As always, you can argue whether splits are meaningful, but the stats are the stats. Here are how various teams have performed with and without key players. I list the points scored on offense and allowed on defense per 100 possessions adjusting for opponent quality. Adjusting for opponent quality is critical given the uneven schedules this time of year. Because I adjust for opponent quality, I throw out games against non-D1 opponents.

Team

Adj Off

Adj Def

W

L

Pyth.

Baylor (without Jones)

105.3

88.2

5

0

0.8596

Baylor (with Jones)

120.0

84.8

6

0

0.9722

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ohio St. (without Sullinger)

111.4

88.7

2

1

0.9116

Ohio St. (with Sullinger)

114.3

75.2

10

0

0.9866

You might not have noticed, because Baylor has won every game this year, but when Perry Jones III was out, Baylor was playing like the 30th best team in the country. Since his return, the Baylor offense and defense have improved substantially, and Baylor is playing like the second best team in the nation. Now, that post-return rating is inflated by the ridiculous defensive game the team had against Northwestern. But I think it is fair to say Baylor is still under-rated in all the major computer rankings.

For Ohio St., I decided to throw the South Carolina game into the “no Sullinger” category since Sullinger only played six minutes. Ohio St. wasn’t bad with Sullinger out. They still played like the 15th best team in the country. But with Sullinger in the lineup, Ohio St. has been the top team in the country. Again, perhaps the numbers are inflated because Ohio St. crushed a tired Duke team that had just returned from Maui. But Duke had been back for several days, and I honestly think that by anyone’s standards, that was one of the most dominant performances of the year. If the splits love Ohio St. with Sullinger, I don’t think the eye-test is going to disagree.

Moving on to two key injuries and one key departure:

Team

Adj Off

Adj Def

W

L

Pyth.

Pittsburgh (with Woodall)

124.7

104.4

6

1

0.8608

Pittsburgh (without Woodall)

109.5

95.8

5

1

0.7977

 

 

 

 

 

 

UCLA (with Nelson)

101.7

101.0

1

4

0.5191

UCLA (without Nelson)

109.2

93.7

5

1

0.8285

 

 

 

 

 

 

Detroit (without Eli Holman)

97.8

103.5

2

6

0.3594

Detroit (with Holman)

110.4

100.9

2

2

0.7142

Pittsburgh’s offense fell off a cliff when point-guard Travon Woodall was injured. Given that Woodall was such an efficient player, with one of the top assist rates in the nation, it is not a surprise that Pittsburgh would struggle with him out. But the home loss to Wagner was still a punch in the gut for Pitt fans. Pittsburgh’s defense has picked up slightly since Woodall went down, but not enough to make up for the drop in offense. (Note these numbers are through Monday and do not include Tuesday Night’s game against Notre Dame.)

The table also shows that UCLA hasn’t missed this year’s version of Reeves Nelson. (I.e. the guy who oversleeps for plane rides and destroyed the head coach’s credibility.) These numbers make UCLA look like the 40th best team in the country without Nelson, but while they are adjusted for opponent quality, I am slightly skeptical since UCLA has not played any elite teams without Nelson. Still, it is fair to say UCLA is playing better lately.

Finally, Detroit has been a completely different team since Eli Holman returned to the lineup (although I caution that Nick Minnerath is still out for Detroit.) With Holman, Detroit has been playing like the 83rd best team in the country, while they were playing like the 228th best without him.

The next two splits are minor mysteries. First, given Calvin Newell’s large role early this season for Oklahoma, I think it has to qualify as a minor surprise that the team has gotten better since he left. And it has to be an even bigger surprise that Oregon’s offense has gone in the tank since Devoe Joseph arrived. After all, Joseph is putting up fabulous individual numbers and is now playing the most minutes on the Oregon team. 

Team

Adj Off

Adj Def

W

L

Pyth.

Oklahoma (with Newell)

109.3

98.6

4

1

0.7411

Oklahoma (without Newell)

113.3

89.1

5

0

0.9210

 

 

 

 

 

 

Oregon (without Joseph)

104.3

95.4

4

2

0.7139

Oregon (with Joseph)

98.4

95.8

5

1

0.5682

I think the answer with Newell is fairly simple. Oklahoma is learning a lot from new head coach Lon Kruger. While all teams get better as the season goes on, with a new coach, Oklahoma has been speeding along the learning curve. These splits don’t mean Oklahoma is substantially better without Newell, they simply indicate that Oklahoma is improving rapidly right now. Once Oklahoma gets into Big 12 play, I think they will get a reality check. But you have to give Lon Kruger a lot of credit for the team’s improved play.

For Oregon, the individual player splits help tell the story: 

 

W/o J

With J

W/o J

With J

W/o J

With J

 

PctMin

PctMin

PctPoss

PctPoss

Ortg

Ortg

Joseph, Devoe

0%

79%

0%

23%

0.0

114.1

Sim, Garrett

76%

77%

17%

18%

135.9

122.5

Singler, E.J.

69%

74%

19%

22%

121.4

110.4

Loyd, Johnathan

60%

61%

22%

14%

100.9

78.6

Ashaolu, Olu

56%

47%

20%

23%

97.8

83.4

Nared, Tyrone

49%

16%

12%

10%

133.5

141.3

Emory, Carlos

44%

42%

20%

19%

67.4

92.9

Woods, Tony

43%

44%

25%

27%

104.0

82.7

Jacob, Jeremy

38%

42%

23%

19%

85.2

87.3

Kingma, Brett

32%

19%

21%

16%

80.5

53.2

Brown, Jabari

21%

0%

27%

0%

44.3

NA

Barron, Bruce

9%

0%

22%

0%

66.4

NA

Lucenti, Nicholas

3%

1%

18%

0%

60.1

NA

Adding a high volume efficient player to the offense should not cause the offense to fall apart, particularly when inefficient players like Jabari Brown and Brett Kingma are seeing their role in the offense reduced. 

So what is the cause of the offensive collapse? As an Oregon fan, it might be tempting to point to forward Tyrone Nared’s injury as a reason the Oregon offense is stagnating. But that would be a bit of an exaggeration. While Nared was efficient, he almost never shot when on the floor. His absence does not account for the drop-off.

What seems to be happening is that all the key Oregon players are slumping relative to the start of the year. Garrett Sim, EJ Singler, Jonathan Loyd, Olu Ashaolu, and Tony Woods have all started slumping since Devoe Joseph took the court. And this isn’t just opponent quality either. Oregon played Vanderbilt and BYU in the “before” splits, and as the team numbers show, adjusting for opponent quality, the effect is still there. 

Could it be that Joseph is too much of a “me-first PG”, and isn’t setting up his teammates as well? Perhaps, but alternative PG Jonathan Loyd hasn’t seen his assist rate plummet since Joseph joined the team. The answer may be what has happened to Garrett Sim’s role in the offense. Before Joseph arrived Sim had 25 assists in 6 games. Since Joseph has arrived Sim has only 8 assists in 6 games. Sim is facilitating the offense less with Joseph on the team, and so far that has hurt Oregon’s offense.

These next three splits should not have been particularly fascinating because the player’s roles with their teams were not that huge. But since I often hear them mentioned, I decided to include them:

Team

Adj Off

Adj Def

W

L

Pyth.

Florida (with Murphy)

124.7

94.0

8

1

0.9477

Florida (without Murphy)

121.5

89.6

2

1

0.9577

 

 

 

 

 

 

Marquette (with Otule)

117.9

86.2

9

0

0.9612

Marquette (without Otule)

107.4

91.1

2

1

0.8431

 

 

 

 

 

 

Memphis (with Carmouche)

114.2

98.8

2

2

0.8149

Memphis (without Carmouche)

112.6

92.6

4

3

0.8805

First, Florida didn’t really miss a beat when Erik Murphy was out, but the only meaningful game they played was against Syracuse.

Second, Marquette will miss some depth in the paint with Chris Otule now injured, but he was playing less than half the team’s minutes, and I think the results in this table are more coincidence than anything. His departure just happened to coincide with the team’s worst performance of the year, a loss to LSU.

Finally, while Charles Carmouche was posting nice offensive efficiency numbers for Memphis, because he was such a small part of the offense, not much has changed. What this table really shows is that Memphis’ defense has improved over the course of the season. With Carmouche in the first four games, the team was playing poor defense like last year. But since the trip to Maui, Memphis has started to do better on that end of the court. Still, the best you can say is that with better defense Memphis is playing like a borderline top 25 team. At no point has this team played as well as its preseason ranking.

I still want a little more data before I say something about Texas A&M’s Khris Middleton, but so far the results aren’t good. And I will have more to say about the Cincinnati - Xavier brawl fallout, but I want to wait until the suspensions all run their course.

Two weeks ago I also listed some splits for Trevor Mbakwe, Ryan Boatright, and others. Here is the link, if you missed those.