Leaderboard

I am a self-proclaimed stat-geek, as anyone who really knows me will confirm. Over the weekend, I went back through our last six games (our five game losing streak and the IUPUI win) and analyzed the TEAM’S performance based upon who was on the floor at the time. Without going into too much detail, I analyzed each player based upon how many minutes they played, and the game score when they entered the game and again when they left – and then compared this score differential to the “average” flow of the game. For example, if Darian Harris played 20 minutes of a game, and during those 20 minutes, we outscored the opponents by 2, but ended up losing the game by 6, Darian would get a +5. (A six point loss in forty minutes would equal an average deficit of 3 for twenty minutes, but DH was plus 2 for his twenty minutes, a difference of five). Now I know that there are a lot of flaws with this analysis, such as the team may play well even when the player is not, or a player could enter the game after a foul and timeout on the floor, and an opponent immediately makes two FT that had NOTHING to do with the new player. And, pity the five that were on the floor when Denver poured it on in the last few minutes at the Mabee Center! But, over several games, you begin to see some interesting trends. And, by comparing to final margin of the game, each player scores a plus, a neutral, or a minus, but add all of the scores for the team together, and it nets to zero. In essence, over a long enough period of time, this should provide a statistical insight into what players help make the team better and what players may drag down the performance on a given night. What REALLY surprised me is this… In EACH of the six games, Aaron Anderson had a positive score, which is AMAZING. No one else was even close. And, incredibly, Aaron was one of those on the court at the end of the Denver game! For example, against Denver, AA played 35 minutes, and in those 35 minutes we were outscored by 14 (or 2 points every five minutes). But, for the FIVE minutes he was NOT on the court, we were outscored by 10! The stats are even more dramatic from last weekend at IUPUI. AA played 36 minutes, in which we outscored them by 18. In the FOUR minutes that he was out of the game, IUPUI cut into the deficit by 12. That is an incredible momentum swing! Against WIU, AA played 32 minutes, in which we outscored the Leathernecks by two. In the other eight minutes, we were a minus five. I would think that this is a total fluke, but he has been a “plus” every game (which is also REALLY hard to do with the amount of minutes that he plays - the more playing time, the closer you move to the average). Game after game, Aaron is definitely the straw that stirs the drink on this team. If someone can provide advice on importing a chart, I can report everyone’s plus/minus score for each of the six games. As you can imagine, the other guards don’t fare as well, as they are playing most of the minutes that AA doesn’t! As an example, there may be a good reason Dez may still not be getting a lot of playing time. In only five minutes on the court in these six games, ORU has been outscored by nine .For the big guys, E-Man has been a net positive in four of the six games, and Albert has been average (3 plus, 3 minus). Interesting stuff! (at least to me) Owens Nzekwesi Bradley Anderson Martin Harris Young Miller Dez IN OUT IN OUT IN OUT IN OUT IN OUT IN OUT IN OUT IN OUT IN OUT at NDSU -13 3 -4 -6 -11 1 -6 -4 -4 -6 -3 -7 -12 2 3 -13 0 0 -10 36 -9 13 -3.25 38 -9.5 37 -9.25 36 -9 15 -3.75 21 -5.25 4 -1 0 0 -0.111 -0.058 -0.039 0.088 0.139 0.050 -0.321 1.000 #DIV/0! FW -3 -1 -9 5 -8 4 -2 -2 -9 5 2 -6 9 -13 0 0 0 0 -4 31 -3.1 24 -2.4 37 -3.7 40 -4 19 -1.9 22 -2.2 27 -2.7 0 0 0 0 0.003 -0.275 -0.116 0.050 -0.374 0.191 0.433 #DIV/0! #DIV/0! DEN -24 0 4 -28 -25 1 -14 -10 -17 -7 -8 -16 -32 8 0 0 -4 -20 -24 26 -15.6 20 -12 36 -21.6 35 -21 31 -18.6 15 -9 35 -21 0 0 2 -1.2 -0.323 0.800 -0.094 0.200 0.052 0.067 -0.314 #DIV/0! -1.400 at SDSU -4 -3 -3 -4 -6 -1 -3 -4 -6 -1 -4 -3 -6 -1 -3 -4 0 0 -7 38 -6.65 35 -6.125 38 -6.65 27 -4.725 35 -6.125 5 -0.875 20 -3.5 2 -0.35 0 0 0.070 0.089 0.017 0.064 0.004 -0.625 -0.125 -1.325 #DIV/0! WIU -4 1 2 -5 -8 5 2 -5 -4 1 -5 2 0 -3 1 -4 1 -4 -3 32 -2.4 22 -1.65 34 -2.55 32 -2.4 25 -1.875 12 -0.9 34 -2.55 8 -0.6 1 -0.075 -0.050 0.166 -0.160 0.138 -0.085 -0.342 0.075 0.200 1.075 IUPUI 7 -1 5 1 10 -4 18 -12 8 -2 -2 8 -11 17 1 5 -6 12 6 30 4.5 12 1.8 35 5.25 36 5.4 30 4.5 26 3.9 20 3 9 1.35 2 0.3 0.083 0.267 0.136 0.350 0.117 -0.227 -0.700 -0.039 -3.150 Summary -41 -1 -5 -37 -48 6 -5 -37 -32 -10 -20 -22 -52 10 2 -16 -9 -12 193 126 218 207 176 95 157 23 5 Per game +/- -1.813 5.913 -1.697 5.986 0.227 -3.021 -5.096 4.522 -64.200 Score differential while in game Score differential while out of game Minutes Played Score differential expected for minutes played Per-minute Plus/Minus scoring