Statistical Analysis of the 2011 NCAA Tournament field

This weekend I did a statistical analysis of every team in this year’s NCAA Tournament, except for the teams that are the 16th seeds or are playing for the right to be the 16th seed.  The only way those teams would advance past Round 2 is if the 1st seeds did not show up.

The table with the statistics is at the bottom of the post.  First I will explain my approach so you can decide whether you might find my work useful or not in determining your selections.

Calculations

Since the best predictor of a basketball team’s future success  is the team’s offensive and defensive efficiency averages, the evaluation I did was centered on two different approaches that basically look at adjusted efficiency, adjusted for strength of schedule.

Adjusted Marginal Win Score 

First, I calculated each team’s adjusted Marginal Win Score, using the offensive and defensive statistics provided by Statfox.com.  Win Score is (Pts + Rebs + Stls + .5Ass + .5Blks – FGAs – TOs – .5FTAs – .5PFs).  Marginal Win Score is the Team’s Win Score – the Team’s Opponents’ Win Score divided by 2. 

The Win Score calculation accounts for the first four columns of the table (not including the column with each team’s name).  The first column is the Team’s Win Score.  For an NCAA Champion, you generally want that above 42.00.  The second column is Opponent Win Score.  For an NCAA Champion, you generally want that below 20.00.  The third column is the Team’s Raw Marginal Win Score.  I included this number to show how successful each team has been, regardless of schedule. 

The fourth column is the Team’s Adjusted Marginal Win Score.  Adjusted Marginal Win Score is simply the Marginal Win Score of the team’s collective schedule plus the team’s raw Marginal Win Score.  Some teams — like Illinois — didn’t post the greatest Win Score differentials, but their numbers improve because of massive adjustments brought on by brutal schedules.  In college basketball, you have to adjust for schedule because different team’s play vastly different levels of competition.

At the same time, I get a little skittish with huge adjustments.  At some point, a team has to actually win games, not just play well against strong competition.  I included each team’s raw Marginal Win Score for this reason.  Yesterday Digger Phelps made a sound point.  He said teams that are successful during the season, regardless of schedule, tend to do better than teams that played well but lost a lot of games against a tough schedule (Georgetown, for example).  I don’t know if that is true, but you have the information to factor that in if you wish.   

Adjusted Efficiency Differential

Adjusted Efficiency Differential measures the same thing as Adjusted Marginal Win Score, but does it in a more straightforward manner. 

Adjusted Efficiency Differential is simply a team’s Efficiency Differential (Points per 100 possessions) plus their collective Opponents Efficiency Differential.  As an example, Missouri posted an offensive efficiency average of 113.0 and a defensive average of 97.8 (+15.20).  Their collective schedule posted an offensive efficiency average of 105.4 and a defensive average of 98.8 (+6.60).   Therefore, Missouri’s Adjusted Efficiency Differential was (+21.80). 

The thinking is, Adjusted Efficiency Differential levels the playing field by measuring each team’s performance against the performance that a vast collection of other teams put up against the same schedule.  Its not perfect, but I don’t think you can do much better without getting into more complex math.

Effective Field Goal Differential

I added this number to this year’s analysis because Dean Oliver found that it was by far the most important of his “Four Factors”.  Effective Field Goal Differential is simply a team’s Effective Field Goal percentage minus their Opponents Effective Field Goal Percentage.  There is no adjustment made to this number. 

The Table

Below I have the table with the statistics.  Its long.  I ordered each team according to the sum total of the last three columns.  That doesn’t make it a perfect ordering, but it gives some indication. 

2011 NCAA TOURNAMENT 

	WS	oppWS	MWS	adjMWS	adjEffDiff	EfgDiff
Kansas	49.01	16.81	32.21	41.81	33.6	13.4
Ohio St	45.41	16.81	28.61	40.15	36.5	8.1
Duke	41.21	19.35	21.91	33.08	32.1	9.4
Pitt	41.51	18.61	22.91	34.32	30.2	7.7
Texas	39.05	15.85	23.21	33.33	28.9	8.8
Kentucky	42.01	21.85	20.15	31.32	27.2	8.3
Syracuse	44.51	23.81	20.71	32.91	25.7	7.2
Washington	43.25	23.01	20.24	30.63	26.9	7.9
SD State	40.01	18.51	21.51	30.59	27.8	6.8
Notre Dame	43.95	24.55	19.41	31.61	24.9	7.5
Purdue	37.45	22.25	15.21	29.23	28.9	5.5
BYU	44.21	23.31	20.91	28.57	27.5	5.9
Louisville	40.51	23.11	17.41	28.05	24.1	8.7
Wisconsin	35.91	22.01	13.91	27.93	28.5	4.1
UNC	40.91	23.55	17.51	31.71	24.8	3.9
Illinois	36.65	24.51	12.15	28.64	22.3	7.7
Georgetown	36.41	26.41	10.01	28.05	22.5	7.8
Utah St	39.25	15.71	23.55	23.81	23.1	9.2
Connecticut	38.91	25.61	13.31	27.85	21.9	3.3
Gonzaga	41.01	19.21	21.81	25.31	19.9	7.6
Vanderbilt	39.05	24.91	14.14	23.94	20.7	8.1
West Virg	33.61	23.81	9.81	27.33	22.6	2.8
Cincinnati	35.11	18.51	16.59	24.51	23.1	3.5
Florida	38.05	22.31	15.74	24.97	21.4	3.6
Arizona	36.55	22.95	13.61	22.56	21.1	5.9
Marquette	40.05	26.51	13.54	25.62	21.3	1.4
Belmont	42.15	17.25	24.91	18.03	21.5	8.8
Kans State	32.21	19.35	12.86	24.93	20.6	2.7
Flor State	34.01	19.25	14.76	23.97	17.1	6.6
Villanova	37.31	25.25	12.06	24.91	19.1	3.3
Missouri	40.45	26.21	14.24	22.81	21.8	2.6
Geor Mason	39.11	20.41	18.71	19.71	18.7	7.8
UNLV	35.91	26.51	9.39	18.08	20.4	5.9
Mich St	33.41	26.91	6.51	24.95	17.2	1.1
Texas A&M	32.81	19.71	13.11	20.24	18.7	3.8
Clemson	32.85	20.35	12.49	20.29	17.1	4.8
Richmond	37.45	21.85	15.61	18.19	17.1	8.9
Temple	38.25	22.41	15.84	20.52	17.2	4.1
Xavier	36.01	22.46	13.56	18.09	17.3	5.6
UCLA	33.81	23.55	10.26	20.63	15.2	4.6
Georgiz	35.91	23.15	12.76	21.05	13.4	4.7
Michigan	31.55	27.51	4.04	18.46	16.9	3.3
Oakland	46.21	29.96	16.25	18.06	13.8	6.7
USC	30.51	23.55	6.95	18.75	15.1	3.7
St. Johns	31.31	26.45	4.86	20.17	18.1	-1.1
Old Domin	38.51	20.01	18.51	20.96	14.1	1.4
Tennessee	32.61	26.71	5.91	18.63	15.3	0.8
Butler	33.65	22.95	10.71	15.77	16.5	2.2
Penn St	28.61	27.65	0.96	19.13	15.1	-0.7
UAB	33.55	24.01	9.54	13.31	12.9	5.2
VCU	44.01	29.81	14.21	17.58	9.8	0.5
Princeton	35.15	22.61	12.54	10.99	9.4	5.2
Memphis	33.15	26.51	6.65	10.02	7.9	3.6
More State	34.51	19.81	14.71	10.15	9.1	1.9
UCSB	33.15	24.95	8.21	8.72	6.4	5.1
Bucknell	34.11	24.15	9.96	5.15	7.1	6.2
Wofford	34.05	25.31	8.74	6.42	7.8	3.3
Ind State	29.31	24.03	5.28	8.24	5.7	2.9
Long Island	41.71	26.35	15.36	6.79	5.5	4.2
Long Bea St	33.71	28.95	4.76	8.64	7.3	0.6
North Colo	31.55	23.15	8.41	4.91	6.8	1.4
Akron	32.25	25.71	6.54	2.79	5.1	3.3
St Peters	25.45	21.71	3.74	4.39	2.8	3.7
AVG	37.04	23.02	14.03	21.46	18.5	4.9

Some potential second round upsets that stand out:

Gonzaga over St Johns

Utah St over Kansas St

Florida St over Texas A&M

Mich St over UCLA (shaky, though)

Marquette over Xavier

Possible Third Round Upsets

Washington over UNC

Gonzaga over BYU

Utah St over Wisconsin (gut feeling)

Possible 4th Round Upsets

Washington over Syracuse (very close)

Texas over Duke (gut feeling)

Gonzaga over Florida (Flor is way overseeded)

Wild Card Final Four Team

San Diego State

Championship Game

Kansas over Ohio St (zzzzz…)

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