Would love to make a point and shut down martinelli. In a game we shut down stirtz and Francis the games before.
Make that a thing moving forward
Make that a thing moving forward
Pregame: Illinois at Northwestern, Wednesday, January 14th, 7:30pm CT, BTN
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RabidDawgClassic
- Los Angeles, CA
Right now we're 1.08 pts above where that 21 team finished and 2.54 pts below where the 05 team ended. We're in very elite territory.
Caveat being, within the last few years teams have started trying to be efficient so you have more gaudy numbers than in the past where efficiency wasn't so a much a goal but a byproduct.
lstewart53x3
- Scottsdale, Arizona
I’ve seen this said, but is this really true? That teams are more efficient now because they’re “trying to be efficient”, as opposed to simply “trying to be good on offense and defense, i.e. efficient?”
I know this year the efficiencies are crazy, but that looks to be more of an outlier than anything.
In 04-05, there were 9 teams +24 or better.
21: 10
22: 11
23: 5
24: 11
25: 17
26: 17
Definitely an uptick past 2 years, but certainly coaches have known about efficiency metrics longer than that?
I remember everyone talking about Bo Ryan coached teams 10-15 years ago and how they were more efficient than other teams.
I'm sure he will stilll get his..at least 15. Guessing their philosophy will be make him earn it inside the arc and shut the water off to everyone else.
Fighter of the Nightman
- Chicago, IL
Put me in the camp that is SUPER frustrated with the recent losses in Evanston, and I get even more frustrated when people classify this as your typical "tough road game." We play 10 conference road games each year ... the one we should rarely be excusing away a loss is the one that is a 2.5-hour bus ride to play a Quad 2 opponent in front of a crowd that is always AT LEAST 50% Illini fans.
Does NU seem to get up for this game? Sure. Does the NU student section tend to bring more energy for this game than their other home games? Definitely. But guess what? Jump out to an early lead like we did at Iowa, and not only do we totally negate their crowd advantage ... we actually create our OWN, as our fans get into the game! I can't imagine it feels great to be playing on your home floor and begin to feel like the "crowd momentum" is literally shifting toward the visiting rival team because they have so many fans in your building.
Zero excuse not to stop the losing streak in Evanston.
Does NU seem to get up for this game? Sure. Does the NU student section tend to bring more energy for this game than their other home games? Definitely. But guess what? Jump out to an early lead like we did at Iowa, and not only do we totally negate their crowd advantage ... we actually create our OWN, as our fans get into the game! I can't imagine it feels great to be playing on your home floor and begin to feel like the "crowd momentum" is literally shifting toward the visiting rival team because they have so many fans in your building.
Zero excuse not to stop the losing streak in Evanston.
ChiefGritty
- Chicago, IL
This is like when we had that losing streak in the Braggin' Rights and Cuonzo Martin was circling the drain.
We've been embarrassing ourselves in this game, these Mildcats stink, we need to make this one hurt.
I was just eyeballing the KP numbers but from 2002 to 2024 there was only 1 season where there were more than 4 teams with an efficiency rating of 29+. I would say on average there were only 2 or 3 teams in the 29+ range.
Then, last year there were 6 such teams. And currently there are 10.
So, to me, again just eyeballing and not doing a true analysis, it looks like there's some "efficiency inflation" where in past years, a 30+ would have put us in the top 3 of KP, now it's "only" good for 7th and puts us 5+ points behind 2nd place.
Purely my hunch, but it seems like coaches are much more aware of efficiency than they were 10 or even 5 years ago. Like, I would be shocked if your "average" shot chart from 2015 looked like your average shot chart today.
But who knows. Could just be a coincidence or perhaps NIL and transfer rules have allowed modern teams to assemble these super potent offenses.
But, again, I think teams are just smarter about the data now so they scheme more to be as efficient as possible.
OrangeBlue98
Iowa is not in a great spot right now (LvilleILL1)
- Des Moines, IA
Goal here is similar to guarding Stirtz. Make him work really hard on both ends of the floor, and make sure no one else gets hot. Martinelli will get some points, but you can’t let him be efficient.
Did you play high school sports?...... Lol
This 100% the case. The Net Rankings have an efficiency component too. It is discouraging coaches from playing developmental players in favor of leaving starters in the game even when games are not really in doubt.
Fighter of the Nightman
- Chicago, IL
Lol, yes, but I would think it might be a tad more embarrassing for a Big Ten D1 basketball player to see his fan support be that bad than for a high school baseball player like me.
The Sprouting Divot
Invisible and Bulletproof
- Miracle Mile
If my 10 year old witnesses a fourth straight loss at Northwestern, I may never be able to convince him to attend another Illinois game.
Kenpom is are only adjusted to the season and average teams in that particular season. It's not very useful to compare between seasons.
What we see now with a bunch of very highly rated teams just means NIL has lead to talent being far more consolidated on the top 20-25 teams.
The best teams in the country can now reload with upper classmen every year instead of just relying on freshman. The top teams are generally now older, deeper, and better then they ever have been.
Also, keep in mind that mid majors make up most of the averages and are way worse now than they were in the previous 20-25 years since all their best players and upper classman they develop get poached by power schools. They no longer have guys that played 3-4 years in their system like you say with a lot of the veteran dominated teams that made tourney runs.
Ken Pom only goes back to around 2000 but I think you'd see something similar if it went back to the 70s-80s with the top teams being far better before talent started to spread out and now we are back to that.
Fighter of the Nightman
- Chicago, IL
I opened one Christmas present quite early this year, and was a navy Flyin' Illini jersey. I wore it for the first time during Braggin' Rights, and it has now been worn while I watched the following games...
1) Braggin' Rights beatdown
2) Music City bowl last second victory
3) Win vs. PSU at the Palestra
4) Yesterday's win at Iowa
I even skipped wearing it for the Rutgers game to not waste up too much good luck on a game we should win, but man what a blessing it has been!! On the opposite end of the spectrum, I do have a confession to make and I must apologize to Illini Nation for the bad juju, haha. We always do a Christmas-like bar crawl with our friends on a Saturday in December. Last year? I watched Tennessee hit a buzzer beater to beat us at home on my phone in an Uber. This year? I watched Nebraska hit a buzzer beater to beat us at home on my phone in an Uber, lol. So never fear, I have already proclaimed that I refuse to participate next year if it's on a day that Illinois plays, especially if it's vs. a ranked opponent at home!
Anyway, the TL;DR here is that I am strongly debating what to wear to Evanston on Wednesday. I got a new Orange Script jersey that I have never worn, so I was leaning toward that to (A) let it debut with a win and (B) help to paint Welsh-Ryan Arena orange rather than navy, which is much less cool in visiting arenas. On the other hand ... MAN, this navy jersey has had some good luck so far!!
1) Braggin' Rights beatdown
2) Music City bowl last second victory
3) Win vs. PSU at the Palestra
4) Yesterday's win at Iowa
I even skipped wearing it for the Rutgers game to not waste up too much good luck on a game we should win, but man what a blessing it has been!!
On the opposite end of the spectrum, I do have a confession to make and I must apologize to Illini Nation for the bad juju, haha. We always do a Christmas-like bar crawl with our friends on a Saturday in December. Last year? I watched Tennessee hit a buzzer beater to beat us at home on my phone in an Uber. This year? I watched Nebraska hit a buzzer beater to beat us at home on my phone in an Uber, lol. So never fear, I have already proclaimed that I refuse to participate next year if it's on a day that Illinois plays, especially if it's vs. a ranked opponent at home!Anyway, the TL;DR here is that I am strongly debating what to wear to Evanston on Wednesday. I got a new Orange Script jersey that I have never worn, so I was leaning toward that to (A) let it debut with a win and (B) help to paint Welsh-Ryan Arena orange rather than navy, which is much less cool in visiting arenas. On the other hand ... MAN, this navy jersey has had some good luck so far!!
There was a time where running up the score was unsportsmanlike. No more.
I'm not sure when efficiency rankings started weighing into selection Sunday, but there's no doubt that coaches know that those rankings matter. If you think you can sniff an at-large tournament bid, you'd better consider how the metrics look. I think that has some ripple effects on top of simply coaching guys to play every possession like it matters.
I think it's been a few years but I remember a press conference where Brad said he'd love to put the bench in but he needs to beat the opponent by at least ten points to hit the committee's desired efficiency thresholds.
Battle89
- Cary-Grove, the better Trojan team
LOL as I have a very similar situation.I opened one Christmas present quite early this year, and was a navy Flyin' Illini jersey. I wore it for the first time during Braggin' Rights, and it has now been worn while I watched the following games...
1) Braggin' Rights beatdown
2) Music City bowl last second victory
3) Win vs. PSU at the Palestra
4) Yesterday's win at Iowa
I even skipped wearing it for the Rutgers game to not waste up too much good luck on a game we should win, but man what a blessing it has been!!
Anyway, the TL;DR here is that I am strongly debating what to wear to Evanston on Wednesday. I got a new Orange Script jersey that I have never worn, so I was leaning toward that to (A) let it debut with a win and (B) help to paint Welsh-Ryan Arena orange rather than navy, which is much less cool in visiting arenas. On the other hand ... MAN, this navy jersey has had some good luck so far!!
Bought an Illini hockey sweater a year or two ago, and to best of my recollection, the Illini never won if I wore it on game day. The Nebraska game was the last straw...while I can still wear it on non-game days, that sweater is now retired on days we play.
However I also got the navy jersey as a Xmas gift, and have not yet worn it. Trying to pick my spot as you are.
LouHenson
- Naples Florida
This is some of the coolest part of looking at the efficiency tools like the shot chart. It is crazy how are shot chart is literally all 3’s and in paint shots? For us old timers this is just crazy to look at?
ptgrd23
- orange county CA
Sold out stadium. Crazy fans. The roar of crowd gives you a burst of adrenaline every time you make a good play. Even in HS.
College football is nuts when you have 70,000 roaring fans. The sold out crowd was so loud in Memorial Stadium during 1983-4 Rose Bowl season that concrete literally started falling from under the 2nd deck and they had to put up netting.
Assembly hall "house of Paign" was pretty crazy in Bill Self and early Weber era. We never lost at home.
I remember of quote from Chris Paul after we crushed #1 Wake Forest at home about " there was orange everywhere, it was crazy"
College football is nuts when you have 70,000 roaring fans. The sold out crowd was so loud in Memorial Stadium during 1983-4 Rose Bowl season that concrete literally started falling from under the 2nd deck and they had to put up netting.
Assembly hall "house of Paign" was pretty crazy in Bill Self and early Weber era. We never lost at home.
I remember of quote from Chris Paul after we crushed #1 Wake Forest at home about " there was orange everywhere, it was crazy"
Fighter of the Nightman
- Chicago, IL
Absolutely great point, and I feel it makes the older teams on that list (e.g., 2005 Illinois) that rank so highly even more impressive. Sure, that team took a lot of threes (and made a lot of them), but they took a lot of "inefficient" mid-range shots, too, IIRC. Their "byproduct" efficiency, as you noted, was just because they were a DAMN good basketball team!
I thought this was an interesting theory - that it's not so much that teams are becoming more efficient but that the top is becoming stronger, the middle weaker, and thus the top appears more efficient relative to the middle.
So, I looked into it a little more. I looked at points per possession for every cbb team since the 97-98 season. What you'll see below is the median, the average of the top 10 teams and the average of the bottom 10 teams. Additionally, I've indicated when NET took effect as well as immediate transfer eligibility. Finally, just for reference, I've also added the Google search volume for "kenpom" since 2004.
My takeaways are:
A) You're right that the top is more efficient this year relative to the median. It's the largest disparity between the top teams and the median since the data starts in 1998. (It's almost exactly the same as it was in 1998.)
B) There is a clear upward trend in points per possession (a measure of efficiency) for all levels of teams
C) There is a clear spike in PPP that started in 2023 (unsure of the significance of that year)
D) There does seem to be a correlation between increased Kenpom popularity and the recent increase in efficiency
KenPom Google volume (the spikes happen each March)
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