Dr. Green and White Sports Authority

I have always been a sucker when in comes to "bracketology."  In fact, for several years in a row I have gone through my own exercise of ranking the 68 teams and placing them into regions on the eve of Selection Sunday, the most holy day of the college sports calendar.  That said, I honestly don't see much value in bracketology starting in October or November, or frankly, even in February.  Far too much can change and we really only have enough data to evaluate teams until they have played 30 games or so. But, it isn't February any more.  It is now March.  So, it's time to starting taking a look at what the brackets might look like and how they might shake out. One thing that I have learned over the years is that when it comes to predicting the results of the NCAA tournament, the variance that we see (re: upsets) follows the same trends that we see in the regular season when it comes to point spreads.  In other words, by just looking at the point spread...

Unfreaking believable! Full disclosure:  I was on tape delay during family time, but I accidentally saw the half-time score.  Despite seeing that, I was still oddly optimistic that MSU could pull it out.  Then, I watched the game... WOW!  Coupled with the loss to Maryland, here is where I have things: Odds to win / share the B1G Title: 1. MSU = 73% 2. Maryland = 72% 3. Wisconsin = 45% 4. Illinois = 17% Both MSU and Maryland project to be about a 4-point favorite on Senior Day, so both teams have a roughly 65% chance to win.  My, have things changed over the past few days! As for the BTT, MSU has now locked in a double bye.  I just updated the tie-breakers and I can give good probabilities for seeding: 1-seed: 51% 2-seed: 32% 3-seed: 14% 4-seed: 3% If MSU beat OSU, the odds for the 1-seed go up to ~70%.   MSU basically now will win any 1-1 tie-breaker with Maryland, as MSU has an equal or better record a...

For those that having been paying attention, the results of Saturday night's game in College Park should have come as no surprise.  For weeks, the metrics have been telling us that MSU was still a pretty good team.  Those same metrics have been telling us that Maryland had honestly been pretty lucky and perhaps was due for a step back. As we looked at MSU's roster, there was no obvious problem.  MSU had one of the best, if not the best point guard / big man combination in the country.  Each of the wings had shown sustained flashes of very strong play, and even the members of maligned power forward group had shown promise at times.  Also, there is that guy at the end of the bench that always seems to get teams to hit their peak at the right time.  All the ingredient were there.  The team had looked dominant in early January, but the dog days of the Big Ten schedule were long and hard. I must admit that even I lost faith a bit, but I never lost hope....

As we look at the calendar, it tells us clearly that March is just around the corner.   When it comes to the Big Ten regular season race, the end is near.   Time is running out, and the final picture for this phase of the season is coming into focus.   For MSU, they got a desperately needed win over Iowa on Tuesday night.   Moreover, they proved that they actually could come from behind and execute winning plays against a good team in winning time.   We knew that they had it in them (as many of the same guys did it last year, several times) and the stats were telling us that they could do it, but it is quite another thing to actually do it.  They finally did it. This team still has a way to go and not a lot of time left to get there.   But, Tuesday night was progress.   Beating Iowa was huge, both from a confidence standpoint, but also from a Quad 1 win and Big Ten Tournament tiebreaker standpoint.   It also means that MSU is still ...

(Note: I meant to post this Monday afternoon, but I was a bit delayed in getting it out.  As a result, Illinois completely expected win over Nebraska on Monday night is not reflected in the data below.  But, it doesn't change the overall story.) Did everyone has a nice weekend? I did. As much as I love college basketball and MSU basketball in particular, sometimes it is nice to have a little break. It was nice not to have to worry about what time the game was on, whether or not I was going to be able to rearrange family activities to catch it live, or if I would just catch it on "tape delay."  If nothing else, I didn't have to worry about what a potential loss might do to MSU's record or NCAA Tournament seed.  It was nice. As it turns out, sometimes the best thing that you can do is sit on the couch and watch.  Because, as MSU was chilling out at home, both Penn State and Maryland posted "Ls" and MSU's faint hope for a Big Ten title get a little ...

For MSU basketball, the odds of a Big Ten regular season title are now vanishingly small (about 7%), but that doesn't mean the season is over.  While the last few weeks have certainly been disappointing, MSU still has the potential to make this a season to remember.  What happens in February stays in February.  But, college basketball legends are made in March, and March is just around the corner. So, the question now is what can we realistically expect out of the Spartans in March?  While no one has a crystal ball to predict the future, it is possible to look back at historical data to see what attributes are necessary to build a championship team.  While the number of variables that we could analyze are virtually endless, there are certain key stats that seem to be more important than other. I am personally a huge proponent of efficiency values.  For my money, Kenpom adjusted efficiency values (offensive, defensive, and margins) are the golden standar...

As February starts to draw to a close, the race for the Big Ten title is starting to come into full focus.  MSU had a fairly easy test this week in Lincoln, and fortunately they passed.  While there certainly were some encouraging signs (rebounding! Gabe Brown! Henry! Arhens!) there were also still some concerns (turn-overs? Bingham? and... Cassius still doesn't quite seem to be himself.)  At the end of the day, it was a pretty big win for MSU against a very bad team.  All I can say is that big wins are better than close wins, and close wins are better than loses.  I will take it. As for the Big Ten race, here is the updated win matrix for all 14 teams, once again derived from Kenpom efficiency data As expected, Maryland appears to be pulling away in the final lap.  Following Penn State's surprising loss at home to Illinois this week, the Terps now have almost a 2-game lead in expected wins over the Nittany Lions.  After that, the battl...