The game has ended and you are left wondering how you were able to either win that game or lose that game. A staff member hands you a piece of paper with the game stats on it. There is a bunch of information on that piece of paper. What information is the most important?
A stat sheet from a game can be overwhelming to look at if you are not looking at the right pieces of information. There are shots attempted, shots made, and shooting percentage for both 2 point shots and 3 point shots. There are rebounds and assists and all kinds of other information that can be looked at and broken down. What stats give the best indicators for whether you won or lost the game? Of course the final result is about who scored the most points but that is the not what I look at when looking at stats. What stats are the most useful in determining who wins the game? Here are my 3 stats that I pay the closest attention to after each and every game.
1) Turnovers
The first stat I look at is turnovers. I look at how many did we have? How many did we force? The team that wins the turnover battle is normally the team that is winning the game. Why is this? Looking at your stats and even going back a couple of seasons if you have that information; look at a couple of things. For me, both teams on average shoot about 47 shots per game. The number of shots taken is about even each and every year. So if both teams are shooting the same amount of shots per game then how does 1 team gain an edge over the other team? TURNOVERS. Every turnover creates one less shot attempt for you and gives the other team one more shot attempt. And not all turnovers are the same. A turnover can lead to a runout and wide open layup. That is not the same turnover as if a player throws a pass out of bounds. At least if the ball goes out of bounds then the defense can get set up. I consider a turnover to be a 4 to 6 point change in the game outcome. You lose a shot and give the other team an additional shot. If you lose the turnover battle by 5 then that can come out to a 20 to 30 point difference in the game. Most teams are not better than their opponent by 20 points. So that -5 turnover battle creates a hard stat to overcome. I use, “Value the Basketball,” over and over again all year long. This is to get my players to understand the importance of not turning the ball over. The most important stat at the end of the game is who won the turnover battle?
2) Rebounding: Offensive Rebounding Percentage
The second stat that I look at is rebounding. I do not just look at how many rebounds we had in comparison to our opponent. I look at the percentage of offensive rebounds for us and our opponent. Looking at my stats, both teams are usually around 30% on average for the number of offensive rebounds compared to missed shots. Again each team is going to shoot on average about 47 shots per game. If a team shoots 50% from the field then that means there are about 23 missed shots. What I want to do is get half our all of our missed shots with an offensive rebound. If we get half of the missed shots back in offensive rebounds then we have gained another 11 shots for that game. On the other side we want to limit our opponent to under 10% offensive rebound on all their missed shots. Staying with the same numbers this means they are getting an extra 5 shots on offensive rebounds. This 6 shot difference due to offensive rebounds could be up to a 12 to 18 point difference in scoring for your team. While most games the offensive rebounding percentages are about the same, the games in which there is a big difference between the two teams, the better offensive rebounding team is usually going to win that game. They are earning extra shots and some of these are easy put backs. While at the same time they are limiting their opponent to only one shot per trip. This reduces the amount of easy shots or shots taken with the defense scrambling after an offensive rebound. This stat indicates which team is earning themselves those extra shots.
3) Free Throw Percentage
The last stat I look at is free throw percentage. This stat is not a big indicator of winning or losing, however I have won and lost games because of how well or poorly a team shot free throws. This is about not taking advantage of easy points by missing free throws. Our team goal is to shoot 70% as a team from the free throw line every game. For instance, one season our team average shooting 14 free throws a game. At 70% made this is 10 points a game. At 50% this is 7 points a game. That is a difference of 3 points. One possession. Now ask yourself how many games have you won or lost within that one possession scoring range. In one season, I had 4 games decided within 3 points. That free throw percentage can be the difference between 4 more wins or losses. We are only playing about 24 games in a season. 4 games is 17% of the season. That can be the difference between 12-12, 8-16 or 16-8. A record of 8-16 is not that good. A 4 game swing brings that to a 12-12 record. To me that 4 game difference in the record does a lot for or against a program. An 8-16 can get people fired quickly. While free throw percentage does not carry the same type of weighted outcome to each game, it can be that small little difference in determining quite a few games each and every year.
Conclusion
There are a lot of stats in the game of basketball. Most of them have value. Some of them are much more valuable in determining the outcome of a game. I think the game of basketball really comes down to trying to get as many shots during the game as possible and limiting the number of shots your opponent gets. Turnovers and offensive rebounds impact the total number of shots each team gets a game. While there are games where a team has fewer turnovers and more offensive rebounds and still loses, most of the time a team that commits less turnovers and has more offensive rebounds than their opponent, that team is going to win the game. These are the two most important stats in my opinion in the game of basketball. Free throw percentage comes in 3rd because that usually determines the winner in a close basketball game. Good free throw shooting can keep a lead late in a game. Bad free throw shooting can give your opponent a chance to make a comeback late in a game. As you start to look over the stats after each game, take special notice of these three. I think you will find yourself winning games when the emphasis is put on winning these stat battles.
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