While Duke kept it close in the first half, and Ohio St. had a dramatic comeback, for the most part the Elite Eight was a series of blowouts. Rather than look back at that action, let’s look ahead to the Final Four. Here is how every single player in the Final Four has performed in the first four tournament games:

Wichita St. has a reputation for playing a longer rotation than most teams. But Gregg Marshall has substantially shortened his rotation in the tournament. The players on the tail end of the bench each played 15-30% of the minutes in the regular season, but those numbers are much lower now.

Most interestingly, senior Demetric Williams has seen his playing time plummet in the tournament. Williams started 16 games for Wichita St. this year and played vital minutes when the injury bug struck the team in January. But Williams was also the least efficient starter. And Gregg Marshall has decided to give him substantially less playing time in the NCAA tournament. So far it has worked.

During most of the season, Cleanthony Early has been the Shockers high volume shooter, but Malcolm Armstead has taken over that role in the tournament. That hasn’t always been a great formula. Armstead needed 21 shots to score 14 points in the win over Ohio St.

But luckily, Wichita St. freshman forward Ron Baker has saved his most efficient play for the tournament. Baker has 10 assists in 4 tournament games so far, but the real reason his efficiency is so high is that he has lived at the free throw line. Bakers has 23 free throw attempts on 21 field goal attempts in this first four tournament games. And by making 20 of those free throw attempts, Baker has been incredibly efficient. Normally fouling a freshman makes sense, but given Baker’s tournament efficiency, that strategy doesn’t look so good.

Tekele Cotton has also been plenty efficient, but that is largely due to how passive he has been offensively. (He has used only 12% of his team’s possessions.) But for a quiet player, he may have hit the loudest Wichita St. shot of the season when his three pointer stopped the huge Ohio St. rally on Saturday.

Carl Hall has the most blocks in the tournament of any player in the Final Four. Hall has 12 blocks, Louisville’s Gorgui Dieng has 10 blocks, Syracuse’s Baye Moussa Keita has 7 blocks, and the entire Michigan team has only 9 blocks.

In the regular season, Syracuse basically relied on four players for their scoring, and in the tournament that has continued. This is particularly true now that fifth leading scorer Rakeem Christmas has lost playing time to Baye Moussa Keita.

The bad news is that Brandon Triche is still struggling. He looked good against Montana, but shot terribly against California and Marquette and struggled with turnovers against Indiana. This continued the February trend of poor play and Jim Boeheim probably wishes he could let Triche spend more time on the bench until he breaks out of his slump. Unfortunately, Boeheim only has one other choice at the guard slot, and Trevor Cooney is also struggling mightily in the tournament.

Luckily for Syracuse fans, Michael Carter-Williams is playing better. The Syracuse point-guard’s turnover rate is down substantially in the tournament, and he has been a very consistent player while playing nearly every minute of the last three tournament games. Carter-Williams has chipped in a remarkable 13 steals in those 4 tournament games and for a player who experienced tragedy off the court (see house fire), he has channeled his emotions into positive results on the basketball court.

I know it is hard to believe, given how Trey Burke basically carried Michigan to a victory against Kansas on Friday night, but Trey Burke was sick this week. (Russ Smith was too. Seriously, what a bad time to get an illness.) And Burke’s shooting has been off in the tournament so far. He has shot just 42% on his twos and 26% on his threes in the first four games. But Burke is basically the only Michigan player whose efficiency has been lower in the tournament than in the regular season.

First, Mitch McGary has become a star, averaging a double-double per game. His 14 offensive rebounds in the tournament are the most of anyone in the Final Four. Meanwhile, Glen Robinson has chipped in 10 offensive rebounds of his own, which combined with Robinson’s 4 of 10 three point shooting has made Robinson an important offensive piece, despite his low shot volume. Tim Hardaway carried the team with his three point shooting against South Dakota St. in the opener. And Nik Stauskas carried the team with his three point shooting against Florida in the regional final. And just when you want to say this is a five player team, Spike Albrecht stepped in and got a key steal that ended the Gators most important second half run on Sunday.

With an offense like this clicking on all cylinders, it should be really fascinating to see Michigan match up with the long, dangerous Syracuse 2-3 zone.

Russ Smith is once again the highest volume shooter in the Final Four, but unlike last season, he has been unbelievably efficient. Smith also has 13 steals, which ties Syracuse’s Michael-Carter Williams for the most of any player in the Final Four. Oddly Michigan’s Mitch McGary is the only other player in the Final Four with double digit steals at this point.

Basically every Louisville player has been more efficient in the tournament than in the regular season except for Peyton Siva (and those guys at the end of the lineup card). But even if Siva has struggled some in the tournament, his scoring surge after Duke tied the game at 42 points on Sunday was still critical.

Louisville’s Kevin Ware’s ORtg was only 96 on the season, but he was playing the best basketball of his career prior to the devastating injury. He had a 114 ORtg in 4 tournament games. I can’t add anything about the injury that hasn’t already been said, but the sight of all those Louisville players hunched over on the court showed me how much love this team has for each other.

Gonzaga led 58 to 51 and then the baskets started falling. In Doug Gottlieb’s words, “Wap, Wap, Wap!”

-Tekele Cotton Three Pointer

-Cleanthony Early Three Pointer

-Ron Baker Three Pointer

-Carl Hall Jumper

-Ron Baker Free Throws

-Ron Baker Three Pointer

-And then, with the shot-clock down to one and Fred Vanvleet fumbling the ball, the shot of the tournament, another three. Wap!

19 points in 7 possessions

In 14 years, Mark Few has won 12 WCC titles at Gonzaga. But in 14 years, Mark Few has never made it to the Elite Eight. You can say all you want about how this is bad coaching. If Mark Few really had Gonzaga playing great basketball, they would have led by more than seven points late in the game. If Mark Few’s teams really played elite defense, Gonzaga wouldn’t give up runs like this.

But really that is all hyperbole. How do you make sure four separate guys don’t get hot from the perimeter in a short-stretch. What coaching adjustment are you supposed to make? 19 points in four minutes and 34 seconds. Sometimes, even for the best coaches in the world, basketball isn’t fair.

Meanwhile, if Gregg Marshall isn’t coaching in a Power Conference next season, he’s making $1.75 million at Wichita St. His NCAA tournament appearances at Winthrop, rebuilding a winner at Wichita St., and exceeding expectations in the tournament make him the hottest coaching prospect not named Shaka Smart. (I honestly don’t see Brad Stevens leaving Butler, especially with Butler headed to the new Big East.)

Re-Match

Brad Stevens has seemingly had a lucky horseshoe in his pocket the last few years. A lot of that is planning and preparation, but his fortune in close games has been too good to be true. There was Butler’s last-second lay-up win against Pittsburgh in the NCAA tournament a few years ago; there was the former walk-on hitting a floater to beat Indiana in OT this season; there was the possible shove, steal, and miracle basket against Gonzaga. And oh-by-the-way, there was that buzzer-beating three pointer to beat Marquette in the Maui Invitational to open the season.

Execution absolutely has a lot to do with it. And even down four with five seconds left, Butler executed enough to give itself a chance to win. Butler pulled off a beautiful full-court pass to Andrew Smith whose (goaltended) basket cut the lead to two. And there was the great inbounds defense that forced a turnover and gave Butler a chance for the win in regulation. But finally, even with good execution, the percentages finally caught up to Brad Stevens. Rotnei Clarke was used as a diversion, and Andrew Smith a capable if not elite three point shooter (read 29%) caught the ball at the top of the key. He should have had the size to get up a clean look. But instead he tripped over his own feet. And Butler’s chance at a miracle three pointer came up short.

A Double Digit Seed to the Sweet 16

I absolutely believe Oregon was under-seed in this tournament and they were better than a 12-seed. But the talk about how Oregon is a different team with Dominic Artis in the lineup has to stop. Artis was 0-for-7 with one assist and one turnover on Saturday, and this follows up a string of recent games where Artis has posted ORtgs of 47, 48, 81, and 34.

This isn’t a team that we vastly overlooked in the regular season. Rather, this is a team that lost its last two regular season games and blew a chance to share the Pac-12 title. What they have done in the Pac-12 tournament and NCAA tournament is simply start playing better basketball.

It was Damyean Dotson on Saturday who provided the surprise boost for the Ducks. St. Louis does a fantastic job at denying three-point opportunities. Much like Duke, they do everything possible to stop teams from even attempting shots on the perimeter. But somehow Dotson got open on Saturday and the freshman 31 percent three-point shooter made five of six three-pointers. Meanwhile, the Ducks as a team made 8 of 11 from deep. And that surprise outside shooting made a normally stout St. Louis defense look suspect. A team that had not lost in regulation since January 12th, and that many of us felt could handle Louisville’s pressure in the Sweet Sixteen, was blown out of the water.

Elsewhere

The rest of the games were all relatively easy wins by the favored seeds. I was amused at the CBS graphic that said “Lost Shoes” and listed one apiece in the Michigan St. vs Memphis game. I am nervous that Michigan St.’s Keith Appling injured his shoulder. But mostly in the other games, I was just sad to see another crop of seniors go out.

I hope Memphis forward DJ Stephens isn’t too upset to see his career come to an end with a 1-for-7 performance. Because even in defeat he showed plenty of grit. Whether it was his blocked shot in the first half that seemed to temporarily change Michigan St.’s inside attack, his hustle to knock a ball out from behind, or simply the play at the seven-minute mark of the first half where Stephens dove horizontally to keep a possession alive for his team, Stephens was worth the price of admission. And in my opinion he has absolutely done enough to get invited to the NBA summer league this season. He is under-sized and has no plausible NBA position. But someone needs to evaluate his raw athleticism against the other top prospects. And for a former 0-star recruit with asthma, his senior year highlight reel of dunks and blocks reminded us all why we love college basketball.

Finally, I hope Saturday’s game reminded Shaka Smart that he isn’t done learning yet. Smart seems to be a young Rick Pitino, a master of the full-court pressure, and a master motivator of his program. But one of the key lessons Pitino has learned over the years is that you can’t press every team. Sometimes you encounter teams with brilliant guard play and outstanding passing, and the only right call is to play tough-nosed half-court defense. Until Smart learns to better adapt to his opponents, he won’t quite be able to reach elite status. He isn’t quite there yet, but I think someday Smart will reach that point.

Expected Wins in Round of 64

As I have done throughout this tournament, I am tracking the expected wins in the Round of 64, according to the Pomeroy Rankings. Saturday saw more losers than winners as more of the favored seeds advanced.

As a reminder of how to interpret this table, Wichita St.’s win over Gonzaga increased the shockers expected wins in this tournament by a full 1.34 games. But since it was more of a mismatch, Arizona’s win over Harvard only increased Arizona’s expected wins by 0.38. (See own game.)

The margin of games also matters as well as other results in the tournament. Thanks to a dominating performance, Michigan added another 0.13 to their expected wins in the tournament. And thanks to Gonzaga losing, Mississippi and La Salle saw their odds of advancing improve as well. (See Other.)

With Michigan St. advancing, Duke’s expected wins fell slightly. Similarly, the fact that Michigan won in such dominating fashion lowered the Kansas expectations slightly.

Before I start looking at the impact of injured or suspended players, I want to talk a little about losing streaks. (This piggy-backs nicely on Ken Pomeroy’s recent writing on the predictive power of wins.) This weekend we heard a lot about Louisville’s three-game losing streak and Minnesota’s four-game losing streak.

The point I want to make is that not all losing streaks are created equally. When Illinois went on a recent losing streak against Minnesota, Wisconsin and Northwestern, John Groce’s team played distressingly poor basketball. They played basketball roughly equivalent to the 229th best team in the nation. That was the type of losing streak that correctly caused people to adjust their expectations. Even if Illinois had a few nice wins early in the year, they were NOT a Top-25 team.

But Minnesota and Louisville’s recent losing streaks have been much less distressing. While losing four in a row, Minnesota has still played roughly equivalent to the 32nd best team in the nation. And while Louisville has lost three in a row, the Cardinals have been roughly equivalent to the 55th best team in the nation. Both losing streaks could have easily been stopped with a few bounces. Had Minnesota’s Rodney Williams made a free throw in a one point loss, or had Georgetown’s seldom used Aaron Bowen not tipped in a circus shot against Louisville, we wouldn’t be talking about long losing streaks at all.

That’s not to say that those two teams are playing well right now. Both team’s offenses and defenses have fallen off in recent games. But neither team’s performance is remarkably distressing. In fact, I’m much more distressed by how Kentucky is playing in the SEC this season. The Wildcats have gone 4-2, but given how poor the SEC is this year, Kentucky has actually been playing worse basketball than Louisville during the losing streak.

*Does not include Sunday’s game.

Splits replicate the Adjusted Offense and Defense calculation on Kenpom.com which controls for opponent quality and venue. These measure how many points the team would score on a neutral floor against an average D1 team based on the team’s performance in the sample of games.

All this suggests that Minnesota and Louisville will be relevant at the end of the year, while I can’t be quite as certain about Kentucky.

For the record, I am a little nervous about Russ Smith’s play the last two games. Louisville’s national-player-of-the-year candidate has posted ORtgs below 100 in back-to-back games. (From the sideline, I can tell you Georgetown freshman D’Vauntes Smith-Rivera was very much bothering Russ Smith on Saturday.) Louisville hasn’t quite played a juggernaut schedule yet, and I’m worried if Smith might revert to his old inconsistency under the grind of Big East play.

Unfortunately, sometimes a breakout performance is just a hot-streak. As an example, look at Florida St.’s Michael Snaer. Snaer posted a career high 110 ORtg last year, and everyone thought he would be an ACC superstar this year. But Snaer has always had turnover problems prior to last season, and after a year of cutting down the turnovers, Snaer’s turnovers are back with a vengeance this season. Snaer’s ORtg has suffered because of it.

Similarly, Wisconsin's Ryan Evans is making last year look like the fluke. Here are Evan’s ORtgs over the last four years:

2009: 92

2010: 82

2011: 102

2012: 92

Sometimes when inefficient players suddenly look efficient, it really is just a temporary fluke. Russ Smith has clearly played brilliantly this season, but until we get to March, I am always going to wonder if the inconsistent Russ Smith, who falls in love with impossible shots, isn’t still around.

Of course, even if I believe in Minnesota and Louisville, these losing streaks will matter to the NCAA selection committee. And personally, I believe they should matter. A lot of people advocate for seeding the NCAA tournament based on team quality (read: Margin of Victory), not based on team accomplishment (read: Quality Wins). And I understand the arguments. Certainly, when you don’t seed by team quality, you run into situations where a 1-seed gets a horrible draw. And the NCAA committee is instructed to pick the BEST teams for the tournament.

But I view it this way. You can either win an NCAA title by over-achieving in the regular season or over-achieving in the post-season.

No one wins the NCAA tournament without performing above expectations. If you look pre-tournament, no team is favored to win more than four games. But every year someone wins 6 games and over-achieves. Similarly, some teams over-achieve in the regular season. They earn surprising wins and earn better seeds, even though they have to squeak by with a series of close wins. But why condemn over-achievement in the regular season when we don’t condemn over-achievement in the tournament?

Louisville and Minnesota are under-achieving. That just means they have a harder road to post-season glory. It doesn’t mean they are bad teams.

Injury Splits, Part 1

Over the next two days, I’m going to talk about where injuries or suspensions may be skewing our evaluation of various teams. I won’t be talking about all of this year’s critical injuries. For example, Wisconsin’s Josh Gasser, Missouri’s Michael Dixon, and Tennessee’s Jeronne Maymon have missed the entire season. While those injuries have clearly hurt their teams, because they didn’t play a minute this year, the Pomeroy and Sagarin ratings for those teams accurately reflect their future expectations.

But when players are out for a period of time (like Duke’s Ryan Kelly), it can take awhile for the rankings to catch up. Duke is now playing worse basketball, and we may want to look at how much worse the Blue Devils are playing without Kelly.

Of course not every player who is injured matters. For that reason I focus on players who play at least half their team’s minutes. And often we are looking at very small samples. Random noise may certainly explain some of the deviations from the norm. But I do think it is informative to look at how teams have performed without their missing stars.

A lot of smart folks have written about how Duke will be a much worse team without Ryan Kelly. I wasn’t quite as convinced because I happen to have high expectations for Duke’s Amile Jefferson. But through four games, the numbers are clearly worse without Kelly in the lineup. Duke’s offense has slid, and their defense has fallen off a cliff.

That’s probably too big a drop off to be permanent, and Duke’s horrific performance at Miami felt like a once-per-season collapse, not a permanent sign of bad things to come. But I think it is informative how Mike Krzyzewski is allocating playing time with Kelly out. While Amile Jefferson has seen his percentage of minutes increase from 21 percent to 58 percent in the four games Kelly has been out, the second biggest beneficiary of playing time is actually Mason Plumlee. And this worries me a little bit if I’m Duke. Plumlee has been playing 96 percent of Duke’s minutes since Ryan Kelly has been out, and Krzyzewski seems hesitant to ever take him out. I worry that all those minutes are having a negative impact on Plumlee’s energy level. Plumlee’s ORtg was 115 prior to Kelly going down, and has been just 95 in the four games since Kelly went down. Some of that is due to the tougher ACC defenses Plumlee has faced, but you have to wonder if the lack of rest time is hurting Plumlee’s overall performance.

However, I honestly think Duke may be better in the long-run if Kelly can come back. That’s because Jefferson has thrived as an offensive player now that he is getting more playing time. Jefferson has seen his ORtg increase from 104 before the Kelly injury to 119 after the injury. Now that he finally has a chance to get a rhythm in games, Jefferson is showing his offensive talents. If Jefferson can eventually improve his defense, his development will only be an asset for Duke come tournament time.

The second most important injury split in this column might be the Wyoming split listed above. Ever since Luke Martinez was suspended for his role in a bar room brawl, Wyoming’s offense has fallen off a cliff. You simply cannot lose such a potent scorer and expect to replace him with other rotation players. Larry Shyatt has done a masterful job keeping Wyoming playing elite defense without Martinez. And that defense will keep Wyoming competitive in the MWC this year. But Wyoming simply lacks offense without Martinez.

Lastly, Marquette’s offense has improved since Todd Mayo joined the team mid-semster. (Mayo was suspended for the first semester.) Mayo’s ORtg hasn’t been fantastic, but he has been aggressive and has attracted some offensive attention. The part I find more interesting is that Marquette’s defense has sagged since Mayo joined the team. In fact, in the last game against Providence, Mayo received an unusual DNP-Coach’s Decision.  Buzz Williams explained his decision not to play Mayo by saying he didn’t have anyone for Mayo to defend. But it certainly seemed puzzling for Mayo to go from over 20 minutes per game to riding the bench for a non-disciplinary reason.

Long Island was the media’s pick for the NEC title this year because they returned almost their entire rotation from last year’s tournament team. But Long Island’s season was off to a disappointing start, and then super-scorer Julian Boyd went down. And while a recent winning streak has improved expectations somewhat, this remains a heart-breaking season for fans of the team.

Former South Florida guard LaVonte Dority joined Valparaiso mid-season, and the aggressive offensive player has helped boost the team’s overall performance. He is attracting a ton of attention and making his teammates better.

Finally, Gregg Marshall has to be a national coach-of-the-year candidate. He lost virtually his entire rotation to graduation, but in November and December his team continued to play at a very high level. Then on Dec. 20th he faced a situation where three of his key rotation players were out. Carl Hall, Ron Baker, and Evan Wessel were all injured and missing in action. And yet since that time, Wichita St. has actually played better basketball. Carl Hall has returned for the last four of those games, but Gregg Marshall’s ability to find new players and stick them in the lineup has been nothing short of amazing.

Arguably, Missouri has never been at full strength (since Michael Dixon left the team), but for two games in December they had everyone else active. They crushed South Carolina St. by 50 and beat an Illinois team that was playing well at that time.

The rest of the season has seen key player’s missing and the team’s performance has suffered because of it. Bowers injury has clearly been the worst, but Missouri wasn’t exactly playing elite basketball before Jabari Brown became eligible either.

I’m not going to show the Kentucky or Louisville splits (since I discussed those teams at length earlier), but surprisingly, their struggles cannot really be tied to Willie Cauley-Stein’s injury, Ryan Harrow’s early absence, or Gorgui Dieng’s absence.

Click here for Part 2: James Southerland, Greg Whittington, Taylor Braun, CJ McCollum, Mike Moser, Kris Dunn and more.

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