UofL's shooting confidence
How do the Cards respond after making or missing shots? The data shows they respond pretty well.
i can’t even imagine the mental focus it takes to be a Division 1 basketball player. Every possession of every game you need to try to be at your best, regardless of the circumstances around you. Playing the #1 team in the country? Gotta step it up. Just missed 3 shots in a row? Forget about it. Crowd cheering your name? Don’t get carried away.
Playing for a team that is 2-19 despite carrying the banner of the fabled Louisville program has to be an incredible challenge in this regard. How do you maintain confidence when the odds overwhelmingly suggest that your team is going to lose by double digits? How do you bounce back repeatedly when the shots won’t fall?
I don’t have any of the answers to this, but I do have some interesting data. One thing I track is how often a player shoots and scores in the 5 possessions following an event. An “event” can be a missed shot, a made shot, even a turnover or a committed foul. I like to look at this data about 2/3 of the way through a season when there’s a decent sample size and the results can indicate how players and teams respond to success and adversity at the micro level.
Here’s how Louisville looks as a team this season:
If a UofL player makes a 2 pointer, they average 0.7 shots taken in the following 5 possessions. They have an effective FG% of just over 45% on these shots.
This data can be interpreted in some interesting ways. Louisville players are more likely to shoot if they’ve just made a shot, but they don’t score as effectvely. This indicates UofL players tend to force some lower quality shots as a “heat check”. After other negative events (turnovers or fouls), Cardinals are also less likely to shoot. Interestingly, after turnovers Louisville players tend to be efficient when they do shoot..this indicates that they are able to refocus and get quality shots.
For premium subscribers below, I’ll dive into these stats for some individual Cardinals to see how each ones handles adversity and success.
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