What Combinations Have Been the Most Efficient for Wisconsin?

Wisconsin has completed just over half of its Big Ten Conference schedule, so it is a good time to take a deeper look into some of the on/off court numbers for the Badgers.

Two things to keep in mind.

First, the data isn't adjusted for which opponent players are on the floor. Two, the sample sizes may end up being small and not very meaningful. That is a problem for almost any college basketball related analysis, where even a couple of made three pointers for or against can have a huge impact in terms offensive or defensive efficiency.

Since Ben Carlson's injury, the Badgers have had an eight-player rotation during the B1G season. This first table shows Wisconsin's top eight players during the season. The different columns represent the time on (or off) the court, how many points the Badgers have scored, how many points the opponents have scored, how many possessions UW has had on offense, and how many their opponents have had.

Off Eff represents offensive efficiency in points per possession (the NCAA average for the 2020-2021 season is 1.009 points per possession, according to basketball analyst Ken Pomeroy), and Def Eff represents defensive efficiency, also in points per possession. Difference represents the offensive efficiency minus the defensive efficiency – a bigger number here is better for the Badgers (the numbers might be slightly off because of rounding). The numbers used here have been compiled by @nuclearbdgr.

(NR = Nate Reuvers, AF = Aleem Ford, MP = Micah Potter, DT = D'Mitrik Trice, BD - Brad Davison, TW = Tyler Wahl, TA = Trevor Anderson, JD = Jonathan Davis).

So far this season, the Badgers have played 730 minutes of basketball, scored 1,294 points and given up 1,131 points. They have had 1,197 possessions on offense and on defense (not counting end of game possessions where teams were not trying to score). On the season, Wisconsin scored, on average, 1.08 points per possession, and given up 0.94 (remember that the NCAA average is 1.009). As noted in a recent article, the Badgers have been an even more efficient team with freshman Jonathan Davis on the floor. One thing to keep in mind is that the numbers above illustrate how the team has done when the player is on the court.

One area of great interest for fans this season has been how the team has performed with the various combinations of the twin towers of Nate Reuvers and Micah Potter on or off the floor.

For the first 13 games this season, Reuvers and Potter both started but usually one was replaced when the Badgers would make their first substitution, limiting their time together. They would similarly start the second half and play together for a short stint. Starting with the game at Rutgers, sophomore Tyler Wahl has replaced Reuvers in the starting lineup, so Potter and Reuvers have played together for less than two minutes over the past four games. One of the reasons for the large difference when Reuvers and Potter played together (0.30 points per possession, which is huge) is that UW's starting lineup dominated games against some of their non-conference opponents.

Here is a look specifically in Big Ten conference games.

As you can see in the table above, the Badgers' efficiency during conference play is much closer to the NCAA average than their performance overall – a result of the level of play in the B1G this season. The sample sizes are also smaller, leading to some outliers of results.

Speaking of small sample sizes, here are UW's 15 most commonly used five-man lineups.

The two starting lineups used this season have played the most, and 11 of the 14 next most common lineups contain Davis. Again, these lineups are not adjusted by opponent in any way.

One last set of numbers – just to take a peak at next season. Here are the numbers for the combination of Wahl and Davis.

When Wahl and Davis are on the court together, the Badgers outscore their opponents by 0.30 points per possession (or about 20 points over a typical 65 possession game for the Badgers). If the team continues to play as well with those two on the floor, the future will continue to look bright.