The Real ACC SOS – State’s The Toughest

Since the ACC plays an unbalanced conference schedule, it should be obvious that some teams will play a harder conference schedule than others.

Last year, we developed an analysis technique to which Atlantic Coast Conference squads played the toughest and the easiest conference schedules. This year, both Coach K and the N&O have already chimed in with their thoughts.

So, let’s see if we can do a little more thorough job than they did. 🙂

NEW TECHNIQUE

Last year, I totalled conference wins by each team’s opponents and then ranked the various team’s schedules. The “total wins” technique has one obvious flaw which was discussed in the comments to last year’s entry: The teams at the bottom of the conference “contribute” a lot of wins to everyone…thus inflating their conference SOS.

This flaw is relatively minor as long as you don’t try to compare the SOS of the regular season champion with the teams at the bottom of the conference. However, I did say last year that there was always the possibility of coming up with a new technique.

This year’s technique is not really new, it’s always been used in the RPI formula. When calculating a given team’s SOS for the RPI calculation, the opponents’ winning percentages do not include the games against that given team. We can use that same principle and look at the opponents’ adjusted wins (now that I’ve figured out how to do it in a spreadsheet and not completely by hand.)

Here’s an illustration of the new technique using NC State and the two VA teams:

Excerpt from NC State’s
Opponents’ Win Totals
	Total	Adjusted
	Wins	Wins
Virginia	11	9
Virginia	11	9
Virginia Tech	10	10
Virginia Tech	10	10

State played both Virginia teams twice, thus the Wahoos’ and Hokies’ conference win totals are used twice when calculating State’s SOS. In last year’s system, the two VA teams would contribute 42 wins towards State’s SOS. Using adjusted wins, State’s two losses to UVA are not included when calculating State’s SOS.

If I’ve confused anyone, either ask questions in the comments or just trust me.

RESULTS

So without further ado…here are the results for 2007:

	Opponents’
	Adjusted
	Wins
North Carolina St.	122
Duke	121
Clemson	117
Virginia Tech	117
Maryland	115
Georgia Tech	114
Miami FL	114
Wake Forest	113
Boston College	112
Florida St.	112
North Carolina	112
Virginia	111

Disclaimer – The total wins analysis had a built-in self checking technique, but this one doesn’t. So, there is always the chance that I’ve fat-fingered something. If you find a problem then please let me know in the comments.

OBSERVATIONS

* Several weeks ago, I said that the team that finished highest in the conference among UVA, VT, and BC should win ACC Coach of the Year. But after seeing the conference SOS results, I would now vote for Seth Greenburg of Virginia Tech.

* Coach K was a little off on his projections. I’m not sure why he was even bringing up the conference SOS issue. He certainly can’t be feeling any heat in Durham….do you think he’s embarrassed by his team’s results this year?

* The N&O said that Duke couldn’t have the toughest schedule because they can’t play Duke. This year’s results don’t support the assertion that playing Duke significantly contributes to anyone’s SOS. 🙂

A CLOSER LOOK AT STATE

– There are five teams that earned double-digit conference wins this year. State played nine games out of a MAXIMUM of ten potential games against these five teams.

– State only had six games against the other five teams at the bottom of the conference.

– State’s three road-only opponents this year were GT, FSU, and Miami. These three teams won a combined 19 conference games but 15 of those wins were at home. This type of “bad luck” can be obvious when you look for it, but is nearly impossible to quantify.

– Bottom line – State’s conference schedule was clearly the toughest in the conference and nearly as hard as theoretically possible.

From my perspective, I would rather for State to have the toughest schedule when their post-season hopes were minimal than during a bubble year. It would really be tough for your conference schedule to play a major role in going to the NIT. If you look at last year’s results, it would be easy to make the argument that UMD might have made the NCAA Tournament with an easier conference schedule.

CONCLUSIONS

We have to be really careful about the conclusions drawn from the conference SOS. The HSSS used to try and wave their hands to make losses disappear. I ridiculed those attempts in the past and will not hesitate to do so in the future.

That does not mean that this type of analysis is meaningless. I’ve already mentioned one potential use for these results in analyzing coaches – Seth Greenburg and VT both deserve major props for outstanding results against a difficult schedule. If you go back to last year’s entry…I said the same thing about Roy Williams and UNC-CH then. Tough schedules reveal good teams; and VT has earned the title of a good team this year.

– Several VT grads that I work with have pointed out that they would have won the regular season title if it weren’t for NC State. It makes me chuckle when they say that they hope that someone else can beat State on Thursday.

– It’s always difficult to evaluate a coach when circumstances beyond his control leave him with a depleted team. However, it’s hard to imagine any coach doing substantially better than Sidney Lowe has done this year. When you throw in State’s recruiting class for next year (and the one after that); it shouldn’t be hard to see why most fans are extremely optimistic about the future.

– One word of caution, coaches should be evaluated for winning more than expected; not losing less than expected. If you’re confused about the difference then look up Pete Gillen’s record and see when he was given a 10-year contract extension.

– With one of the easiest conference schedules, Florida State has still managed to lose enough games to land squarely on the NCAAT bubble. Where would they be if they had played a tougher conference schedule? (Don’t forget that FSU had a three-game losing streak BEFORE they lost anyone to injuries.)

– Before anyone accuses me of needless Seminole bashing then realize that FSU has managed to stay on the bubble through two different losing streaks because they substantially upgraded their OOC schedule versus last year’s. I suspect that this year’s ACCT is essentially the NCAAT play-in game for FSU.

RUNNING TOTAL

Since I used last year’s results to work out the spreadsheet formulas for adjusted wins, I might as well post the results from both years of unbalanced schedules with 12 ACC teams.

CONFERENCE SOS
2006		2007
UM	123	NCSU	122
UNC	123	Duke	121
VT	120	CU	117
UMD	119	VT	117
WF	119	UMD	115
FSU	115	GT	114
Duke	114	UM	114
UVA	114	WF	113
GT	112	BC	112
NCSU	112	FSU	112
BC	106	UNC	112
CU	103	UVA	111

I find it interesting that the spread from easiest to hardest is much closer this year than last year. I attribute the difference to the fact that the top of the ACC is both deeper and bunched closer together this year. Because of this, I’m resisting the temptation to total the adjusted wins for each team.

It’s also interesting to see that Virginia Tech had one of the toughest schedules both years while Boston College had one of the easiest. This would be the perfect place to insert something witty about ACC expansion. but nothing comes to mind. I’m sure that our readers can come up with something for me.