The Holy Land of Hoops

On one of the Xavier boards, conference standings have been evaluated by a simple metric, a plus/minus where road wins are worth a point, home losses are worth a negative point, and road losses and home wins are worth zero points. So, if a team finishes with a score of 0, they were 9-9 in conference. At this point in the season, it's probably better than the conference records, as not everyone has played the same number of home or road games or the same number of games period, plus road wins are hard to come by. So, here are the standings at this moment:

Villanova = 4 (5 road wins, 1 home loss, with 4 road games to go)
Creighton = 3 (3 road wins, with 5 road games to go)
Xavier = 1 (1 road win, with 6 road games to go)
Providence = 0 (1 road win, 1 home loss, with 7 road games to go)
Marquette = 0 (1 road win, 1 home loss, with 4 road games to go)
St. John's = -1 (1 road win, 2 home losses, with 4 road games to go)
DePaul = -1 (1 road win, 2 home losses, with 4 road games to go)
Seton Hall = -1 (2 road wins, 3 home losses, with 5 road games to go)
Georgetown = -2 (1 road win, 3 home losses, with 5 road games to go)
Butler = -3 (1 road win, 4 home losses, with 5 road games to go)

It's not too different from the conference standings, except for some minor movement among the lower 5, but it does reveal some things:

- Villanova and Creighton are already pretty far ahead of the rest of the pack (though Xavier hasn't had as many opportunities to boost their score).
- Providence has had even fewer opportunities than Xavier and has maintained an even score so far.
- Creighton and Xavier are the only teams to hold serve at home completely.
- Marquette is closer to Providence than it would appear by their records.
- Butler is even further behind here than they are in the standings.

In another week or two, the numbers probably won't be as tightly packed and this metric should be even more revealing.

XUFan09 wrote:On one of the Xavier boards, conference standings have been evaluated by a simple metric, a plus/minus where road wins are worth a point, home losses are worth a negative point, and road losses and home wins are worth zero points. So, if a team finishes with a score of 0, they were 9-9 in conference. At this point in the season, it's probably better than the conference records, as not everyone has played the same number of home or road games or the same number of games period, plus road wins are hard to come by. So, here are the standings at this moment:

Villanova = 4 (5 road wins, 1 home loss, with 4 road games to go)
Creighton = 3 (3 road wins, with 5 road games to go)
Xavier = 1 (1 road win, with 6 road games to go)
Providence = 0 (1 road win, 1 home loss, with 7 road games to go)
Marquette = 0 (1 road win, 1 home loss, with 4 road games to go)
St. John's = -1 (1 road win, 2 home losses, with 4 road games to go)
DePaul = -1 (1 road win, 2 home losses, with 4 road games to go)
Seton Hall = -1 (2 road wins, 3 home losses, with 5 road games to go)
Georgetown = -2 (1 road win, 3 home losses, with 5 road games to go)
Butler = -3 (1 road win, 4 home losses, with 5 road games to go)

It's not too different from the conference standings, except for some minor movement among the lower 5, but it does reveal some things:

- Villanova and Creighton are already pretty far ahead of the rest of the pack (though Xavier hasn't had as many opportunities to boost their score).
- Providence has had even fewer opportunities than Xavier and has maintained an even score so far.
- Creighton and Xavier are the only teams to hold serve at home completely.
- Marquette is closer to Providence than it would appear by their records.
- Butler is even further behind here than they are in the standings.

In another week or two, the numbers probably won't be as tightly packed and this metric should be even more revealing.

Only thing I'd add to the bottom list is:

- Villanova is the only team to pick up every point on the road so far (5-0)

Interesting metric...might try and look at this come bracket time if I remember.

I hope X wins 'em all @ home and goes .500 on the road. That would my pipe dream.

XUFan09 wrote:Xavier = 1 (1 road win, with 6 road games to go)

Really tough stretch for XU fans over its last 11 games:

5 conf games remaining at home; 2 vs. SHU (who seems tougher on the road this year) and DePaul but 3 vs. the other Top 3 teams in the league: PC, Nova and CU. I think it may be tough for XU to survive both Creighton and Nova unscathed. Let's say 4-1 at home is what I am thinking. Then @ Nova, @ Butler, @ Marq, @ Gtwn, @ SJU and @ SHU. 2-4 away is prob realistic. That puts you guys at 11-7. Solid #3 in the league is what I am thinking. Probably a 7 seed with a win at the BET.

GumbyDamnit! wrote:

XUFan09 wrote:Xavier = 1 (1 road win, with 6 road games to go)

Really tough stretch for XU fans over its last 11 games:

5 conf games remaining at home; 2 vs. SHU (who seems tougher on the road this year) and DePaul but 3 vs. the other Top 3 teams in the league: PC, Nova and CU. I think it may be tough for XU to survive both Creighton and Nova unscathed. Let's say 4-1 at home is what I am thinking. Then @ Nova, @ Butler, @ Marq, @ Gtwn, @ SJU and @ SHU. 2-4 away is prob realistic. That puts you guys at 11-7. Solid #3 in the league is what I am thinking. Probably a 7 seed with a win at the BET.

That's why we're here.

That being said, I agree with your analysis and have not argument with your projections.

BEX wrote:I hope X wins 'em all @ home and goes .500 on the road. That would my pipe dream.

Win all your home games and being above .500 in your road games will put you at at least 14-4. MU rode that formula to a share of the Big East championship last year (Won all 9 home games, went 5-4 on the road at Rutgers, St. John's, Louisville, Seton Hall, South Florida, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Georgetown, and Villanova)

In the 6 seasons the Big East has had since it upgraded from a 16-game conference schedule and went to an 18-game conference schedule in 2007-08, 15-3 has been good enough to win at least a share of the regular season conference championship in 4 of them. (16-2 Louisville in 2009, 17-1 Syracuse in 2012).