Dayton Numbers RecapWritten by: noreply@blogger.com (Rob Lowe (aka Henry Sugar))Just wanted to break down the Dayton game a bit by numbers before we move on to Central Michigan and then the hated Badgers. After all, it is rivalry week.
No surprise, but Dayton won on almost every aspect of the
Four Factors. Even the one area where Marquette enjoyed an advantage was negligible. The numbers tell us that this game was lost on the defensive end. Marquette's offensive efficiency was definitely worse than their season average (1.15 points per possession), but it was the inability to stop Dayton defensively that was the real killer.
I'd like to look at two primary culprits, eFG% and TO Rate.
If Marquette averaged a defensive eFG% of 56.1%,
that would be #325 in the nation. If we averaged a defensive Turnover Rate of 14.6%, that would
be #340. From my own modeling efforts, both of those results ended up outside the expected 90% confidence interval.
eFG%
I calculated that Dayton should have gotten an eFG% somewhere between 23% and 55%, with a most likely view right around 42%. After all, Dayton's
season eFG% is 46.0.
TO Rate
TO Rate tells a similar story. Dayton coughs up the ball
20.2% of the time and Marquette forces a lot of turnovers (well, they usually do). Dayton should have had a turnover rate somewhere between 21% and 35%. For Dayton to protect the ball at 14.6% is another result outside the range of expectations.
So was it just one bad game, or was it a result of Marquette being exposed? It's way too early to tell, but if I was forced to make a judgement, I'd lean towards one bad game. If these teams played again, I'd be shocked if Dayton was in the top 5% of expected eFG% and Turnover Rate.
At least we'll get another opportunity to see how Marquette stacks up against a good team on Saturday. Plus, there's a game tomorrow! Let's move on.
http://marquettebasketball.blogspot.com/2008/12/dayton-numbers-recap.html
