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Through games of March 2, conference games only
Pace: possessions per 40 minutes
PPP: points per possession
Opp. PPP: opponent points per possession
EM: efficiency margin (PPP - Opp. PPP)
Missouri Valley: The Numbers Are In
Opp.
Pace PPP PPP EM
1. Drake 61.5 1.14 1.03 +0.11
2. Illinois St. 61.6 1.06 0.99 +0.07
3. S. Illinois 61.1 1.02 0.96 +0.06
4. Creighton 63.9 1.04 1.02 +0.02
5. Missouri St. 64.6 1.04 1.03 +0.01
6. Bradley 67.3 1.06 1.05 +0.01
7. N. Iowa 60.3 1.02 1.04 -0.02
8. Indiana St. 63.4 1.02 1.05 -0.03
9. Wichita St. 60.5 0.99 1.07 -0.08
10. Evansville 64.5 0.92 1.06 -0.14
Clip and save this little table for your brackets. The Valley has already concluded its regular season, so these are the final tempo-free stats for one of those wonderfully Euclidean conferences in which every team plays every other team home and away. That means the results listed here give us the most accurate read we have on the true relative quality of these teams. Drake is best, obviously, but not nearly as dominant as a 15-3 conference record would seem to suggest.
ACC: Clemson Has a PR Deficiency
Opp.
Pace PPP PPP EM
1. North Carolina 75.0 1.13 0.98 +0.15
2. Duke 75.7 1.12 0.99 +0.13
3. Clemson 68.9 1.08 1.00 +0.08
4. Maryland 72.6 1.04 1.03 +0.01
5. Georgia Tech 72.4 1.04 1.05 -0.01
6. Virginia Tech 72.6 0.96 0.99 -0.03
7. Miami 69.8 1.06 1.09 -0.03
8. Wake Forest 72.8 1.01 1.04 -0.03
9. Florida St. 67.7 0.99 1.04 -0.05
10. BC 69.2 1.05 1.10 -0.05
11. Virginia 69.6 1.02 1.08 -0.06
12. NC State 67.6 1.00 1.14 -0.14
In terms of performance, Clemson is closer to Duke than they are to Maryland, whom they defeated by three in College Park last night. James Mays and Trevor Booker crash the offensive glass while Cliff Hammonds and K.C. Rivers harass opponents into turnovers and missed threes. If the Tigers do end up being a seven-seed, as they're projected to be in the brackets I'm seeing, I could envision them giving some unlucky two-seed a very tough game the first weekend.
Big 12: What's the Matter with Kansas?
Opp.
Pace PPP PPP EM
1. Kansas 69.2 1.14 0.94 +0.20
2. Kansas St. 70.3 1.11 1.01 +0.10
3. Texas 65.6 1.10 1.01 +0.09
4. Baylor 72.5 1.09 1.07 +0.02
5. Texas A&M 63.3 1.02 1.01 +0.01
6. Oklahoma St. 64.9 1.03 1.03 0.00
7. Texas Tech 69.8 1.00 1.05 -0.05
8. Oklahoma 63.7 0.99 1.04 -0.05
9. Nebraska 64.5 0.97 1.03 -0.06
10. Missouri 70.4 1.04 1.10 -0.06
11. Iowa St. 67.4 0.91 1.01 -0.10
12. Colorado 60.9 0.98 1.10 -0.12
I've had some nice things to say the past couple weeks about Texas as a team and about Rick Barnes as a coach, but I have to admit I was kind of glad they lost at Texas Tech. The Longhorns were being crowned as a presumptive one-seed way too fast for my tastes. After all, even within the cozy confines of the Big 12 there's another team whose performance has been head and shoulders above that of the 'Horns. Why that other Big 12 team gets relatively little attention, I can't say. Yes, that other team lost by one at Oklahoma State. Hey, last year Florida lost by ten at LSU, for goodness sake. What's the big deal?
Big East: Louisville is (Still) Clearly the Best
Opp.
Pace PPP PPP EM
1. Louisville 67.5 1.07 0.91 +0.16
2. Georgetown 62.9 1.04 0.93 +0.11
3. Marquette 68.9 1.07 0.97 +0.10
4. West Virginia 64.3 1.07 1.00 +0.07
5. Connecticut 67.2 1.10 1.03 +0.07
6. Notre Dame 73.4 1.11 1.06 +0.05
7. Pitt 64.0 1.08 1.04 +0.04
8. Syracuse 69.9 1.02 1.03 -0.01
9. Cincinnati 64.3 1.00 1.01 -0.01
10. Villanova 68.6 1.00 1.02 -0.02
11. Seton Hall 69.0 1.04 1.10 -0.06
12. Providence 66.9 1.03 1.09 -0.06
13. DePaul 67.1 1.04 1.12 -0.08
14. S. Florida 63.3 1.00 1.10 -0.10
15. St. John's 65.2 0.89 1.01 -0.12
16. Rutgers 66.1 0.88 1.06 -0.18
For all its quality and sprawl, the Big East this season has been surprisingly orderly by my tempo-free lights. The best team is clearly Louisville. The second-best team is likely Georgetown, although Marquette is right there with the Hoyas. (That would have been made plain on Saturday if not for the second catastrophic play of the year to be visited upon a Georgetown opponent in the closing seconds. Both plays resulted in Jonathan Wallace free throws.) After that comes a three-team knot: take your pick among Connecticut, West Virginia, and Notre Dame. Lastly there's ever-more-healthy Pitt and, as far as I'm concerned, here's where you pull up the drawbridge.
Big Ten: Nice Explosion, Michigan State. Now: Win on the Road.
Opp.
Pace PPP PPP EM
1. Wisconsin 60.4 1.07 0.92 +0.15
2. Purdue 64.1 1.06 0.93 +0.13
3. Michigan St. 63.7 1.07 0.97 +0.10
4. Indiana 65.1 1.09 1.02 +0.07
5. Ohio St. 63.7 1.01 0.95 +0.06
6. Minnesota 65.7 1.02 1.02 0.00
7. Illinois 62.3 0.99 0.99 0.00
8. Michigan 64.0 0.97 1.04 -0.07
9. Iowa 59.3 0.92 1.01 -0.09
10. Penn St. 62.3 0.99 1.12 -0.14
11. Northwestern 61.6 0.94 1.17 -0.23
If you tuned in to CBS yesterday at 2 p.m. Eastern, you saw a combustible mix of unconscious shooting by the Spartans and weirdly comatose defense by the Hoosiers in East Lansing. When the smoke had cleared, Tom Izzo's team had scored 103 points in just 70 possessions. That's nice, but then again MSU has been weirdly comatose themselves (2-5) on the road in the Big Ten. Now they'll close the year with games at Illinois and Ohio State, two teams who, as seen here, are both better than commonly realized. It's as if it were meant to be. The Spartans have copped their Senior Day buzz. Now, can they carry it with them on the road against the fifth- and seventh-best teams in the conference?
Pac-10: The Truth about Oregon
Opp.
Pace PPP PPP EM
1. UCLA 64.7 1.13 0.95 +0.18
2. Stanford 62.7 1.07 0.96 +0.11
3. Washington St. 58.3 1.09 1.01 +0.08
4. USC 64.6 1.05 1.01 +0.04
5. Arizona 63.0 1.08 1.08 0.00
6. Oregon 64.1 1.10 1.11 -0.01
7. Washington 68.2 1.01 1.03 -0.02
8. Arizona St. 62.6 0.99 1.02 -0.03
9. Cal 67.3 1.08 1.14 -0.06
10. Oregon St. 65.9 0.88 1.17 -0.29
When I read articles that speculate on Ernie Kent's future in Eugene and that lay the Ducks' struggles at the feet of youthful point guards or poor three-point shooting, I slap my forehead. Such articles do not contain the word "defense." Let me be clear: given that Oregon has one of the best offenses in the nation, if they had merely a Pac-10-average defense this season, they'd be at worst a five-seed. Instead they'll likely go to the NIT. All for lack of defense--more specifically, a total lack of turnovers by opponents.
SEC: Mississippi State Has an Opportunity
Opp.
Pace PPP PPP EM
1. Tennessee 71.6 1.10 0.97 +0.13
2. Mississippi St. 66.9 1.05 0.95 +0.10
3. Arkansas 69.0 1.03 0.98 +0.05
4. Vanderbilt 68.0 1.06 1.03 +0.03
5. Florida 68.8 1.09 1.07 +0.02
6. Kentucky 63.5 1.00 1.01 -0.01
7. Alabama 69.3 1.03 1.06 -0.03
8. Ole Miss 69.9 1.05 1.09 -0.04
9. South Carolina 64.4 1.03 1.09 -0.06
10. Georgia 67.3 0.97 1.03 -0.06
11. LSU 66.4 0.98 1.05 -0.07
12. Auburn 68.2 1.07 1.15 -0.08
The Bulldogs would appear to be the second-best team in the SEC and, as such, they clearly should be ranked. The good news is that Rick Stansbury's team has a chance to prove both assertions beyond a shadow of a doubt when they play at Vanderbilt Wednesday night.
John Gasaway is an author of Basketball Prospectus.
You can contact John by clicking here or click here to see John's other articles.
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