Butler-Duke Four Factors

I updated the Opponent-adjusted Four Factors spreadsheet to include last night’s games.  The actual team values didn’t change much, so no point in showing those again, but here are the predictions for Monday’s championship game:



I don’t think any of these should be a surprise to people who have been paying attention.  Duke’s offensive clinic against West Virginia was impressive, but a lot of that was due to them making a higher-then-expected percentage of their jumpers.  Obviously, if they’re on fire again Monday, it’ll be a blowout.  But a more likely scenario is a game that looks a lot like Butler-Michigan State, except with Duke turning the ball over less than Michigan State.  I expect Duke will win without the need for any last minute heroics, mostly by outshooting (and possible outrebounding) Butler.

[EDIT: I took a page from the basketball distribution, and used linear regression to map single game Four Factors values onto efficiency margin.  The numbers above work out to an 11.1 efficiency margin.  Adjusting for the 62-possession pace predicted by Pomeroy, that's a point margin of 6.9.  Obviously in Duke's favor.]