Pleasant Surprises and Total Letdowns (HV Weekly: 4/3/2020)
Measuring up to preseason expectations + new podcast episode + more NCAAT team breakdowns.
Welcome back to the Hoop Vision Weekly!
Thank you. Truly.
The end of a college basketball season isn’t exactly the ideal time to grow a premium college basketball newsletter — and that’s the case regardless of COVID-19 or the overall economic climate. But add a pandemic into the mix and the independent sports media world — like many other industries — has certainly taken a hit.
In light of that, we cannot thank you enough for your support of Hoop Vision over the past few weeks. Your willingness to not only continue to support the cause, but also spread the word on social media has been incredibly appreciated.
Improbably, we have not only been able to maintain our subscriber base, but we have actually grown since the season abruptly ended. Obviously, that would not be possible without you. We’re going to continue working to earn that support with offseason newsletters, videos, and podcasts all throughout the spring and summer.
Hoop Vision started almost 10 years ago as an amateur blog that almost no one (deservedly so) was reading. Thank you for helping turn it into a professional endeavor.
— — —
In today’s edition of the HV Weekly:
The return of the Solving Basketball podcast
Context behind UNC’s underperformance (plus Virginia and Kentucky)
The top coaches at beating preseason expectations
Teams 21-30 in our scouting breakdowns from the HV Tourney Bible
The X’s & O’s and analytics roundup
The Return of Solving Basketball
This week, we rolled out a new episode of Solving Basketball featuring Illinois assistant coach Stephen Gentry. (Apple//YouTube links)
Illinois and Brad Underwood underwent some of the most extreme scheme and style changes in the country this season. On defense, Underwood moved from his on-the-line-up-the-line pressure scheme to a pack line. On offense, Underwood moved from the Spread to more ball screens.
In the podcast conversation, Gentry explained those schematic changes — plus his role and the role of data/analytics in the decision making process.
A Season of Underperformance
Months before the season became known forever as the one without an NCAA Tournament, it was the season without dominant teams. November and December were marked by top preseason teams underachieving relative to expectations.
Baylor and then Kansas — as well as Dayton, San Diego State, and Gonzaga — would emerge later in conference play, but on the whole it was a season of underperformance.
The top seven teams in the preseason kenpom ratings — Michigan State, Kentucky, Louisville, Duke, Virginia, North Carolina, and Purdue — all finished the season with a lower adjusted efficiency margin than their preseason projection.
The graph below displays the changes in kenpom rating from the preseason to the end of the season. The x-axis is preseason AdjEM and the y-axis is change in AdjEM over the course of the season.
Top five AdjEM increases (“The Overachievers”):
Stephen F. Austin: -11.2 —> +7.0
San Diego State: +6.5 —> +24.5
Northern Colorado —> -5.4 —> +10.1
Chattanooga: -9.9 —> +1.9
Southern: -19.3 —> -7.6
Top five AdjEM decreases (“The Disappointments”):
Samford: +3.0 —> -14.0
Kennesaw State: -13.4 —> -28.7
North Carolina: +24.5 —> +9.4
NJIT: +1.5 —> -11.1
Virginia: +26.1 —> +14.2
For most, the compelling section of the graph is the bottom right corner. North Carolina, Virginia, and Kentucky all started the season with a projected AdjEM of over 20 points per 100 possessions. All three teams finished the season at least 10 points worse than their initial projection.
Ken Pomeroy has been publishing preseason ratings since the 2012 season. Over that time, there have been 108 teams with a projected AdjEM above 20 points. Besides the three teams this season, just four other teams have had similar drops in performance.
Those four gray dots in the same bottom right corner as North Carolina, Virginia, and Kentucky represent:
2012 Pittsburgh
2013 Kentucky
2013 Texas
2019 West Virginia
In other words, from 2014 to 2019 only one top team (West Virginia) underperformed preseason expectations to the same level as UNC, Virginia, and Kentucky this season.
To be fair, it does feel strange to group Virginia and Kentucky with North Carolina. The Tar Heels finished 14-19 overall and tied for last in the ACC standings. Meanwhile, Virginia won their final eight games, and Kentucky won nine of their last 10.
(And of course, don’t forget John Calipari’s “I think I had the national championship team” comments.)
But while UNC clearly underperformed expectations to the most extreme extent, the predictive metrics weren’t entirely sold on Virginia or Kentucky this season either. Virginia finished the season ranked #42 in kenpom, and Kentucky finished at #29.
— — —
The Top Coaches at Exceeding Expectations
Virginia was unable to meet preseason expectations (at least on an efficiency basis) this season, but the rest of Tony Bennett’s tenure has been quite the opposite; the Hoos had outperformed their preseason rating in the previous eight seasons.
Below, you’ll see a graph conceptually similar to the previous section’s, but on a year-by-year basis. The top 25 coaches in adjusted efficiency since the 2012 season are selected.
Besides Bennett, Mark Few is another top coach that stand outs. In 2012, Gonzaga tied their preseason rating exactly — they both started and finished the season with a +18.4 adjusted efficiency margin. Since then, Few and the Zags have outperformed preseason expectations in every single season.
Other coaches who have outperformed preseason expectations in every season:
Chris Holtmann (8-for-8)
Pat Kelsey (8-for-8)
Craig Smith (6-for-6)
Mark Pope (5-for-5)
Steve Forbes (5-for-5)
Grant McCasland (4-for-4)
Heath Schroyer (4-for-4)
10 more scouting breakdowns from the HV Bible
We have now released 30 individual team breakdowns for Hoop Vision Plus subscribers. The 10 new teams published on HV+ this week were:
We will have another 10 teams coming out next week. If you were considering purchasing the full e-book, we’d urge you to consider joining us on HV+ to get the experience and look back on the season that was.
ICYMI earlier this week…
On the data side of things, we tweeted out a visualization of the year-by-year changes in shot selection — percentage of shots from three or at rim — for a select group of teams.
And a follow-up with 25 additional teams.