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Early Season Lineup Productivity

pittchagg

Athletic Director
Gold Member
Mar 30, 2017
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This is inspired by the Morning Pitt this morning. I subscribe to a site called cbbanalytics.com, which gives you full access to one team (Pitt) with a free membership. One of the most interesting tools on the site is the lineup tool, which tracks the statistics for each individual group of five players that a team uses.

It’s a small sample size with three games and 120 total minutes played, but I think it’s interesting. Here are the four highest usage lineups we have used this year, with their ORTG and DRTG.

1. Lowe, Leggett, Dunn, Guillermo, Corhen (31 minutes) - 119.2 ORTG, 83.8 DRTG (+35.4)

2. Lowe, Leggett, Dunn, Austin, Corhen (14 minutes) - 142.8 ORTG, 48.9 DRTG (+93.8)

3. Lowe, Leggett, Cummings, Austin, Guillermo (9 minutes) - 170 ORTG, 68 DRTG (+102)

4. Leggett, Dunn, Austin, Guillermo, Corhen (8 minutes) - 91.5 ORTG, 77.5 DRTG (+14.1)

A few takeaways:

1. The lineups that have Guillermo and Corhen on the court are not as productive as the lineups that only have one of them on the court. This is true both offensively and defensively.

2. The Lowe, Leggett, Dunn, Austin, Corhen lineup is obnoxiously efficient on both ends of the floor. That’s probably because the group of Leggett, Dunn and Austin has been a 97th percentile trio in college basketball this season (just those three in isolation are 132.8/77.8/+55.1). It’s still early, but I think that will end up being their best lineup this season.

3. Ish Leggett’s numbers have been absurd, and he is operating on a first team all-ACC level early in the season. He is 13/13 in attempts at the rim, his EFG% is 76.6% (94th percentile), he’s taken our toughest defensive assignments (and is in the 100th percentile for defensive win shares) and his advanced stats are pretty much in the very high 90 percentiles across the board. He is on pace to have a special, special year.

4. Zack Austin has also been a stupid good defender. His Hakeem Percentage (the total of a player’s steal rate and block rate) is 16.2%, good for 97th percentile. His block percentage alone is one of the best in college basketball. If he can provide enough offense to stay on the floor, he is a special defender, and is operating at an ACC all-defensive team level right now, if not ACCDPOY.

Just some thoughts as I play around with the lineup tools. Again, it’s a really small sample size and trying to draw too much from lineup data with under 10 total minutes played is going to be pretty faulty. But I think it’s an interesting look - partially because I think it tends to align with the eye test that a lot of us have been talking about.
 
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