Offseason Projects

Now that the NCAA tournament has come to its conclusion and Kentucky has taken the title the offseason is officially in full swing in college basketball. I have a few projects that I want to work on during this time. Some of them are surprises, because everyone loves surprises, but I want to share a few here so that people know about them and can help out if they want.

Project 1: Schedule and Recruiting Database

I want to put together two pages on this site that will be extremely helpful for me as the offseason progresses and hopefully a solid resource for readers as well. One page is going to track all the known recruits for 2012-13 and beyond for the schools that this site covers. The other is going to be a list of all the known non-conference games that have been scheduled by New York City teams.

I’m not so much worried about keeping these pages updated, but building it out originally. For the recruiting especially I hope that I can do more than just give a name and a Rivals, ESPN or Scout grade. I’d like to give some flavor through local articles or some original reporting.

The schedules are pretty straightforward. Some of those agreements are in place or have already been announced. For instance, LIU is going to be playing quite a bit at the Barclays Center. What other games do we know about? Who still has open games? That becomes more and more important as the offseason goes along.

Project 2: The Momentum Index and Game Inflection Points

One of the things that fascinated me this season was seeing the in-game slumps and runs a team can go on. Everyone always say, “Basketball is a game of runs.” Why? What triggers a run? I want to go back and analyze play-by-play using a “momentum index” to find shifts in the game. Maybe I’ll be able to find it in statistics – I’m guessing dunks, blocks and steals mean more, but I’m not sure. Or maybe it’s something more nebulous. I’m going to be collecting some game data on some high-variance teams and other interesting case studies (read: Iona) and try and figure out exactly what the heck is going on. I’ll try to keep people updated along the way, because this obviously isn’t going to be a one weekend sort of deal.

Of course there will also be the typical reporting that goes into every offseason. Player and coaching movement, conference realignment, etc. will happen and I’ll cover that as necessary. What else do you want to see on the site for the next five months? Let me know and I’ll see what I can do.