NIT-log5 and Adjusted Efficiency Predictions

Following up on yesterday's teaser post, it's time to post preview odds for the 2009 NIT.

Contrary to my hopes, I haven't been able to expand my bracket to account for championship chances, so you're just getting finals chances for every team. If the Hoyas win Wednesday and after the first round is over, I'll post complete odds for the rest of the NIT.

Because the NIT is played at campus sites, team's chances of making it to NYC for the semifinals are greatly affected by seeding. First, here's what team's chances would look like if this were the NCAA tournament and home court advantage was not taken into account, via the log5 method:

Seed  Team           2nd Round Quarters New York  Finals
1     Auburn           79.93%   43.19%   19.60%    8.89%
8     UT-Martin        20.07%    4.58%    0.82%    0.14%
4     Tulsa            53.29%   28.60%   12.30%    5.28%
5     Northwestern     46.71%   23.63%    9.43%    3.75%
3     Baylor           37.57%   22.07%   12.20%    5.76%
6     Georgetown       62.43%   43.78%   29.38%   17.48%
2     Virginia Tech    63.87%   24.63%   12.68%    5.50%
7     Duquesne         36.13%    9.52%    3.59%    1.10%

1     San Diego St     81.33%   47.34%   27.67%   15.94%
8     Weber St         18.67%    4.57%    1.14%    0.28%
4     Kansas St        59.62%   30.84%   16.71%    8.92%
5     Illinois St      40.38%   17.25%    7.71%    3.39%
3     South Carolina   52.41%   21.14%    8.65%    3.76%
6     Davidson         47.59%   18.12%    7.01%    2.88%
2     St Mary's        36.30%   18.92%    7.92%    3.51%
7     Washington St    63.70%   41.81%   23.19%   13.42%

Seed  Team           2nd Round Quarters New York  Finals
1     Creighton        78.07%   35.31%   14.01%    6.46%
8     Bowling Green    21.93%    4.16%    0.65%    0.13%
4     Kentucky         58.72%   37.48%   17.95%    9.75%
5     UNLV             41.28%   23.05%    9.06%    4.15%
3     New Mexico       63.69%   32.50%   19.72%   11.58%
6     Nebraska         36.31%   13.54%    6.38%    2.88%
2     Notre Dame       52.37%   28.83%   17.52%   10.30%
7     UAB              47.63%   25.13%   14.71%    8.31%

1     Florida          81.12%   43.34%   27.70%   14.55%
8     Jacksonville     18.88%    4.10%    1.20%    0.25%
4     Miami            66.70%   38.62%   25.45%   13.92%
5     Providence       33.30%   13.94%    6.86%    2.60%
3     Niagara          52.42%   29.91%   12.59%    5.29%
6     Rhode Island     47.58%   26.02%   10.36%    4.12%
2     Penn State       58.05%   27.52%   10.62%    4.09%
7     George Mason     41.95%   16.55%    5.21%    1.63%

Alas and alack, playing at on-campus sites significantly decreases the odds for teams that will likely end up playing a lot on the road.

Here's what it looks like with home field advantage taken into account, including Miami playing at Providence and assuming the higher (better) seed hosts in all second and third round games:

Seed  Team           2nd Round Quarters New York  Finals
1     Auburn           88.76%   61.58%   38.76%   17.28%
8     UT-Martin        11.24%    1.46%    0.16%    0.03%
4     Tulsa            68.66%   25.89%   10.07%    4.21%
5     Northwestern     31.34%   11.08%    4.00%    1.55%
3     Baylor           52.95%   25.35%   12.50%    5.77%
6     Georgetown       47.05%   27.83%   13.97%    8.23%
2     Virginia Tech    76.85%   42.87%   19.63%    8.29%
7     Duquesne         23.15%    3.95%    0.91%    0.27%

1     San Diego St     89.70%   64.40%   48.36%   28.63%
8     Weber St         10.30%    1.15%    0.18%    0.04%
4     Kansas St        74.11%   27.00%   14.09%    7.73%
5     Illinois St      25.89%    7.45%    3.20%    1.44%
3     South Carolina   68.19%   28.72%   10.08%    4.48%
6     Davidson         31.81%   12.68%    2.88%    1.21%
2     Saint Mary's     52.28%   35.16%   12.60%    5.72%
7     Washington St    47.72%   23.44%    8.61%    5.11%

Seed  Team           2nd Round Quarters New York  Finals
1     Creighton        87.58%   52.47%   28.24%   12.67%
8     Bowling Green    12.42%    1.23%    0.10%    0.02%
4     Kentucky         73.56%   35.55%   13.21%    7.03%
5     UNLV             26.44%   10.75%    3.23%    1.44%
3     New Mexico       77.71%   35.44%   21.01%   12.18%
6     Nebraska         22.29%    7.35%    2.28%    1.00%
2     Notre Dame       67.69%   45.92%   27.17%   15.71%
7     UAB              32.31%   11.29%    4.76%    2.64%

1     Florida          89.22%   62.56%   47.87%   25.07%
8     Jacksonville     10.78%    1.39%    0.24%    0.05%
4     Miami            51.97%   22.24%   12.48%    6.82%
5     Providence       48.03%   13.81%    5.51%    2.06%
3     Niagara          67.38%   32.57%   12.53%    5.22%
6     Rhode Island     32.62%   15.16%    3.98%    1.57%
2     Penn State       72.78%   45.52%   16.10%    6.13%
7     George Mason     27.22%    6.75%    1.30%    0.40%

Methodological note: This latter calculation is made using the Pythagorean expectation formula, with an exponent of 11.739. That seemed to produce results very similar to log5, so it's more of an apples-to-apples comparison.


The great advantages of a home team are pretty clear here, as all of the higher seeds look much better. Creighton's chances of making it to New York essentially double, and they're not alone.

In fact, game location probably matters more in the NIT than it does in the NCAA, simply because the teams, except for the automatic qualifying dreck at the bottom of the bracket, are fairly evenly matched in quality.


Finally - not that you need a reminder - efficiency ratings are not destiny.

Gasaway on the Hoyas

John Gasaway of Basketball Prospectus had a short post on Georgetown Friday, "Georgetown's Internal Bleeding."

Some highlights, annotated:

The Hoyas have now played a third of their conference slate. There’s plenty of season left to be played, of course, but in order to make something of that season GU will have to improve dramatically on defense.

I'd love to have a snarky rebuttal, but this is true. I've updated the season's Performance Charts through the West Virginia game, and the Hoyas have been consistently underwhelming on defense since the UConn game. That's six games in a row where the Hoyas have allowed more points than expected, based on venue and KenPom's season stats to date.

A month ago I remarked somewhat raffishly that Georgetown appeared to be inventing a new category: “outstanding defense without rebounds.” Well guess what. Turns out you need rebounds after all. In a conference with Seton Hall, the Hoyas can at least take solace in the fact that they will always be spared the indignity of being “last in defensive rebounding,” but the truth is their defensive rebounding is terrible.

For the season as a whole, Georgetown's defensive rebounding has been miserable at 61.7%, ranked 318/344 - worst amongst the BCS conference schools. Within conference play, Georgetown (56.9%) is just a fuzz better than Seton Hall (56.4%) which is worst. The comparison to SHU is particularly appropriate since the teams have 5 common opponents so far this season (UConn, NDU, Cuse, Provy and WVU). The only difference is that the Pirates have played Villanova (OR = 36.3%; 69/344) while G'town played Pitt (43.6%; 2/344).

There’s a sense at large that Thompson will right this talented ship and, who knows, that sense may be proven correct. But as of this moment Georgetown has been merely the tenth-best team in Big East play on a per-possession basis. Unthinkable on December 29, but true.

Here's where Gasaway is being a bit disingenuous - Georgetown may be tenth in efficiency margin [= points scored per 100 possessions - points allowed per 100 possessions], but they have played the hardest conference schedule to date, based on KenPom's ratings.

To look at this further, I've compiled the strength of schedule for all Big East teams for conference games played so far (through Saturday, Jan 24th), and plotted eff. margin against strength of schedule. Here, I'm using KenPom's Pythagorean rating (0-1), rather than his ranking (1 to 344) for the strength of schedule calc.

The blue line is a linear fit to the data. There is clearly a trend here - the harder a team's conference schedule so far, the worse their efficiency margin. If the fitted line is to be trusted - and I don't have any way of knowing if it should, beyond the fact that it is statistically significant at 95% - it implies that there are 6 top-tier teams in the Big East, once you account for the quality of opposition. Georgetown is one of them, along with Louisville, Pitt, Marquette, UConn and West Virginia.

One thing I'm not adjusting for here is home vs. road in evaluating strength of schedule, mostly because I'm not clear what the best weighting factor would be. It should be noted that Georgetown has played 6 conference games so far this season, with only 2 on the road.

A few other comments from looking at this chart:

• Notre Dame is surprisingly (to me) below the line, implying that they are not a top-half team in the Big East.

• Providence and South Florida are quietly hanging around in the second tier of Big East teams. The Friars aren't a big shock, as they were a darling pick to make the leap this year due to their experience; the Bulls may be reaping the rewards of Gus Gilchrist's eligibility.

• The four worst teams are Rutgers, St. John's, DePaul and Cincinnati, in descending order. A few weeks ago, I had figured that Cincinnati was probably the 10th best team in the Big East, heading into conference play.

• Seton Hall, today's opponent for the Hoyas, has played the 2nd hardest conference schedule to date - i.e. they may not be as bad as their current conference record indicates.