds in this grouping, none have won a title and only 1 made the Final Four. 5 other 2-seeds in this sector have made the Final Four with 3 playing for the title and 1 ('04 UConn) winning it all. Skipping to Sector 4, you will find the UNC Tar Heels. This is also where IU sat (red circle). About 9% of the Final Four participants have come from this sector with Butler in '11 (who was also an 8-seed) as the only one to make the Finals. None have won a title. It's predominantly made up of 7 through 11-seeds and on average a Sector 4 team will win 1.46 games/tourney (again this is discounting First Four wins). Lastly, regarding Sector 7. It's predominantly populated with 15 and 16-seeds (about 3/4 of the teams) but has had seeds as high as 10 and 11-seeds. Just like the 16-seeds, prior to St.Peter's (circled in white), it never had a team go further than the Sweet 16 (twice: Florida Gulf Coast '13 and Oral Roberts '21). On average a team in this Sector wins 0.05 games/tourney. This is a not-so-brief introduction to this new Grid as well as some fun facts from the database I've created. Will continue to add posts related to data from these as time goes on. Wonk On!

Man, Larry Brown just can’t catch a break!

Here is a Sweet Sixteen update of the Arcs graph with teams broken up by color according to their region: One note of correction from the original graph - I had UNC and UConn labelled incorrectly. Now in their correct position UNC sits just outside the FF arc. Note also that these continue to reflect their pre-NCCA tourney stats. As it stands currently, here's how the Regions sit: West: Championship-grade team: 1. Gonzaga Finals-grade teams: 1. Gonzaga 2. Duke Final Four-grade teams: 1. Gonzaga 2. Duke 3. Arkansas 4. Texas Tech East: Championship-grade team: 1. None Finals-grade teams: 1. UCLA Final Four-grade teams: 1. UCLA 2. Purdue South: Championship-grade team: 1. Houston Finals-grade teams: 1. Houston 2. Arizona 3. Villanova Final Four-grade teams: 1. Houston 2. Arizona 3. Villanova Midwest: Championship-grade team: 1. Kansas Finals-grade teams: 1. Kansas Final Four-grade teams: 1. Kansas The West looks like the deepest region with all 4 teams FF-grade or better and the South remains the most top-heavy with 3 remaining Finals-grade teams. In the East, of the 9 available FF-grade teams, only 2 advanced to the Sweet Sixteen and they no longer have a Championship-grade team. The Midwest has become the Kansas regional with no other FF-grade teams remaining. A point to ponder is that the teams lying outside the FF arc seem to be the teams playing some of the best basketball! It will be interesting to see if this is sustainable as their season-long metrics suggest that it may not...or will it just be a year that busts the Arcs!

They are listed alphabetically in each category with teams from the category above placed at the beginning of each new list. As an aside, I changed the term from "Final Four-quality" to "Final Four-grade" since I didn't want to imply that I thought those 26 teams were necessarily the best 26 teams in the field. These metrics don't directly take into account Wins/Losses which is why there can be such a discrepancy in seeding and these metrics. For instance, IU's close losses to quality opponents can bolster their standing in these metrics but ultimately don't win you high seeds or championships. It does, however, unveil the potential of the team to have success. Those the term change.

An additional thought or two: Based on the above analysis, you can predict with over 85% confidence that the Final Four will be built from these 26 teams (all within the Final Four Arc): Arizona, Arkansas, Auburn, Baylor, Boise St, Duke, Gonzaga, Houston, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, LSU, Memphis, Purdue, San Francisco, St. Mary's, Tennessee, Texas, Texas Tech, UCLA, UNC, Villanova, Virginia Tech, and Wisconsin. Also with at least 85% confidence, you can predict the Finals will be made up of a combination of these 12 teams (championship-level aDE and aOE): Arizona, Auburn, Baylor, Duke, Gonzaga, Houston, Illinois, Kansas, Kentucky, UCLA, UConn, and Villanova. Finally, you can predict with 85% confidence that the national champion will come from these 4 teams (all within the Arc of Champions): Baylor, Gonzaga, Houston, and Kansas. Applying these to the brackets, this is what you find for each Region: West: Championship-grade team: 1. Gonzaga Finals-grade teams: 1. Gonzaga 2. Duke 3. UConn Final Four-grade teams: 1. Gonzaga 2. Duke 3. UConn 4. Arkansas 5. Boise State 6. Memphis 7. Texas Tech East: Championship-grade team: 1. Baylor Finals-grade teams: 1. Baylor 2. Kentucky 3. UCLA Final Four-grade teams: 1. Baylor 2. Kentucky 3. UCLA 4. Indiana 5. Purdue 6. San Francisco 7. St. Mary's 8. Texas 9. Virginia Tech South: Championship-grade team: 1. Houston Finals-grade teams: 1. Houston 2. Arizona 3. Illinois 4. Villanova Final Four-grade teams: 1. Houston 2. Arizona 3. Illinois 4. Villanova 5. Tennessee Midwest: Championship-grade team: 1. Kansas Finals-grade teams: 1. Kansas 2. Auburn Final Four-grade teams: 1. Kansas 2. Auburn 3. Iowa 4. LSU 5. Wisconsin Looking at this, the East seems to be the deepest Region by far (lucky us!). 1 of the Sweet Sixteen teams from the East would have come from a 4-team grouping that included 2 FF-grade teams while 2 others (including IU's grouping) will have included 3 (in our case: IU, St.Mary's, and UCLA). There is only 1 other grouping in all the bracket that has 3 FF-grade teams - interesting enough it is Gonzaga's which also includes Memphis and Boise State. The West, South, and Midwest each have 1 additional grouping that includes 2 FF-grade teams. All other 4-team groupings include only 1 FF-grade team. The South Region looks to be the most top heavy with 4 Finals-grade teams. Unfortunately for 1 seed Arizona, to reach the Elite Eight, they will be going through an 8-team grouping that includes 3 of them (Arizona, Houston, and Illinois). The only other groupings in all the bracket that includes more than 1 Finals-grade team is the one the includes Indiana (Baylor and UCLA) and Gonzaga (Gonzaga and UConn). Lace 'em up tightly, looks like it's gonna be a bumpy ride!

The data comes from Bart Torvik’s site. https://www.barttorvik.com/teamcast.php?&team=Indiana&year=2022 The graphs are made on good ‘ol Apple Numbers.

Excuse the self quote, but I wanted to followup this thought with a little more robust data. The above Final Four Arc includes teams with an aOE as low as 103.4 and teams with an aDE as high as 96.6. In the Championship Arc, the lowest aOE is 112.6 and highest aDE 95.2. For the seasons '08-'22, an average of 145.6 teams/season (or 41.8%) had an aOE of 103.4 or better while only half that amount, 70.1 (20.1%) had an aDE of 96.6 or lower - in other words, defense alone eliminates over 80% of teams from Final Four contention. For the same seasons, an average of only 30.6 (or 8%) had a championship-level aOE of 112.6 or better while 51.1 (14.6%) had an aDE of 95.2 or better - only a handful of teams have the offensive chops to win it all. Now, most teams that make the Final Four are very strong on both sides of the ball, but not in equal proportions. Of the Final Four teams, ~85% have a championship-level defense (aDE 95.2 or better) while ~73% have championship-level offense (aOE 112.6 or better) - essentially, an average of one Final Four team / season will fail to have an adequate offense to win it all. It appears the lack of offensive punch is most greatly exposed in the championship game itself as a slightly higher percentage of inadequate offenses (28%) were able to advance to the finals versus percentage of inadequate defenses (25%) - essentially 3/4 of each will be eliminated though. This information is probably too late to help with filling out the brackets, but I find fascinating nonetheless.

They are both UConn - '11 with Kemba and '14 who won it as a 7 seed

One thing to notice from this graph is the differences defense makes in making the Final Four versus winning it all. A punishing defense is enough to get a team into the Final Four despite a pedestrian offense - the dotted line on the left is the aOE of 100 mark. This year there were 224 teams that had a aOE of at least that. So the old adage is correct: defense does win championships - at least Regional championships. However, no team has been able to win it all without an aOE of at least 112.6. This year, that includes just 41 teams. On the other hand, a potent offense does not have the same ability to, alone, take you to the Final Four - there just aren't teams sitting above the Champions Arc. Except for VCU in 2011, no team since '08 has made the Final Four with a pre-tourney aDE greater than 96.6 (by the way, VCU played amazing defense during the tourney) - which is about the top 1/3 defensive teams this year. Villanova in '18 was able to wean it all with an aDE of 95.2 - this year that limits it to the top 42 teams. The take-away is that to get into the Final Four, you need a top third defense - with the best defenses overcoming even relatively bad offenses. But only teams that are in the top 10-12% in both, have a realistic chance at winning it all.

Another interesting take on this graph: Below you will find the pre-tourney aOE X aDE positions of the Final Four participants since 2008 (gold diamonds = champions, silver diamonds = runner-ups, bronze diamonds = other Final Four teams). With these teams, a new arc can be formed that would encompass over 94% of the Final Four teams since '08: Now here is this Arc added to the current crop of teams: Interesting group of teams, isn't it! 25-26 teams, including our Hoosiers, fall within the Arc (+/- Loyola Chicago). Bear in mind that over the 13 seasons compiled, there have been a LOT of teams that fall within this range so being in it doesn't mean you are likely to make the Final Four (for instance, Oklahoma falls right on the Arc and they are definitely not going to the Final Four)...but being outside does mean you are quite unlikely to do so (<6% chance)...so I'd prefer to be in it! More food for thought.

Here is the graph with all 68 teams - obviously very busy but some key developments: 1. Following adjustments for conference tourney - there are now 4 teams in or at the Arc (Zags, Houston, Kansas, Baylor) with Arizona just outside. 2. Outside those 5 teams, there is a strong grouping of 4 more teams as the 2nd tier (Duke, UK, 'Nova, UCLA) Here's a graph highlighting IU, Wyoming, and St Mary's. IU and St Mary's appear pretty closely matched (advantage Gaels) with Wyoming as the outlier All three teams are relatively evenly matched offensively (all within ~1 point): St Mary's 109.3, Wyoming 108.9, IU 108.2 Defensively is where we see the separation: St.Mary's and IU are within 1 point from each other (St.Mary's 89.9 vs IU 90.9) where Wyoming is 6-7 points worse (97.4)

That’s the plan. I’ve been populating one w/ teams that are in / likely in and let’s just say, it’s very busy in the area around / above where IU falls.

The problem with bubble teams taking the auto bids is the last four at-larges are higher up the seed list. The first four is likely to include 2-4 11 seeds. For me personally, whoever / wherever / whenever is fine. First four or not. Beat whoever they put in front of you. If you can take out a high seed, you get to steal their path to the Final Four. The BTT worked out fine despite what appeared to be “the worst case scenario” in the way the bracket fell. Hopefully everyone stays healthy and let’s see what we’ve got!

As 5Fouls alluded to, these efficiencies are adjusted according to the competition. To give an example, for our game versus Purdue, we gave up 69 points and scored 67 points on a 65 possession game. That would equal an Offensive Efficiency of 103 and Defensive Efficiency of 106. But, Purdue has the most efficient offense in the country and a middling defense. For that game, our adjusted Defensive Efficiency was 88.5 and adjusted Offensive Efficiency was only slightly altered at 106.3. For Purdue, the opposite is true. Their Offensive Efficiency was 106 and Defensive Efficiency was 103. But IU is a significantly better defensive team than offensive team. So their adjusted Offensive Efficiency for that game had a significant bump to 119.3 (still on the lower end for them) and adjusted Defensive Efficiency saw a less significant change to 97.1.

Added results heading into conference tournaments. Also tweaked the graph so that the NCAA champion's positions represent their standing prior to the NCAA tourney (parred it down to the '08 to present due to data availability). With these changes, an additional (injury-ridden) team ,Baylor, is poised right on the arc with Arizona just outside. I looked at the sets of teams that fell within the Arc since 2008, some thoughts: A total of 71 teams in the 13 represented tourneys fell within the Arc - Indiana was present once, 2013 Of the 71 Arc teams: 15.5% won it all 22.5% made the finals 36.6% made the Final Four 62% made the Elite Eight 80.3% made the Sweet Sixteen 97.2% made the round of 32 If this year stands as it is with only 3 Arc teams, it would tie for the least amount of Arc teams for a season with '21 (all three went to the Final Four) and '14 (when 7 seed UConn won it all) '09 had the most Arc teams in the tournament at 9, including champion Duke, runner-up Wisconsin, and Final Four participant Kentucky Seasonal stats for Arc Teams: Most Final Four teams: 4 ('08) Least Final Four teams: 1 ('18, '16, '13, '14, '11) Most Elite Eight teams: 5 ('19, '12) Least Elite Eight teams: 2 ('18, '14) Most Sweet Sixteen teams: 7 ('19, '15) Least Sweet Sixteen teams: 3 ('21, '18, '16, '14)

Good point - I looked at their numbers following the loss of Mark and Sasser and they are a little worse (aOE from 118.2 to 117.4 and aDE from 89.4 to 90.3). The "adjustment" in the efficiency score is meant to account for the strengths/weakness of their opponent. Below shows where their position shifts to in games missing those guys - laying right on the arc and still in second best position.

There are many analytical ways to evaluate sports teams. One way in basketball is to look a the number of points the offense scores per 100 possessions versus the number the defense gives up (offensive and defensive efficiencies) which can then be adjusted to the strength of the opponent. You can use the numbers to come up with a differential or you can chart them on a graph. When graphed with adjusted offensive efficiency (aOE) on the horizontal axis and adjusted defensive efficiency (aDE) on the vertical one, you get a graph in which the closer you are to the lower right corner, the better your team is as a whole. Wonk nerds have made such charts, plotted past NCAA champions, and have found a strong clustering of champion teams within an arc on the bottom right of the chart (what wonk Andy Wittry called the Championship Arc). In the chart below, this area is represented by the yellow with champions since '02 represented by golden triangles. As can be seen, there are a few outliers ('03 Syracuse who rode 'Melo to the title, '11 UConn who did the same with Kemba, and '14 UConn who won it all as a 7 seed). These represent ~15% of the winners but a large majority fall within the arc. With this knowledge, I graphed the current position of the top 25 teams (plus our Hoosiers) to see how they stack up (if you're interested in how past Hoosier teams stack up, I will be doing a chart of them in the knowledgebase soon). A few observations: There are two clear favorites, one a little surprising. No one, I think, will be surprised to see Gonzaga in a prime position but Houston clearly has a team that looks capable of making a push. Just outside the periphery lies some expected contenders in Duke, Baylor, and Arizona. The closest Big10 contenders (Purdue, Iowa [both troubled by suboptimal defenses] and Illinois [better defense, suboptimal offense]) form their own arc well outside the contention area. Indiana's defense is strong enough to fall within the Championship Arc...if their offense was ~7.8 points better per game.

It seems to me whatever the punishment for UM / Wisc is, it should include forfeiture of any victories for this season.

Perhaps the Crossroads Classic will pay off some dividends in it's last year. Notre Dame has two huge games ahead of them - tonight versus Duke then at Miami. They currently stand in the low 60s on the NET and would have to get to the top 50 to be a tier 1 victory so may be a stretch for that...but as it stands they have a decent chance at winning the ACC, particularly if they have a good week.