Santa Clara

[freethrow]

This team could give us more than we may think. This is a very experienced team with 6 seniors and 3 juniors. They play a ton of people too with 9 players averaging double digit minutes. They have no one man to key on because of very balanced scoring. The top two scorers are seniors averaging 11.3 and 10.0 points with 4 others averaging 7 or more points a game. The biggest game of note on their schedule was an 8 point loss to #20 Nevada. Our guy's can't take this team lightly and go into the game without the focus any major team requires or they could shock us. And the players can't, of course, be looking ahead to the UMASS game. With so much going on at this time of year with the holidays and just beating our major rival etc it could easily happen.

[Will Lavender]

Santa Clara beat Stanford last night 62-46.

That was only Stanford's second loss (the other was to Air Force by 30).

Stanford beat Texas Tech by 11, and Texas Tech blasted Arkansas yesterday.

This isn't going to be an easy game at all. I'd be surprised if the Cats won by double digits.

Ken Pomeroy adjusts Santa Clara's offensive efficiency to 121, and their defensive efficiency to 41.

Kentucky's offensive efficiency is 77, and our defensive efficiency is 37.

That's pretty close. :shock:

www.kenpom.com

[DCWildcat]

Will Lavender wrote: Santa Clara beat Stanford last night 62-46.

That was only Stanford's second loss (the other was to Air Force by 30).

Stanford beat Texas Tech by 11, and Texas Tech blasted Arkansas yesterday.

This isn't going to be an easy game at all. I'd be surprised if the Cats won by double digits.

Ken Pomeroy adjusts Santa Clara's offensive efficiency to 121, and their defensive efficiency to 41.

Kentucky's offensive efficiency is 77, and our defensive efficiency is 37.

That's pretty close. :shock:

http://www.kenpom.com

Lord, you scared me for a second there. I didn't realize you were putting out the ranks, not the numbers :D I mean, our defense is good, but not "allowing only 20 ppg" good.

[Will Lavender]

DCWildcat wrote: Will Lavender wrote: Santa Clara beat Stanford last night 62-46.

That was only Stanford's second loss (the other was to Air Force by 30).

Stanford beat Texas Tech by 11, and Texas Tech blasted Arkansas yesterday.

This isn't going to be an easy game at all. I'd be surprised if the Cats won by double digits.

Ken Pomeroy adjusts Santa Clara's offensive efficiency to 121, and their defensive efficiency to 41.

Kentucky's offensive efficiency is 77, and our defensive efficiency is 37.

That's pretty close. :shock:

http://www.kenpom.com

Lord, you scared me for a second there. I didn't realize you were putting out the ranks, not the numbers :D I mean, our defense is good, but not "allowing only 20 ppg" good.

It's trending that way.

Of course, we'd score 33 per. :nada:

Should have put the ths on there.

Kentucky's offensive efficiency is 77th (adjusted), and our defensive efficiency is 37th (adjusted).

Those numbers still don't mean much, but we're getting to the point where you can pull a little bit from them. You're not going anywhere unless you're in the top 50 offensively, but still it's good to see that defense in the top 50. Of the Final Four teams last season, LSU had the worst adjusted offensive efficiency, and they were 50th.

George Mason had the worst defensive efficiency, and they were 18th. :shock:

Shows you can win with an average offense, but you have to have a killer D.

[Will Lavender]

Some more Pomeroy numbers:

In 2005, Pomeroy adjusts our defensive efficiency to 5th, and our offensive efficiency to 25th. :shock:

In '04, our defensive efficiency was 12th and our offensive efficiency was 19th. Double :shock::shock:

I don't know how all this ended up on a thread about Santa Clara.

[DCWildcat]

The scary thing is to see how much better we'd be on all fronts if we could just force some freaking turnovers

We're lagging at 308th in forced turnovers. Compare the rest of our defensive statistics to '04

2007:
class="x"Raw Efficiency : 100.6 (159) (http://www.kenpom.com/stats.php?s=7) 92.2 ( 63) (http://www.kenpom.com/stats.php?s=11)
class="x"Adj Efficiency : 108.1 ( 77) (http://www.kenpom.com/stats.php?s=8) 87.2 ( 37) (http://www.kenpom.com/stats.php?s=12)

class="x"Effective FG% : 52.6 ( 93) (http://www.kenpom.com/factors.php?t=o&s=3) 42.3 ( 18) (http://www.kenpom.com/factors.php?t=d&s=3)
class="x"Turnover Pct. : 23.2 (197) (http://www.kenpom.com/factors.php?t=o&s=5) 19.0 (308) (http://www.kenpom.com/factors.php?t=d&s=5)
class="x"Off. Rebound% : 32.0 (223) (http://www.kenpom.com/factors.php?t=o&s=7) 33.4 (166) (http://www.kenpom.com/factors.php?t=d&s=7)
class="x"Free Throw Rate: 24.3 (171) (http://www.kenpom.com/factors.php?t=o&s=9) 24.3 ( 17) (http://www.kenpom.com/factors.php?t=d&s=9)

class="x"3-Point FG% : 34.7 (161) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=FG3Pct) 28.1 ( 21) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=OppFG3Pct)
class="x"2-Point FG% : 52.9 ( 59) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=FG2Pct) 42.5 ( 35) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=OppFG2Pct)
class="x"Free Throw Pct.: 68.1 (171) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=FTPct) 66.2 (106) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=OppFTPct)
class="x"Block Pct. : 7.3 ( 85) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=OppBlockPct) 15.6 ( 22) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=BlockPct)
class="x"Steal Pct. : 10.0 (158) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=OppStlRate) 8.3 (271) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=StlRate)

class="x"3PA/FGA : 31.8 (208) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=FG3Rate) 34.9 (198) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=OppFG3Rate)
class="x"A/FGM : 59.9 ( 86) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=ARate) 53.2 (113) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=OppARate)


2004:
class="x"Raw Efficiency : 107.8 ( 47) (http://www.kenpom.com/stats.php?s=7&y=2004) 93.0 ( 19) (http://www.kenpom.com/stats.php?s=11&y=2004)
class="x"Adj Efficiency : 115.6 ( 19) (http://www.kenpom.com/stats.php?s=8&y=2004) 87.7 ( 12) (http://www.kenpom.com/stats.php?s=12&y=2004)

class="x"Effective FG% : 52.8 ( 32) (http://www.kenpom.com/factors.php?t=o&s=3&y=2004) 46.1 ( 35) (http://www.kenpom.com/factors.php?t=d&s=3&y=2004)
class="x"Turnover Pct. : 21.2 (152) (http://www.kenpom.com/factors.php?t=o&s=5&y=2004) 22.9 ( 71) (http://www.kenpom.com/factors.php?t=d&s=5&y=2004)
class="x"Off. Rebound% : 36.0 ( 50) (http://www.kenpom.com/factors.php?t=o&s=7&y=2004) 29.0 ( 53) (http://www.kenpom.com/factors.php?t=d&s=7&y=2004)
class="x"Free Throw Rate: 23.9 (220) (http://www.kenpom.com/factors.php?t=o&s=9&y=2004) 33.8 ( 94) (http://www.kenpom.com/factors.php?t=d&s=9&y=2004)

class="x"3-Point FG% : 35.5 (105) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=FG3Pct&y=2004) 32.8 ( 89) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=OppFG3Pct&y=2004)
class="x"2-Point FG% : 52.6 ( 22) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=FG2Pct&y=2004) 44.4 ( 31) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=OppFG2Pct&y=2004)
class="x"Free Throw Pct.: 69.7 (141) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=FTPct&y=2004) 71.9 (296) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=OppFTPct&y=2004)
class="x"Block Pct. : 8.8 (195) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=OppBlockPct&y=2004) 8.7 (135) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=BlockPct&y=2004)
class="x"Steal Pct. : 10.4 (175) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=OppStlRate&y=2004) 11.3 ( 78) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=StlRate&y=2004)

class="x"3PA/FGA : 31.4 (199) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=FG3Rate&y=2004) 35.6 (260) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=OppFG3Rate&y=2004)
class="x"A/FGM : 58.5 (106) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=ARate&y=2004) 50.7 ( 49) (http://www.kenpom.com/tmleaders.php?c=OppARate&y=2004)

Notice that we're actually better on the important ones--eFG% is of course
the most important, and within that we're defending better both from 2 and
from 3. We allow more offensive rebounds, but that's essentially nullified
by not letting our opponents get to the line as much. We block a lot more
shots, but we're killed on the steals (part of the turnover bit).

It's pretty clear that the only thing separating our defense from being that
good again is forcing turnovers. And there are lots of other nice benefits
to doing that as well: the tempo everyone is so in love with tends to go up,
and offensive efficiency along with it (since steals tend to lead to high
percentage fast break opportunities).

I honestly think we're a top 15 team if we can be just average at forcing
turnovers, and top 10 if we excel in it.

[DCWildcat]

Oh dear god, that looked a lot better when I was actually writing it out.

But I'm too lazy to type it all out. Look at it for yourself here: 2007- http://www.kenpom.com/sr.php?team=Kentucky
2004- http://www.kenpom.com/sr.php?team=Kentucky&y=2004

[audacious1]

UK should never look past any opponent, of course, but truly Santa Clara isn't a nobody. They've got a pretty good team that has a solid chance of making the NCAA. We need to be prepared and focused.