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Chaifetz Home Court Advantage


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Having followed KenPom for a long time I remember a blog post of his that explains his thinking on home court advantage. He broke it down in a two-part post. If you are a subscriber to his site:

How to measure site-specific home-court advantage, part one | The kenpom.com blog

How to measure site-specific home-court advantage, part two | The kenpom.com blog

His blog is actually pretty interesting (though not very active). 

He also has a lot of posts with Majerus mentions, including dedicated posts about how great of a coach he was: rick majerus | Search Results | The kenpom.com blog

 

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1 hour ago, rgbilliken said:

Having followed KenPom for a long time I remember a blog post of his that explains his thinking on home court advantage. He broke it down in a two-part post. If you are a subscriber to his site:

How to measure site-specific home-court advantage, part one | The kenpom.com blog

How to measure site-specific home-court advantage, part two | The kenpom.com blog

His blog is actually pretty interesting (though not very active). 

He also has a lot of posts with Majerus mentions, including dedicated posts about how great of a coach he was: rick majerus | Search Results | The kenpom.com blog

 

Interesting articles by KPom.  I don't follow KP but I try to keep up with his methodology(as well as other handicappers).  In those articles it looks like he is struggling to find the "magical stat"...the one that holds the key to home court advantage.  But in the end he (as many others including myself) realizes it is a futile search and winds up doing what I and many other handicappers do...use home and away scoring margins. The data bases and methodology differ from analyst to analyst but the end result is the same...they don't know the why but here are the spreads.

The holy grail of home court advantage is the why. I think most fans think that it is all about the home crowds...size, energy, enthusiasm, etc.  but the numbers don't seem to bear it out.  It has an affect but is not considered one of the top factors. In looking at the studies out there and talking with a number of sports book handicappers and running my own numbers on the data...here is my list for the top 3 factors. Remember, these are not the only factors but the ones that I think have the most influence....listed in order of importance

Travel time....don't confuse this with distance. A trip to St. B  with a plane ride and long bus ride may be longer and more taxing than a trip to the West Coast.

Time change...Bio studies have shown it takes 1 day per time zone for your body to adjust . Not all teams can arrive 24-48 hours before game time. We are not talking about falling asleep on the court. ...but maybe that shot or pass is a few inches off.

Altitude....The number 1 team on my home court advantage list is U of Denver.  If you can't breathe, you can't play. However if the Jayhawks show up in Denver they squash the Pioneers...but just not by as much.

Those are the top 3 ...there are other factors (such as venue size, sight lines, crowds) but in the end it is a combo of some or all the factors in different degrees.

Which is why I (and many others ) use scoring margins home and away. ...It doesn't tell you the how but it tells you the how much.

 

 

 

 

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Altitude can have a major effect on the  performance of a team based at sea level. You cannot adjust to altitude right away, although some people can do it better than others. One thing that teams faced with that situation can do is to rotate players frequently and give low flow oxygen to those sitting on the bench during the game. That allows players from the bench to play at full speed for some time.

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11 hours ago, The Wiz said:

If you look at just 2 games then it doesn't make sense...small sample sizes rarely work ...but if you take 14 years worth of A-10 games it becomes more meaningful. And of course the system is weighted...ie after  a 10 pt spread the margin value starts to decline. ...so the 30  pt road win (outlier) is not as big of an advantage particularly if put it into a pool of hundreds of home and away  A10 games.

Finally, if you win every road game by a bigger margin than your home games  ...you have NO home court advantage... under any system.

I don't think that you are understanding what I am saying.  I am not suggesting using two games worth of data.  If we want to use 14 years worth of data, that's fine.  I'm saying that we should not be comparing what one team does against another team at home and on the road.  How well another team plays at their own arena should not go into the equation when you are determining how good another team is at their home arena

I'm suggesting looking at other teams that play a particular team, like SLU, and see what they do in their other road games compared to the games they play at SLU.  So, take every team that plays at SLU in a season.  Look at what they did at Chaifetz and compare that to what they did on the road everywhere else.  Let's say a particular team averaged a +6 point differential in all games, averaged a +3 point differential on road, and lost to SLU by 7 (-7 at Chaifetz).  For that team, and that team alone, Chaifetz was a -10 point difference compared to their normal road game.

Now, do that for ever team that comes to Chaifetz the whole season.  Then do it over 10 or 15 years.  Then compare what you see to similar numbers for other teams. Doing this will give you a better look at how tough a team is to play in their home arena than if you use data that includes the opponent's home games.  That's all I'm saying. 

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2 hours ago, cgeldmacher said:

I don't think that you are understanding what I am saying.  I am not suggesting using two games worth of data.  If we want to use 14 years worth of data, that's fine.  I'm saying that we should not be comparing what one team does against another team at home and on the road.  How well another team plays at their own arena should not go into the equation when you are determining how good another team is at their home arena

I'm suggesting looking at other teams that play a particular team, like SLU, and see what they do in their other road games compared to the games they play at SLU.  So, take every team that plays at SLU in a season.  Look at what they did at Chaifetz and compare that to what they did on the road everywhere else.  Let's say a particular team averaged a +6 point differential in all games, averaged a +3 point differential on road, and lost to SLU by 7 (-7 at Chaifetz).  For that team, and that team alone, Chaifetz was a -10 point difference compared to their normal road game.

Now, do that for ever team that comes to Chaifetz the whole season.  Then do it over 10 or 15 years.  Then compare what you see to similar numbers for other teams. Doing this will give you a better look at how tough a team is to play in their home arena than if you use data that includes the opponent's home games.  That's all I'm saying. 

I think I understand what you are saying. I would need to setup an entirely different database which would not be compatible with my existing one on the chance that it might be more accurate than the current system.  40% of all D1 teams have a 3-4 pt home court advantage on any given night. The rounding error alone can affect the final spread by almost 1 pt.

Bottom line ...a lot of work for little or no improvement in the current system. I think that is why you have seen little change in how home court advantage has been figured in the past 2 decades. A lot of institutions with far more resources than myself have tried other systems and returned to the current standard.

Perhaps , when I sign my 7 figure NIL contract,  I can try to reinvent the wheel. In the meantime, as a 13 year old girl once told me..."There's no place like home"...after all it is worth 4.18 pts to Bills fans.

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Numbers and statistics are never perfect, that includes the calculations described above. You can always add some increase in the accuracy of the calculation, which may of may not be significant. For example the latest calculation of the constant pi is 206,158,430,000 digits long. It has to be added that this is the current record, someone will come up with something else even longer than this at some time.

The reason for this is that reality can only be described numerically (as in statistics or probabilities) as approximations of reality, not as the real thing.

I think it would be a total waste of time for the Wiz to improve his results by a few digits to the right of the decimal point. After all most calculations than normal people (non mathematicians or statisticians) do using the factor pi,  are accurate enough using a pi with only 4 digits to the right of the decimal point (3.1416)

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I think it would help the student support, but I think it would make the fetz look tackier.  When you do the students behind the bench, theres a drop off so students standing do not interfere with GA behind them.  This would look ugly compared to what it looks like now.  You see what Penn state is doing more and more with outdated arenas, or ones built brand new and designed for that.  Here is Auburns, try and picture what that would look like here. 

-And while I say it would help student support, I don't trust our students involvement enough to make it worth it. 

 

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58 minutes ago, wgstl said:

 I don't trust our students involvement enough to make it worth it. 

 

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we have to bribe the students every game with gifts and food now to get decent turnouts.  

plus selfishly, i have been a loyal fan for years and paid thousands of dollars to sit in my seats and now i would just give those seats up and sit in lesser location so students can have my seat and then not show up half the time?   nah

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17 minutes ago, billiken_roy said:

we have to bribe the students every game with gifts and food now to get decent turnouts.  

plus selfishly, i have been a loyal fan for years and paid thousands of dollars to sit in my seats and now i would just give those seats up and sit in lesser location so students can have my seat and then not show up half the time?   nah

You going to conveniently ignore the massive corporate seat no-shows for every game? I'm split on the topic, but let's not forget that most of those seats are corporately held and their lack of use waters down the atmosphere.

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6 minutes ago, Compton said:

Agreed, I think that kind of privilege is earned.

There is something to be said about using that setup as a prime marketing tool for students. It would be interesting to see if an enhanced experience for students like this would entice better attendance than the so-called "bribery"  It may also do well to make for increased repeat attendance. You could potentially decrease the size of the student section as well like this. I would be interested to see what the capacity numbers would look like if you replaced just the first 5 rows of navy blue seats with student seating on the press row side. That's only 160 seats as far as I can tell. if you throw in the royal blue you're at maybe 225 as a conservative guestimate. Instead of spreading that over 1000 seats on the end you've got 160/225 die hards packed in. I promise you we get at least 160 students unless it's break.

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41 minutes ago, billikenfan05 said:

You going to conveniently ignore the massive corporate seat no-shows for every game? I'm split on the topic, but let's not forget that most of those seats are corporately held and their lack of use waters down the atmosphere.

at least those corporate no shows generate program income.

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2 minutes ago, Midtown Madness said:

Cool they can pay the same for seats 5 rows back. 

Would they be able to see with students standing? Honest question. I always thought there should be a program where crazy season ticket holders like me in the upper bowl should get to move down if they aren't taken by a certain point in the game. Would help the atmosphere forsure. But idk how that would work.

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8 minutes ago, RiseOfTheBillikens said:

Would they be able to see with students standing? Honest question. I always thought there should be a program where crazy season ticket holders like me in the upper bowl should get to move down if they aren't taken by a certain point in the game. Would help the atmosphere forsure. But idk how that would work.

Hard to say. A solution could be found somehow I’m sure. Duke’s seating above the SS is elevated a little I think. 

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Why not do something like Dayton and "The Red Scare?"  Not all Dayton students sit behind the one baseline.  The pilot and the flight attendants and the red painted boys are all members of "the Red Scare."  They have to join that their freshman year and move into the section or move downward when seniors and the like graduate.  And that section only goes up 20 or 25 rows.  Students still get in but they are relegated so the 300 and 400 sections where Dayton puts us visiting fans when we come to town.  

As we all know, Dayton fans show up no matter the opponent.  Not much else to do in Dayton, Ohio.  But there is a lot of money in those seats close in.  I know --- I sit there at midcourt, five rows up when I go, right behind Earl and Rammer,  This is because my frat buddy is a season ticket holder there and buys extra seats for us around him when we show for that one game.  As much as it pains me to say, those Dayton fans are courteous and kind and very knowledgeable about their basketball.  Nothing like being blue in a sea of red.  

At Maryland, when they built the new Comcast Center and moved out of Cole Field House, they designed the student section behind the one basket to be steeper and higher to accommodate more students and force the opposing team to shoot the second half into a more antagonistic setting.  Such a setting would work fine for me but that is up to the students showing up and not leaving at halftime.  You really need them after halftime if the game is close and they CAN become a factor.

Our students seem to have been fickle since the days of Ron Ekker.  And earlier.  I personally think they should be there all the time but they are not.

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5 minutes ago, Taj79 said:

Why not do something like Dayton and "The Red Scare?"  Not all Dayton students sit behind the one baseline.  The pilot and the flight attendants and the red painted boys are all members of "the Red Scare."  They have to join that their freshman year and move into the section or move downward when seniors and the like graduate.  And that section only goes up 20 or 25 rows.  Students still get in but they are relegated so the 300 and 400 sections where Dayton puts us visiting fans when we come to town.  

As we all know, Dayton fans show up no matter the opponent.  Not much else to do in Dayton, Ohio.  But there is a lot of money in those seats close in.  I know --- I sit there at midcourt, five rows up when I go, right behind Earl and Rammer,  This is because my frat buddy is a season ticket holder there and buys extra seats for us around him when we show for that one game.  As much as it pains me to say, those Dayton fans are courteous and kind and very knowledgeable about their basketball.  Nothing like being blue in a sea of red.  

At Maryland, when they built the new Comcast Center and moved out of Cole Field House, they designed the student section behind the one basket to be steeper and higher to accommodate more students and force the opposing team to shoot the second half into a more antagonistic setting.  Such a setting would work fine for me but that is up to the students showing up and not leaving at halftime.  You really need them after halftime if the game is close and they CAN become a factor.

Our students seem to have been fickle since the days of Ron Ekker.  And earlier.  I personally think they should be there all the time but they are not.

It's a decent idea, but I don't love any sort of exclusivity when it comes to the student section. As everyone here knows I was incredibly active in the student section in my time, but I never really did any "official" Blue Crew/SLUnatics stuff like join their executive board. I think maybe my first year. There was a bit of beef between a certain fraternity and the Blue Crew at Scottrade, it seemed to wane after the move to Chaifetz.

The e-Board always sat in those first few rows of the section and it always just felt like it was their own little club and they didn't really care about anything going on behind them. I preferred sitting up about 5-6 rows, mostly for the view but truthfully when the people starting chants are sitting in the first 2-3 rows, it's difficult to hear them to join in.

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12 minutes ago, Taj79 said:

 

At Maryland, when they built the new Comcast Center and moved out of Cole Field House, they designed the student section behind the one basket to be steeper and higher to accommodate more students and force the opposing team to shoot the second half into a more antagonistic setting.  

 

See now this I can get behind. 

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4 minutes ago, billikenfan05 said:

It's a decent idea, but I don't love any sort of exclusivity when it comes to the student section. 

I don't mind the exclusiveness if everyone can be in it. It would suck if there was a program that randomly chooses, or you had to pay your way into it. I don't mind having a program like this for students who generally care more about the games then the rest of the student body, thus gets some sort of promotion. 

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3 minutes ago, wgstl said:

I don't mind the exclusiveness if everyone can be in it. It would suck if there was a program that randomly chooses, or you had to pay your way into it. I don't mind having a program like this for students who generally care more about the games then the rest of the student body, thus gets some sort of promotion. 

I hear you and it's probably all in the marketing, I think my point of view comes from my disdain for the question: "Are you in Blue Crew/SLUnatics?" like it was some club.

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4 hours ago, billikenfan05 said:

There is something to be said about using that setup as a prime marketing tool for students. It would be interesting to see if an enhanced experience for students like this would entice better attendance than the so-called "bribery"  It may also do well to make for increased repeat attendance. You could potentially decrease the size of the student section as well like this. I would be interested to see what the capacity numbers would look like if you replaced just the first 5 rows of navy blue seats with student seating on the press row side. That's only 160 seats as far as I can tell. if you throw in the royal blue you're at maybe 225 as a conservative guestimate. Instead of spreading that over 1000 seats on the end you've got 160/225 die hards packed in. I promise you we get at least 160 students unless it's break.

I don't believe moving a student section in Chaifetz will entice better student attendance, unless it is to an all inclusive suite. The one factor I do believe would entice better attendance is a consistent winning program that participates in the NCAA Tournament nearly every year.

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4 hours ago, billikenfan05 said:

You going to conveniently ignore the massive corporate seat no-shows for every game? I'm split on the topic, but let's not forget that most of those seats are corporately held and their lack of use waters down the atmosphere.

Don’t forget that those corporate no shows are still paying for those seats. That revenue is nothing to sneeze at. I wish people sat there also but I would not want to give the money up if I was SLU

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