There's a new rule in college basketball that allows coaches to call a live-ball timeout when there is less than 2 minutes left in the game. In the most critical moment last night, Clarke gets trapped under the basket with Tech clinging to a 2-pt lead and 19 seconds left. Beard then has the awareness to call a TO (since none of our players apparently did), which allowed us to enter the ball into Moretti on the next inbound play. That quick decision put us in a position where only a miracle could allow DePaul back into the game (from my back-of-the-napkin math, we had over a 98% chance of winning after Moretti makes first FT).
The second one happened with 23 seconds left in OT. Tech is down 60 - 61 and has to foul. During regulation, we'd fouled Jaylen Butz (almost intentionally) on 5 possessions, and he'd converted only 3 free throws. He's a terrible FT shooter.
I don't know how we were able to pull this off, but we commit an off-ball foul on Butz after DePaul had entered it in to Charlie Moore. You never see a team pull that off... and if they do, it's typically called an intentional foul. Butz misses the front-end of that free throw, which takes a bizarre bounce straight up into the air and gives Depaul's rebounders a chance to create a scrum for the ball, which barely goes out of bonds off of Nadolny. Very unfortunate that we weren't able to capitalize on what was a genius strategic decision by Beard.
Of course, hindsight makes it very easy to critique a team that loses after deciding not to foul up by 3. Despite the all-knowing TV announcers' opinions on this issue, it's not a no-brainer decision (evidenced by DePaul electing not to foul in identical situation in OT). There's actually somewhat of a split on among basketball scholars re: whether you should foul in that situation or not. From what I've read, most detailed studies indicate that fouling actually gives you a higher chance of losing. Fouling is certainly the only way you can lose the game in regulation.
DePaul was very long, athletic, and had great rebounders. They were giving us problems inbounding the ball all night, and we didn't have any TOs left to call if we got in trouble. If we foul, we run the risk of (1) giving up an offensive rebound on the FT, or (2) turning it over trying to inbound the ball. Beard absolutely made the right decision in my mind.
For those interested, below are two articles and each one's ultimate conclusion:
https://harvardsportsanalysis.wordp...-points-the-first-comprehensive-cbb-analysis/
https://kenpom.com/blog/yet-another-study-about-fouling-when-up-3/
The fact is, chances of losing are close to remote in either case, but execution errors, an inflated offensive rebounding percentage, poor three-point shooting, and the chance of an extra possession are enough to counteract what might otherwise be the advantage of forcing a team to shoot free throws. In cases where the opponent has multiple good three-point shooters and you have confidence in rebounding a missed free throw, fouling may be the better option. But it appears the default decision should be to not foul.
The second one happened with 23 seconds left in OT. Tech is down 60 - 61 and has to foul. During regulation, we'd fouled Jaylen Butz (almost intentionally) on 5 possessions, and he'd converted only 3 free throws. He's a terrible FT shooter.
I don't know how we were able to pull this off, but we commit an off-ball foul on Butz after DePaul had entered it in to Charlie Moore. You never see a team pull that off... and if they do, it's typically called an intentional foul. Butz misses the front-end of that free throw, which takes a bizarre bounce straight up into the air and gives Depaul's rebounders a chance to create a scrum for the ball, which barely goes out of bonds off of Nadolny. Very unfortunate that we weren't able to capitalize on what was a genius strategic decision by Beard.
Of course, hindsight makes it very easy to critique a team that loses after deciding not to foul up by 3. Despite the all-knowing TV announcers' opinions on this issue, it's not a no-brainer decision (evidenced by DePaul electing not to foul in identical situation in OT). There's actually somewhat of a split on among basketball scholars re: whether you should foul in that situation or not. From what I've read, most detailed studies indicate that fouling actually gives you a higher chance of losing. Fouling is certainly the only way you can lose the game in regulation.
DePaul was very long, athletic, and had great rebounders. They were giving us problems inbounding the ball all night, and we didn't have any TOs left to call if we got in trouble. If we foul, we run the risk of (1) giving up an offensive rebound on the FT, or (2) turning it over trying to inbound the ball. Beard absolutely made the right decision in my mind.
For those interested, below are two articles and each one's ultimate conclusion:
https://harvardsportsanalysis.wordp...-points-the-first-comprehensive-cbb-analysis/
In the 2009-2010 season, I found 443 instances where a team held the ball down three points during their last possession of a period (either the end of the 2nd half or an overtime period). In 391 of those cases, the team leading did not foul. In 52 cases, the team chose to foul. While the unequal sample sizes aren’t ideal, the 52 cases of fouling are significantly more than found in Winston’s NBA study (27).
Of the 52 teams that committed a foul, six lost the game for a winning percentage of 88.46%. Of the 391 teams that did not foul, 33 lost the game for a winning percentage of 91.56%. Both a two sample t-test of proportion and a Chi-squared test fail to reject the null hypothesis that there is a difference in winning percentage between the two strategies. In this sample, teams that did not foul won slightly more often. For the less statistically inclined, this means that there is no significant difference between the two strategies
Of the 52 teams that committed a foul, six lost the game for a winning percentage of 88.46%. Of the 391 teams that did not foul, 33 lost the game for a winning percentage of 91.56%. Both a two sample t-test of proportion and a Chi-squared test fail to reject the null hypothesis that there is a difference in winning percentage between the two strategies. In this sample, teams that did not foul won slightly more often. For the less statistically inclined, this means that there is no significant difference between the two strategies
The fact is, chances of losing are close to remote in either case, but execution errors, an inflated offensive rebounding percentage, poor three-point shooting, and the chance of an extra possession are enough to counteract what might otherwise be the advantage of forcing a team to shoot free throws. In cases where the opponent has multiple good three-point shooters and you have confidence in rebounding a missed free throw, fouling may be the better option. But it appears the default decision should be to not foul.
