Stats

[Dave in Green]

After posting in the CMU game thread a comparison of Zips individual free throw shooting percentages, I thought it might be interesting to have a separate thread (like the officiating thread) where we could focus on numbers in various categories to see how they match up with our impressions about the Zips. Those who are interested in stats can follow this thread and hopefully contribute to the discussion while those who can't be bothered with stats will be pleased to see this discussion moved out of the game threads.

For example, there have been references to this season's team as "young." But what does that really mean? How do the Zips compare with other teams? Fortunately statsheet.com has us covered. They have a list of all 351 D-I team rosters sorted from least experienced to most. It's pretty simple in that you give each player on the roster a number from 1 to 4 based on their class of freshman to senior, add up the numbers and divide by the number of players.

Disclaimer: Zips are shown with 6 freshmen, and 3 each sophomores, juniors and seniors for a total of 15 players. That means they're counting walk-ons. The 3 seniors means they're also still counting Tree on the roster as Deji and Nyles are the only 2 seniors currently on the roster. So these numbers are not 100% accurate and are only roughly indicative of relative roster experience among teams.

Binghamton is #1 with an average of just 1.46 -- halfway between freshman and sophomore. Other baby teams include #3 Southern California (who the Zips beat in Charleston) at 1.69 and #6 Kentucky (the classic one-and-done team) at 1.80. On the other end of the scale at #351 are the senior citizens of North Carolina Central with an average of 3.54 -- halfway between junior and senior.

The Zips just make the top 100 youth teams at #94 with an average 2.42 -- halfway between sophomore and junior. Without Tree, they're actually a little younger than that. So while it's fair to say they're young, they aren't exactly babies compared with the youngest teams. You can also sort the list by conference and just show MAC teams. In that sort, the Zips (2.42) are the 2nd youngest team in the conference to Ball State (2.07) while Can't is the oldest at 3.30.

Here are the links to the full list of D-I teams and the MAC conference only. Enjoy.

[Dr Z]

I thought it might be interesting to have a separate thread (like the officiating thread) where we could focus on numbers in various categories to see how they match up with our impressions about the Zips. Those who are interested in stats can follow this thread and hopefully contribute to the discussion while those who can't be bothered with stats will be pleased to see this discussion moved out of the game threads.

Thanks, I'm glad you started it. I considered doing this. I hope it works as well as the officiating thread has. Hopefully, this will increase/organize the quality/info/critics in the game threads. I'll try to move proper posts over to here when it seems appropriate.

[UAZipster0305]

If there ever was a thread for DiG to headline, this is the one!

[johnnyzip84]

Here's a little stats spiced with (hopefully) some humor.

Who averaged 15.5 PPG in the last 2 games with a standard deviation of 21.9?

[Dave in Green]

Reggie McAdams is the guy I just came here to write about -- 31 points vs. CMU and 0 points vs. BGSU, 31/2 = 15.5. While Reggie's 31-point explosion shocked a lot of people, there were already signs that he's more valuable to the Zips than some might think. While some look only at individual stats like average points, shooting percentage, etc., there's a single stat that sums up many offensive contributions by a player and tells how efficient he is -- offensive efficiency rating.

As Dean Oliver defines it in his 2004 book Basketball on Paper, "Individual offensive rating is the number of points produced by a player per hundred total individual possessions. In other words, 'How many points is a player likely to generate when he tries?'" The offensive rating calculation includes individual total possessions and individual points produced, with total possessions broken down into scoring possessions, missed FG possessions, missed FT possessions and turnovers. The complex version of the formula can be seen here. Looking at the current individual offensive efficiency ratings of all the Zips regulars tells an interesting story:

136.0 - Reggie

128.5 - Jake

118.4 - Deji

116.1 - Nyles

110.8 - Pat

103.0 - Kwan
101.6 - Noah
90.0 - Aaron

85.5 - BJ
82.1 - Isaiah
80.4 - Antino

Offensive rating tends to favor catch-and-shoot 3-point shooters, so it should be no surprise that Reggie, Jake, Deji and Nyles rank highest among the Zips. On the other hand, ball handlers like Noah and Antino tend to rate lower as indicated above. So how does Reggie stack up nationally in offensive rating?

1. 146.61 - John Simons, Central Michigan
2. 142.35 - Joey Ptasinski, Lafayette
3. 141.55 - Kevin Pangos, Gonzaga
4. 139.94 - Josh Kozinski, Central Michigan
5. 137.61 - Devin Booker, Kentucky
6. 137.45 - James McGee, Southern Utah
7. 137.44 - Lorenzo Cugini, High Point
8. 137.14 - Javier Martinez, Tennessee-Martin
9. 136.44 - James Webb III, Boise State
10. 136.25 - Isaiah Williams, Iona
11. 136.05 - Reggie McAdams, Akron

37. 128.52 - Jake Kretzer, Akron

Reggie is #11 (and Jake is #37). It's interesting to note that Reggie's big performance happened to come against the team (CMU) with the #1 and #4 ranked players. Going back to the description of offensive efficiency rating as how many points a player is likely to generate when he tries, maybe Reggie should be trying to score more points for the Zips, as his offensive rating suggests he would likely be more successful than most. For anyone interested in more on this subject, Jon Nichols wrote a piece called The Importance of Efficiency on Basketball-Statistics.com.

[Dave in Green]

Not sure what's going on...Does anyone know why Kwan's offense game has been limited. I see his defense has been very good over last year. But to see what he did the first half of the year... putting up great numbers and in the last few games not too much offense. Can anyone shed any light on this? Thanks

Kwan's defense and rebounding have clearly improved over last season. He's the team's leading defensive rebounder (3.5 per game), his 4.8 total rebounds per game is second only to Pat's 5.5 and his 28 blocked shots are second only to Pat's 31. I wouldn't worry about some offensive fluctuation from game to game. Reggie's 31-point explosion is just one example of how different players have offensive ups and downs. Kwan remains a big part of the offense even if his shooting has struggled a bit recently (9-29 or 31% from the field over the last 4 games). He's still averaging 7.8 field goal attempts per game, second only to Noah's 8.2.

[Sergeant Zip]

Basic article on the proliferation of data and mobile computing making it possible for coaches to start responding to real-time data (with an NFL slant).

[1981 grad]

The one stat that would make this team more consistent is shooting more free throws. We rank 259th out of 345 teams in free throw attempts. One of the reasons is that our team loves to shoot three pointers (Pat and Tree are exempt) instead of driving the paint.

After the bad first half against Ball State, the team made a concerted effort to get the ball inside. We played a much better second half.

Kwan is a perfect example. He is 6-9, athletic and long but he has only has 36 free throw attempts and only 11 attempts in conference play.

Ibitayo has played 100 less minutes and has gone to the line 72 times, 31 in conference play. I believe this team would play better with Ibitayo as a starter. (Last year KD mad Q a starter about half way into the season.)

For Kwan to be a consistent double digit scorer he needs to drive to the hoop more and stop shooting so many 3 pointers. Over half his shots are from the 3 point line. He shoots 33% from the 3 line and only shooting 24% from the 3 line in conference play. I hope that the team will start understanding that they play better when they work the ball inside instead of relying on the 3 ball.

[1981 grad]

Just noticed my error, "Pat and Big Dog" not tree

[Dave in Green]

Might as well throw RPI in with stats in general. The road win over BGSU finally got the Zips into the top 100 RPI at #93. BGSU had a suprisingly strong RPI when the Zips played them, and even with the loss they're still ahead of the Zips at #83. As I post this, here are the current MAC RPI rankings from ESPN :

44. UB

83. BGSU

93. Zips

95. CMU

102. Can't

103. UT

123. WMU

150. EMU

201. OU

231. BSU

234. NIU

265. MU

143.7 = average RPI of 12 MAC teams

131.3 = average RPI of 6 MAC East teams

156.0 = average RPI of 6 MAC West teams

[ZZZips]

Informative article in today's PD by Elton Alexander that DiG should love. http://bit.ly/1zxy6gn

A quote on Free throw shooting stats: " Where 68 percent team free throw shooting used to be considered marginal, the best conference in the country, the ACC, had eight teams shoot less than 68 percent from the line in their last game. The culprits might surprise you.

Florida State (66.7), Louisville (61.4), Wake Forest (59.3), North Carolina State (57.9), Boston College (55.6), North Carolina (55.0), Miami (54.5) and Duke (53.8). Four of those teams were in the last AP Top 25 poll. Two of them (Duke and Louisville) were in the Top 10."

Elton only uses stats from the last game played by each team but I found it interesting. Also in the article Elton provides a link to a Cincinnati radio reporters blog article. The article has links to numerous writers around the country talking about suggested rule changes to increase NCAA MBB scoring.

[Dave in Green]

Thanks, ZZZips. No surprise to me on the free throw shooting as I've read hundreds of articles on the subject. Even top-ranked ACC teams accept substandard free throw shooting in exchange for athletic players who are outstanding in other areas of the game. Those teams can usually get away with missing more than their share of free throws because they're otherwise so dominant. If free throw shooting was so critical to winning, the top 10 free throw shooting teams in the country wouldn't be:

1. 80.1% Ole Miss
2. 79.3% Illinois
3. 77.9% Quinnipiac
4. 77.7% Lafayette
5. 77.2% Brigham Young
6. 77.0% Albany
7. 76.6% Eastern Kentucky
8. 76.1% Pepperdine
9. 76.0% Cal State Northridge
10. 75.9% Evansville

By the way, EA mentions that there are currently only 9 college players shooting better than 90% from the free throw line. Jake Kretzer is currently shooting 95%, better than the national leader. But his 19-20 are too few to qualify for inclusion.

[Dave in Green]

Oddball stat of the day is the comparison of the free throw shooting percentages for the Zips vs. their opponents over the first 23 games of the season:

65.3% vs. 65.3%

[Dr Z]

I don't expect Charles Barkley to post in this thread.

"The NBA is about talent," Barkley continued. "All these guys who run these organizations who talk about analytics, they have one thing in common -- they're a bunch of guys who have never played the game, and they never got the girls in high school, and they just want to get in the game." An NBA coach, speaking to ESPN.com senior writer Ramona Shelburne, said there was value in the use of analytics but that it was limited. "To say they've revolutionized everything about coaching or basketball is just wrong," the coach said. The NBA coach said he used analytics but that a lot of the statistics and formulas have been available for 10 years. "You just had to look it up yourself on a computer," the coach said. "These guys are bright, ambitious and a lot of them have carved out niches for themselves where they take credit for everything," the coach added. "You're taking people with a background in analytics. But they're out evaluating players and making decisions."

[Dr Z]

Oddball stat of the day

Over a month and no stat update? Here is my "oddball stat of the day" for everybody filling out their brackets this week.

10 of last 11 NCAA tournament winners wore blue uniforms. The one exception: 2013 Louisville

[ZachTheZip]

Over a month and no stat update? Here is my "oddball stat of the day" for everybody filling out their brackets this week.

10 of last 11 NCAA tournament winners wore blue uniforms. The one exception: 2013 Louisville

Somebody send this to the Akron athletic department!

[morris buttermaker]

There are only 5 teams that have won 20+ games each of the last 10 years, Gonzaga, tOSU, Kansas, Duke, and Akron. That in it's self is impressive.... what is even more impressive is the fact that (prior to this week) together they have accounted for 65 NCAA tournament wins, 5 Final Fours, and 2 National Championships.

Pretty exclusive company!

[Blue & Gold]

There are only 5 teams that have won 20+ games each of the last 10 years, Gonzaga, tOSU, Kansas, Duke, and Akron. That in it's self is impressive.... what is even more impressive is the fact that (prior to this week) together they have accounted for 65 NCAA tournament wins, 5 Final Fours, and 2 National Championships.

Pretty exclusive company!

Well said. This illustrates many fans' disillusionment with our less-than-demanding schedule.

[LZIp]

There are only 5 teams that have won 20+ games each of the last 10 years, Gonzaga, tOSU, Kansas, Duke, and Akron. That in it's self is impressive.... what is even more impressive is the fact that (prior to this week) together they have accounted for 65 NCAA tournament wins, 5 Final Fours, and 2 National Championships.

Pretty exclusive company!

how many tournament wins, final fours, or national championships does Akron account for? What about NIT,? CBT? CBI...?!

[K92]

Gonzaga, tOSU, Kansas, Duke, and Akron.

[Blue & Gold]

Instant Classic.

[morris buttermaker]

how many tournament wins, final fours, or national championships does Akron account for? What about NIT,? CBT? CBI...?!

equal to or greater than 0 for all the above

[GJGood]

I remember two NIT wins for the Zips, both on the road followed by highly competitive road losses on short turn arounds their next time out.

Ending Florida State's season as well as ending Temple coach John Cheney's career are still two of my favorite Zips basketball memories.