Bring On The Cats, a Kansas State Wildcats community

Nice praise from Ken Pomeroy who dispels many of the comments folks will make about the Zags performance last night and how they are an unworthy one seed.

In this intriguing statistical analysis with a K-State connection, Jordan Spencer takes a look at the impact a coaching change can have on a basketball team's "four factors," with examples.

The Buckeyes have the best odds of any team to win the NCAA Tournament at 21.6%.

According to Ken Pomeroy's system, Ohio State is the overwhelming favorite to win the Big Ten Tournament. The Buckeyes have a 91.8% of reaching the semifinals, a 76.9% of reaching the final game, and a 54.5% of winning the tournament.

That's the headline of a post from Ken Pomeroy at Basketball Prospectus. Here's a snippet: Now, Minnesota is probably not a worse team with Al Nolen on the floor. But whatever boost he brings is easily overwhelmed by the variability in the performance of his teammates over the course of six games, which indicates that Nolen’s influence is that of a role player more than a star. Basically, if Minnesota is going to finish in the top four of the Big Ten, it’s either going to take some luck in close games, or substantial improvement from the team as a whole.

Hey, apparently we're not alone in struggling offensively during the first few minutes of games. Using play-by-play data from a large sample of games, Mr. Pomeroy finds that there's an odd lack of offensive aggressiveness and shooting efficiency in the first couple minutes of college basketball games. He doesn't provide any data on turnover rates in the opening minutes of games, though, so we can continue to assume that that maddening statistical characteristic is unique to our beloved Spartans.

Ken Pomeroy has put up his new scouting reports. His formulae predict Wazzu to go 21-9 in the regular season, including winning our next 9 games! I would certainly take that. We're currently rated 2nd in the Pac 10. So in all our doom and gloom about missing out on key non-con wins, at least statistically we are in a good position in-conference.