So are you saying UConn played mediocre or up their ability in barely beating St. Johns?
2025-2026 MBB computer projections thread
- Thread starter Sigmapolis
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So are you saying UConn played mediocre or up their ability in barely beating St. Johns?
I completely get where you're coming from, and inconsistency may be Iowa State's undoing. But one of my bigger pet peeves when it comes to sports analysis is that, generally speaking, very few games within the same season are comparable. Matchups are at least as significant as an opponent's metrics. For example, UCF and Baylor aren't terribly dissimilar in terms of what they do and don't do well, but one roster presented Iowa State with many more challenges. Teams and players also do different things well and different things poorly game to game, and even against the same opponent. As frustrating as this variance can be, it's the nature of college athletics (well, unless you're Arizona). I think we mostly have to stick to the statistical basics when trying to identify a team's weaknesses (and strengths), rather than "Boy, if they weren't great against Baylor how will they beat Houston?" Circumstances are sometimes discounted or overlooked.
Evan Miyakawa attempts to track consistency of performance via his Opponent Adjustment. Definitely check it out on the Team Ratings page of his website, but thus far, Iowa State has performed about as expected against above-average as well as below-average opponents. We can argue about whether we would prefer, say, overperformance against tough teams and underperformance against inferior teams. But being around the middle of Miyakawa's graphic isn't a bad thing to me
St Joe's played pretty well but not great (88 Torvik game score). While UConn played similarly (89 Torvik game score). UConn finished 14th according to Torvik that year and St Joe's finished 34th. It feels like UConn played down to the competition and given the closeness of that game got lucky to advance.
Note, the rest of their run they played almost flawlessly averaging nearly 98 game score. They absolutely exceeded their metrics. But it almost all didn't happen because they got a little lucky against St Joe's and we didn't have Niang.
Agree this is a fun team to watch when they are playing their best. But give me a win anyway you can get it from here on out
Cyclonepride
Thought Police
No team plays up to their ability in every game. Look at almost any national champion's resume and you'll see some narrow wins (or even losses) that shouldn't have happened on paper.
Uconn failed to cover the spread 7 games in a row lately, they definitely have not been meeting the computers expectations very often recently.
I was referring to 2014 (I think).
But UConn must be putting together dog**** performances. I guess.
I think it's a lost cause at this point to explain this.
To round this up: Anything less than great all the time, which is what we should be expecting from the couch or stands, is because the players chose to be mediocre.
We're really going to be getting a real test of this team's durability and who they really are these next few weeks...
6-2 (or better obviously) in the final 8 game stretch would be amazing. If all home games are wins and they lose at BYU and Arizona that's not bad all.
6-2 (or better obviously) in the final 8 game stretch would be amazing. If all home games are wins and they lose at BYU and Arizona that's not bad all.
Cyclonepride
Thought Police
I think I'd rather have late season games that the guys will be hyped to be in rather than playing out that string against middling teams. The good thing is that almost everyone has a brutal stretch late
I am assuming the conference intentionally backloaded the schedule for the best teams.
Here is Arizona.
Here is Kansas.
Kansas less-so than Arizona or Iowa State but still just a pile of big games for everybody.
Arizona is about to REALLY hit the gauntlet... Let's hope they're gassed out by the time our guys get there!
That away game against OSU for Kansas after they play us is sneaky tough. Potential home dog take gambling wise.
At least both are at home. Houston having to travel helps
Assuming the next week goes well...
Then...
Then...
I know we'll be favored those games but it seems crazy to win all of them.
If we're a #1 seed then we're beating good-but-inferior conference opponents on the road (TCU and Utah) and holding serve at home even against the strongest of competition (UH and KU).
It's the road games against the fellow monsters you gotta worry about...
A few things:
-based on Torvic game score, Arizona's performance last night was very close to their average on the year
-Kansas played well, but not nearly as well as they did against ISU at Phog Allen (part is certainly due to how poorly we played in that game, but also Kansas did a lot of thing better in their game against us, particularly shooting)
-there's no metrical reason to believe we can't play with both Kansas and Arizona if we play how we have against high major competition all year, with the exception of the one week in mid January
-there is not a team in the country that would have much chance to go 8-0 against either ISU's or Arizona's last 8 conference games, 7-1 would point to a team being a favorite to win a national title, and 6-2 would likely be around the average for any of the top 8 or so teams in the country
-based on Torvic game score, Arizona's performance last night was very close to their average on the year
-Kansas played well, but not nearly as well as they did against ISU at Phog Allen (part is certainly due to how poorly we played in that game, but also Kansas did a lot of thing better in their game against us, particularly shooting)
-there's no metrical reason to believe we can't play with both Kansas and Arizona if we play how we have against high major competition all year, with the exception of the one week in mid January
-there is not a team in the country that would have much chance to go 8-0 against either ISU's or Arizona's last 8 conference games, 7-1 would point to a team being a favorite to win a national title, and 6-2 would likely be around the average for any of the top 8 or so teams in the country
Got to protect home court. Fortunate 3 of the 5 difficult remaining games are at home. Find a way to win all three of those and steal a game at BYU or Arizona. Much easier said than done though
But they also need to win at TCU and Utah. Can't afford looking past those teams
