CRACKED SIDEWALKS: Marquette 2nd Worst Turnover Differential of Big 6 Conferences
http://www.crackedsidewalks.com/2020/12/marquette-2nd-worst-turnover.html
Another great day shooting for Marquette led to a great start, but lopsided loss to Villanova. The one problem once again was turnovers. Yes, 7 of 16 free throws was a bad night, but on average a team hits 11 of 16 free throws so that only costs Marquette 4 points - less if they grab just one of the rebounds of those missed shots and score on the possession.
But turning the ball over 17 times while forcing only four turnovers is tough to overcome. Looking at national stats at www.kenpom.com a huge difference in turnovers (though not that big a discrepancy) was not completely unexpected. Villanova forces turnovers on 19.0 percent of opponents' possessions while only turning the ball over 11.6% of their trips - a +7.4 that ranks 15th in the nation in Turnover Advantage.
Unfortunately Marquette's 21.2 percent turnover ratio compared to turning opponents' over 14.8 percent of the time is a -6.4, the second worst difference of any team in the top six conferences. As you can see from the bottom of this table, only Georgetown is worst. The good news is that with one area being such a weak spot - and potentially somewhat explained by all the missed practice time, there is really only one problem that really needs to be fixed for this to be a very exciting team with a high ceiling. Here are the top 25 teams in Turnover Advantage, followed by the worst 10 teams among the top six conferences.
The table is located at http://www.crackedsidewalks.com/2020/12/marquette-2nd-worst-turnover.html
Thank you. Nice read. Interesting top ten list of the worst teams in this category. Many will make the tournament.
So we will be watching the sloppiest game ever in existence on Saturday? Historic!
I probably sound like a broken record, but the biggest thing for me this season is that MU hasn't had good enough guard play. We discuss several different things, but, for me it keeps coming back to this.