Putting a Theory to the Test

[Captain Kangaroo]

Warning - Concise statement-of-the-obvious will follow:

Movement of the 3-point line has had absolutely no effect on the overall ability of a mid-major to knock off a major program.

Thank you.

[Captain Kangaroo]

I wouldn't exactly call Butler a mid-major.

Man...that really sucks for ZipWatcher. If Butler makes the Final Four, he doesn't get the $50.00 from woot?

To be perfectly honest...Northern Iowa was ranked in the top 25 all season, so they exactly a mid-major either.

That leaves St Mary's and Cornell. If Zach has any arguments to support these two not being mid-majors, woot might just be able to put the Ulysses S. Grant in the mail this afternoon?

[skip-zip]

Please don't forget about the other factors that affect defenses with the movement of the 3 point line. Long range shooters are setting up a little bit further from the basket, and need to be guarded further out from the basket. It can spread the floor, open up entry passing lanes just a little bit more, and can make it more difficult for perimeter defenders to provide help defense on big men who have received the ball close to the basket. I think all of this creates more one-on-one defending, which benefits the team with bigger and quicker players when they are on the offensive end.

We could probably never gather enough information to find out how this has actually affected games. But, in practice I certainly don't think the change helps the less talented team with smaller, slower, and "unathletic" players.

[Captain Kangaroo]

We could probably never gather enough information to find out how this has actually affected games.

It is easy to do. Look at the results.

When steroids were eliminated in baseball, home runs visibly dropped.

When the 3-point line was moved in college basketball, absolutely nothing happened.

[skip-zip]

We could probably never gather enough information to find out how this has actually affected games.

It is easy to do. Look at the results.

When steroids were eliminated in baseball, home runs visibly dropped.

When the 3-point line was moved in college basketball, absolutely nothing happened.

Then try to make an argument that lower-level D-1 teams are getting better talent. But, the 3-point line change, with the way it can affect some of your abilities to defend, would not be a benefit to slower, smaller, and less athletic teams.

[Zip Watcher]

I wouldn't exactly call Butler a mid-major.

Man...that really sucks for ZipWatcher. If Butler makes the Final Four, he doesn't get the $50.00 from woot?

To be perfectly honest...Northern Iowa was ranked in the top 25 all season, so they exactly a mid-major either.

That leaves St Mary's and Cornell. If Zach has any arguments to support these two not being mid-majors, woot might just be able to put the Ulysses S. Grant in the mail this afternoon?

These are all midmajors .. and when one of them gets to the Final 4 this weekend, the payout is $500 (10:1 odds baby!).

[Captain Kangaroo]

Then try to make an argument that lower-level D-1 teams are getting better talent. But, the 3-point line change, with the way it can affect some of your abilities to defend, would not be a benefit to slower, smaller, and less athletic teams.

Lower-level D-1 teams could never compete with upper-level teams. They lose by the same ridiculous margins today that the lost by prior to the rule change. The rule change affected nothing. Mid-major team compete just the same as they did before. In two years I've never heard any coach complain that the new rule affected their approach to offense or defense.

The 12" movement of the line affected no one's ability to defend in the paint.

High school girls with 95 lb bench-presses regularly shoot 35+% from 19' 9".

20 year old D-1 male athletes with 200 lb bench presses shoot equally well from 19' 9" or 20' 9". The shot is very easy.

[Blue & Gold]

Does anyone know why the NCAA decided on that distance instead of the European distance for the 3-shot? Was there a specific reason behind that particular distance, or was it just arbitrary? When I first heard rumors about moving the 3-line back, I just thought a move to the international distance would be natural.

[Zipmeister]

Does anyone know why the NCAA decided on that distance instead of the European distance for the 3-shot? Was there a specific reason behind that particular distance, or was it just arbitrary? When I first heard rumors about moving the 3-line back, I just thought a move to the international distance would be natural.

Cause this is America.

[BirdZip]

Does anyone know why the NCAA decided on that distance instead of the European distance for the 3-shot? Was there a specific reason behind that particular distance, or was it just arbitrary? When I first heard rumors about moving the 3-line back, I just thought a move to the international distance would be natural.

Bulk discount on 20'9" paint sticks at Home Depot?

I think I read where the International 3-pt line is moving too (later this year?), so any attempt to make the distances match would have been short-lived anyway.

[w00t]

I wouldn't exactly call Butler a mid-major.

Man...that really sucks for ZipWatcher. If Butler makes the Final Four, he doesn't get the $50.00 from woot?

To be perfectly honest...Northern Iowa was ranked in the top 25 all season, so they exactly a mid-major either.

That leaves St Mary's and Cornell. If Zach has any arguments to support these two not being mid-majors, woot might just be able to put the Ulysses S. Grant in the mail this afternoon?

These are all midmajors .. and when one of them gets to the Final 4 this weekend, the payout is $500 (10:1 odds baby!).

Ha, I just re-read that thread, I feel bad now for disclosing my hatred of UConn... at the time I had no idea about your roots with the dreaded Huskies.

I also thought I was on the hook for $50 as opposed to $500 this whole time. *gulp* I still hope Cornell make the Final Four.

[Dave in Green]

Please don't forget about the other factors that affect defenses with the movement of the 3 point line. Long range shooters are setting up a little bit further from the basket, and need to be guarded further out from the basket. It can spread the floor, open up entry passing lanes just a little bit more, and can make it more difficult for perimeter defenders to provide help defense on big men who have received the ball close to the basket. I think all of this creates more one-on-one defending, which benefits the team with bigger and quicker players when they are on the offensive end.

We could probably never gather enough information to find out how this has actually affected games. But, in practice I certainly don't think the change helps the less talented team with smaller, slower, and "unathletic" players.

Skip, you're absolutely correct that one of the stated reasons for the NCAA moving the 3-point arc back was to spread defenses out a little more, giving more offensive spacing and increased room to operate for post players in the paint as well as players using pass or dribble penetration. This would likely have at least as much affect on the college game as the change in 3-point shooting percentages. Racer did not address this issue in his original comment, focusing more on how the longer 3-point range would tend to hurt mid-majors more than majors.

Fact is, the "have" coaches like Rick Pitino have lobbied in favor of an NBA-length 3-point arc in college, arguing that the best college players need to be prepared for the next step to pro ball. Obviously there are many more future NBA players at major "have" schools than the mid-major "have-nots." Everyone is free to draw their own conclusions from this.

Any effect from spreading the floor would be even more difficult to measure statistically than 3-point shooting averages. Maybe someone has already done this, but I haven't found it.

The combined 3-point shooting and floor spreading effect of moving the arc back a foot on majors vs. mid-majors might best be measured by analyzing results of all games between majors and mid-majors before and after the rule change. But that would require a lot of number crunching. For starters, it would also require a clear definition of major and mid-major. One need look no further than this thread to see that there's disagreement on which teams are majors or mid-majors.

There is some inconclusive data that points to mid-majors suffering last season (2008-9), the first season of the extended 3-point arc, in terms of at-large bids to the NCAA tournament. Since 1997, the greatest number of mid-major at-large bids was 12 in 1998 and 2004, and the lowest number was 4 last season, the first with the extended 3-point arc.

But as far as I've been able to determine, no one has yet come up with a definitive answer supported by hard data that's immediately clear to all.

In the absence of definitive data, I think that most people will keep an open mind and continue looking for good data to help formulate an informed opinion.

I suppose there's also the option to listen to and believe in The Great Wizard of Oz, thundering out great unquestionable absolutes amidst much fire, smoke, and fury. Just be sure to pay no attention to that little man behind the curtain pulling the levers.

[BirdZip]

Any of you number crunchers out there care to just take a look at average scoring (period) for majors vs mid-majors? The effect of moving the three point line may not just be reflected in three-point shooting percentage but may also affect ability to prevent the two, propensity to take the three, etc.

I'd be curious to see over the past 5 years or so, just average points scored by majors vs average points scored by mid-majors. Don't compare them to each other but rather to themselves ebfore and after the change.

[Zip Watcher]

Ha, I just re-read that thread, I feel bad now for disclosing my hatred of UConn... at the time I had no idea about your roots with the dreaded Huskies.

I also thought I was on the hook for $50 as opposed to $500 this whole time. *gulp* I still hope Cornell make the Final Four.

No need to feel bad about hating the Huskies. There's plenty of you out there.

At times they can reflect all that is bad about big time college hoops. Jim C has done a good job there, but to determine that UC's men's hoops team is a collection of *student* athletes is a stretch in the most optimistic of terms. When I went directly from UConn to Purdue, the difference in programs was staggering. My first gig @ Purdue was tutoring in the athletic department, and the lengths to which Gene Keady went to make sure he was putting a team of students on the court really blew me away. Not all Rhodes scholars .. not at all. But there was this thing that you needed to be a "Purdue student" in order to be a "Purdue Boilermaker" .. big difference than what I'd seen a before @ UConn, though there were notable exceptions like Kevin Ollie and Donny Marshall.

Off the topic at hand .. it's this issue that I think about when I envision Zips Athletics a few years down the road in a different conference either slightly or largely upstream from where they are now. The investment into the Info doesn't match with staying a mid-major @ the current level. It's indicative of a goal to take a step up in conferences. Perhaps that opportunity will come with the impending Big TelEveN expansion, who knows? But one of the things I like most about Zips hoops, and a big reason that these kids are the first (and generally only) team that I follow actively and root for, is that they're students. Guys like Schindewolf whom you still see around the JAR. Zeke's a student, these guys like Roberts & Conyers fighting to get on track and get the degree. It's not a happy utopia of dean's list guys. But it is a group of good guys putting forth the big effort to balance the books and the balls. I think I read or heard that the team GPA was over 3.2. That makes it easy to root for these guys and want them to do well. When they do as well as they are doing of late, it makes it even better.

I wonder how that would change (or need to change) if the dominoes fell in the perfect order to find the Zips in an upstream hoops conference .. say playing UAB, Houston, WKU & Memphis .. etc. Can the program retain its makeup as a group of UAkron students? I hope so.

{end manifesto}

On the mid-major front, it's very interesting to me to see the top four of the final regular season Mid-Major Top 25.

Go Teams!

[skip-zip]

Please don't forget about the other factors that affect defenses with the movement of the 3 point line. Long range shooters are setting up a little bit further from the basket, and need to be guarded further out from the basket. It can spread the floor, open up entry passing lanes just a little bit more, and can make it more difficult for perimeter defenders to provide help defense on big men who have received the ball close to the basket. I think all of this creates more one-on-one defending, which benefits the team with bigger and quicker players when they are on the offensive end.

We could probably never gather enough information to find out how this has actually affected games. But, in practice I certainly don't think the change helps the less talented team with smaller, slower, and "unathletic" players.

Skip, you're absolutely correct that one of the stated reasons for the NCAA moving the 3-point arc back was to spread defenses out a little more, giving more offensive spacing and increased room to operate for post players in the paint as well as players using pass or dribble penetration. This would likely have at least as much affect on the college game as the change in 3-point shooting percentages. Racer did not address this issue in his original comment, focusing more on how the longer 3-point range would tend to hurt mid-majors more than majors.

Fact is, the "have" coaches like Rick Pitino have lobbied in favor of an NBA-length 3-point arc in college, arguing that the best college players need to be prepared for the next step to pro ball. Obviously there are many more future NBA players at major "have" schools than the mid-major "have-nots." Everyone is free to draw their own conclusions from this.

Any effect from spreading the floor would be even more difficult to measure statistically than 3-point shooting averages. Maybe someone has already done this, but I haven't found it.

The combined 3-point shooting and floor spreading effect of moving the arc back a foot on majors vs. mid-majors might best be measured by analyzing results of all games between majors and mid-majors before and after the rule change. But that would require a lot of number crunching. For starters, it would also require a clear definition of major and mid-major. One need look no further than this thread to see that there's disagreement on which teams are majors or mid-majors.

There is some inconclusive data that points to mid-majors suffering last season (2008-9), the first season of the extended 3-point arc, in terms of at-large bids to the NCAA tournament. Since 1997, the greatest number of mid-major at-large bids was 12 in 1998 and 2004, and the lowest number was 4 last season, the first with the extended 3-point arc.

But as far as I've been able to determine, no one has yet come up with a definitive answer supported by hard data that's immediately clear to all.

In the absence of definitive data, I think that most people will keep an open mind and continue looking for good data to help formulate an informed opinion.

I suppose there's also the option to listen to and believe in The Great Wizard of Oz, thundering out great unquestionable absolutes amidst much fire, smoke, and fury. Just be sure to pay no attention to that little man behind the curtain pulling the levers.

I see that you get the entire picture....that there is a lot more to this than just making it more difficult to score a 3-pointer. And I can see why coaches at the "bigger" schools would have lobbied for this change. It was the subject of a lot of basketball conversations at the time it happened. Maybe we'll know over time if it contributed to widening the gap between the "haves" and the "have nots".

[Captain Kangaroo]

I see that you get the entire picture....that there is a lot more to this than just making it more difficult to score a 3-pointer. It was the subject of a lot of basketball conversations at the time it happened. Maybe we'll know over time if it contributed to widening the gap between the "haves" and the "have nots".

The picture is actually pretty small and simple:

It was the subject of a lot of conversation two years ago...but it isn't any longer. Why? Because the change has proven to be irrelevant.

A two year sampling of hundred of teams and thousands of games has proven -- the 12" 3-point line change has done nothing to widen the gap between the "haves" and the "have nots".

What's that GP1 line? Something like "...you want it to be one way, but it's the other."

[Dave in Green]

I see that you get the entire picture....that there is a lot more to this than just making it more difficult to score a 3-pointer. It was the subject of a lot of basketball conversations at the time it happened. Maybe we'll know over time if it contributed to widening the gap between the "haves" and the "have nots".

The picture is actually pretty small and simple:

It was the subject of a lot of conversation two years ago...but it isn't any longer. Why? Because the change has proven to be irrelevant.

A two year sampling of hundred of teams and thousands of games has proven -- the 12" 3-point line change has done nothing to widen the gap between the "haves" and the "have nots".

What's that GP1 line? Something like "...you want it to be one way, but it's the other."

What you say may or may not be true. But it's still not clear if your personal conclusion is the result of studying specific data or just a casual assumption. If you could point me to the source of your data sampling, I'll gladly agree with you if what you've based your conclusion on is as compelling to me as it obviously has been to you.

[skip-zip]

I see that you get the entire picture....that there is a lot more to this than just making it more difficult to score a 3-pointer. It was the subject of a lot of basketball conversations at the time it happened. Maybe we'll know over time if it contributed to widening the gap between the "haves" and the "have nots".

The picture is actually pretty small and simple:

It was the subject of a lot of conversation two years ago...but it isn't any longer. Why? Because the change has proven to be irrelevant.

A two year sampling of hundred of teams and thousands of games has proven -- the 12" 3-point line change has done nothing to widen the gap between the "haves" and the "have nots".

What's that GP1 line? Something like "...you want it to be one way, but it's the other."

What you say may or may not be true. But it's still not clear if your personal conclusion is the result of studying specific data or just a casual assumption. If you could point me to the source of your data sampling, I'll gladly agree with you if what you've based your conclusion on is as compelling to me as it obviously has been to you.

I was thinking the same thing. I'll be kind and make a further comment in the form of a question: How can any change that widens offensive sets (even if it's only 12" on both sides), opens the floor, makes it more difficult to play team defense, and naturally creates more man-on-man matchups be anything other than a disadvantage to a slower, smaller, or "less athletically inclined" team?

That is....assuming that the top echelon teams are quicker, bigger, and more athletic.

[Zip Watcher]

As a public service for those of you heading to the Butler game to root them on for the Final Four this weekend, I've attached below the words to their fight song. Sing along loudly when you're there.

Go Bulldogs!

Butler War Song

We'll sing the Butler war song,

We'll give a fighting cry;

We'll fight the Butler battle--

Bulldogs ever do or die.

And in the glow of the victory firelight,

Hist'ry cannot deny

To add a page or two

For Butler's fighting crew

Beneath the Hoosier sky.

[MDZip]

On the mid-major front, it's very interesting to me to see the top four of the final regular season Mid-Major Top 25.

Go Teams!

Sadly though, the Zips ended at #27, which I believe breaks a 4 year string of being ranked in the final Mad-Major top 25 poll.

[UAZipster0305]

On the mid-major front, it's very interesting to me to see the top four of the final regular season Mid-Major Top 25.

Go Teams!

Sadly though, the Zips ended at #27, which I believe breaks a 4 year string of being ranked in the final Mad-Major top 25 poll.

That is sad although I think the ranking is accurate. After getting lit up by our rival at home to end the season with the championship and NIT bid on the line, losing the MACC, then sleep walking in a loss at home in the CBI, we don't deserve the top 25. Getting lit up in the MACT by every starting guard we played against didn't help either even if two of three games were wins. It exposed a huge weakness of ours relative to many of the other top 25 teams.

I am not complaining. The program is on track to continue growing, and I believe KD is the man to do it. We'll get them next year!

[Dave in Green]

I see that you get the entire picture....that there is a lot more to this than just making it more difficult to score a 3-pointer. It was the subject of a lot of basketball conversations at the time it happened. Maybe we'll know over time if it contributed to widening the gap between the "haves" and the "have nots".

The picture is actually pretty small and simple:

It was the subject of a lot of conversation two years ago...but it isn't any longer. Why? Because the change has proven to be irrelevant.

A two year sampling of hundred of teams and thousands of games has proven -- the 12" 3-point line change has done nothing to widen the gap between the "haves" and the "have nots".

What's that GP1 line? Something like "...you want it to be one way, but it's the other."

What you say may or may not be true. But it's still not clear if your personal conclusion is the result of studying specific data or just a casual assumption. If you could point me to the source of your data sampling, I'll gladly agree with you if what you've based your conclusion on is as compelling to me as it obviously has been to you.

After two full days of not seeing a response to this simple question, I'm left to assume that the poster either will not or cannot point us to a source of the data sampling backing the stated opinion.

In the absence of good data, I will consider that post as unsubstantiated opinion and not factually based. Nothing at all wrong with that, as we all have our share of unsubstantiated opinions. Some of us just do a better job of separating our unsubstantiated opinions from statements of fact. For example, the original statement that started all of this was prefaced "I think" non-major schools were hurt by this rule change and not "This is absolute fact."

To summarize, there is some logic that a major rule change like the distance of the 3-point arc would affect different teams differently, and that "have" or major teams are typically different from "have-not" or non-major teams. There would tend to be less difference between a lower-level major and a higher-level non-major.

There is also some evidence to support and some to contradict that the 3-point arc distance change may have changed the relative 3-point shooting performance balance between major and non-major teams. But all the evidence presented so far is inconclusive. There has been little evidence presented about the overall results of spreading the offense and defense with the larger arc.

With logic tending to support at least some difference, but evidence presented to date inconclusive, my own current opinion is that there is probably more than a 50-50 chance that there was at least a small effect on the balance between majors and non-majors. Pending the presentation of more pertinent data, I tend to believe that any change would have been relatively small.

Statistically speaking, you can get good results answering a simple question about half of the time by just flipping a coin. It takes a lot of hard work and analysis to push the 50-50 chance of a coin flip up higher in the range of certainty.

[Zip Watcher]

As a public service for those of you heading to the Butler game to root them on for the Final Four this weekend, I've attached below the words to their fight song. Sing along loudly when you're there.

Go Bulldogs!

Butler War Song

We'll sing the Butler war song,

We'll give a fighting cry;

We'll fight the Butler battle--

Bulldogs ever do or die.

And in the glow of the victory firelight,

Hist'ry cannot deny

To add a page or two

For Butler's fighting crew

Beneath the Hoosier sky.

:D :D :D

:bow:

[zippy5]

I picked Butler to go to the final four in 2 of my polls. no big deal. prove me wrong and get to the championship! go bulldogs!