Jordan Sperber Wins $2,000 Grand Prize In Stat Geek Idol 2

• 3 comments - > Stat Geek Idol, NCAA Basketball - posted by Tom Federico on April 8, 2013

First, we asked the amateur stat geeks of the world to submit us up to four pages of insightful, unique analysis about college hoops. (Here’s the invite.) We staked a $2,000 cash prize for the entry that exhibited the best combination of a compelling topic, rigorous analysis, and refined, persuasive presentation. The entries we received came from people of all backgrounds, from students to professors to professionals.

Then, we whittled the number of submissions down to five finalists, which we sent to an esteemed judging panel stocked with consumers and practitioners of basketball analytics. In the end, eight judges read every finalist’s entry, and weighed in with their rankings and feedback: Mark Cuban, Dean Oliver, Ken Pomeroy, John Gasaway, Ben Alamar, Toby Moskowitz, John Stasko, and Jeff Haley. For judge bios, see the original post.

Now, the judges have spoken, and we are happy to crown our champion of Stat Geek Idol 2: Jordan Sperber.

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Measuring Offensive Balance In Basketball (Stat Geek Idol 2 Finalist)

• 0 comments - > Stat Geek Idol, NCAA Basketball - posted by Stephen Shea on April 8, 2013

This post is one of the five finalists in our second Stat Geek Idol contest. It was conceived of and written by Stephen Shea.

In 2006-07, the champion Florida Gators employed a balanced offensive attack, with five players averaging between 10.3 and 13.3 points per game.  In contrast, the 2010-11 UConn Huskies relied heavily on the shots of Kemba Walker.  The amount of balance in an offense can vary greatly between teams, and the game has seen champions at both ends of the spectrum.  We quantify offensive balance (OB).  We observe a surprisingly high correlation between OB and rank among the AP’s top 25 teams.

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Charting Screens In College Basketball (Stat Geek Idol 2 Finalist)

• 0 comments - > Stat Geek Idol, NCAA Basketball - posted by Joshua Riddell on April 8, 2013

This post is one of the five finalists in our second Stat Geek Idol contest. It was conceived of and written by Joshua Riddell (@Joshua_Riddell).

Teams have the ability to measure or quantify nearly every aspect of a basketball game in today’s game. With the use of Synergy Sports, they can easily pin down how they succeed on offense against man and zone defenses, how strong they are on the pick and roll, how their offense performs in transition and countless other scenarios. Many teams chart other aspects of the game themselves, including deflections, most famously done by Louisville and Indiana and recently profiled in this NPR article.

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Expected Points And Efficiency (Stat Geek Idol 2 Finalist)

• 2 comments - > Stat Geek Idol, NCAA Basketball - posted by Gregory Matthews on April 8, 2013

This post is one of the five finalists in our second Stat Geek Idol contest. It was conceived of and written by Greg Matthews (@statsinthewild).

Let me start with an obvious statement: In basketball, players who attempt more shots score more points on average.  Other individual stats are also associated with more points, such as rebounds and blocks.  Similarly, some statistics, like turnovers, are associated with fewer points scored.  In this way, we can compute an expected number of points a player should score based on their other statistics such as shots attempted, rebounds, turnovers, etc.  Then we can compare the expected number of points a player should have scored to the actual number of points scored and evaluate players based on their tendency to be above or below their expected number of points.  I’m going to call this player efficiency.

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Finding Northwestern A New Coach (Stat Geek Idol 2 Finalist)

• 0 comments - > Stat Geek Idol, NCAA Basketball - posted by Ryan Silvis on April 8, 2013

This post is one of the five finalists in our second Stat Geek Idol contest. It was conceived of and written by Ryan Silvis.

In 1978, a then promising young coach at Army, Mike Krzyzewski, interviewed for the vacant Northwestern coaching job. Northwestern offered the position to a different coach and Coach K went back to Army only to be hired by Duke in 1980. Since, Coach K has led Duke to 29 NCAA Tournaments, while Northwestern is still looking for their first.  Northwestern is again looking for a new coach and hopefully Athletic Director Jim Phillips is on the Stat Geek Idol judging panel, because I will tell him who he should hire.

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Do Matchups Matter In College Basketball? (Stat Geek Idol 2 Finalist)

• 0 comments - > Stat Geek Idol, NCAA Basketball - posted by Jordan Sperber on April 8, 2013

This post is one of the five finalists in our second Stat Geek Idol contest. It was conceived of and written by Jordan Sperber (@hoopvision68).

Introduction

There are 347 teams in Division I college basketball. The nature of the sport allows for all different kinds of styles of play. Every team has varying player personnel and coaching philosophy. College basketball analysts are given the tough task of forecasting the end result of games featuring contradicting styles. It seems undeniable that, in some cases, certain teams can be bad matchups for other teams. Still, quite frequently analysts just say what sounds good. To illustrate this point, let’s look at a first round matchup from this year’s NCAA tournament:

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