EFFICIENCY PREDICTIONS

• Full Season Prediction … Washington St. 65, Oral Roberts 57
• Last 10 Prediction … Washington St. 65, Oral Roberts 56
• Vs. Good Prediction … Washington St. 65, Oral Roberts 56
• Trendline Prediction … Washington St. 68, Oral Roberts 61
• Best 6 Prediction … Washington St. 66, Oral Roberts 55

explanation

ADJUSTED GAME EFFICIENCY DATA

Washington State is the proud recipient of a 3 seed in the NCAA tournament, but if they play the way they have been recently, they certainly won’t live up to the expectations that come along with the seed. Their defense is on an upward march, driven by a rise in opponents’ eFG% (usually an indicator of open looks and easy layups) and their offense has lost the consistency it seemed to have at midseason. Only one of their past 6 games has garnered an overall rating of .95 (NCAA quality). Part of their problem may be that 3 players who average at least 10 minutes a game have missed significant time this season (C Aron Baynes, G Nikola Koprivica, and G Chris Matthews), making it difficult to maintain a consistent rotation. Only Baynes played in the last game, so I assume he will be the only one playing in the tourney.

PLAYER STATS

ADJUSTED GAME EFFICIENCY DATA

Oral Roberts’s strength at the beginning of their year was their defense, which played better than average in 19 of the first 20 games, and held Kansas to one of their worst offensive performances of the year. Since then, however, the unit has played worse than average in 8 of 12 games, and got torched by Centenary. They seem to have lost their ability to force turnovers, and to keep teams from getting easy shots. Luckily their offense is slightly better recently, posting adjusted efficiencies above 110 in 5 of the last 8 games. If they can maintain that offensive level while recapturing their previous defensive efficiency, they could pull an upset.

ORAL ROBERTS PLAYER STATS