Lucky and Unlucky: Measuring the Breaks by John Gasaway
Measuring that role with some degree of precision was of course pioneered by Bill James in baseball and has more recently been brought to college hoops by my Basketball Prospectus colleague, Ken Pomeroy. Where Ken’s luck stat takes in the entire season, however, my own hand-crafted measure is restricted to conference play, giving us a look at how the ball has bounced for major-conference teams over the past couple months only.
In back of this measure are the last 219 conference seasons played by the 73 teams in the ACC, Big East, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-10, and SEC between 2006 and last year. A team’s “luck” is measured here according to how far their conference record exceeds or falls short of what would be expected given their per-possession scoring margin.
Just making his list at #8 is the Friars
Providence (Actual: 9-7; Predicted: 7-9). Losing last week on the road to Louisville and at home against Notre Dame by 18 and 19 points respectively didn’t do wonders for the scoring margin of a group that just knocked off the (soon to be former) number-one team.
I love numbers and all, but come on now.
H/T Matt Berk
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