Bo Ryan by the numbers: Examining Wisconsin basketball's remarkable run since 2001

Ed. note: This story was published on July 1, after Bo Ryan first said he would retire after the 2015-16 season. It remains unchanged, but we are choosing to repromote it in light of Tuesday's surprise announcement that Ryan was retiring effective immediately.

By any measure, Bo Ryan is the greatest coach in the history of Wisconsin basketball, with the possible exception of Walter "Doc" Meanwell, who built a powerhouse at UW in the early part of the 20th century. Bo won more games, more Big Ten games, more tournament games -- more whatever you can think of -- than anyone who preceded him.

And it's not close. Some representative numbers:

	Pre-Bo Ryan	Bo Ryan Era
NCAA tournaments	7	14
Final Fours	2	2
Big Ten championships (since 1939)	2	4
Big Ten tournament championships	0	3
30 wins	0	4
20 wins	4	12
Winning %	.502	.741

A Big Ten legend

In the beginning we said, "What Bo Ryan is accomplishing is amazing, for Wisconsin."

In the end we say, "What Bo Ryan accomplished is amazing, for any program."

Between 1950 and 1992, Wisconsin basketball was essentially an embarrassment, one of the worst major-conference teams -- ever. At least we had Northwestern, but that's all we had:

Big Ten overall records, 1951-1992

Indiana: 779-363 (.682)
Illinois: 711-405 (.637)
Purdue: 689-426 (.618)
Iowa: 679-430 (.612)
Ohio State: 684-434 (.612)
Michigan: 671-453 (.597)
Minnesota: 612-466 (.568)
Michigan State: 592-481 (.552)
Wisconsin: 454-611 (.426)
Northwestern: 376-667 (.360)

Stu Jackson showed up in 1992, and things started looking up. This mini-bloom culminated in Dick Bennett's magical run to the Final Four in 2000, but even if you start the clock in 1992, Wisconsin was a resolutely mediocre program:

Big Ten overall records, 1992-2001

Michigan State: 227-92 (.712)
Indiana: 223-100 (.690)
Purdue: 224-101 (.689)
Michigan: 204-118 (.634)
Iowa: 196-116 (.628)
Illinois: 194-120 (.618)
Minnesota: 200-126 (.613)
Wisconsin: 167-136 (.551)
Ohio State: 158-140 (.530)
Northwestern: 92-191 (.325)

Now compare the 14 years of the Bo Ryan era:

Wisconsin: 357-125 (.741)
Ohio State: 354-133 (.727)
Michigan State: 347-146 (.704)
Illinois: 323-159 (.670)
Purdue: 268-189 (.586)
Michigan: 274-194 (.585)
Indiana: 261-196 (.571)
Minnesota: 262-202 (.565)
Iowa: 249-211 (.541)
Northwestern: 210-227 (.481)
Penn State: 184-255 (.419)

Under Bo, Wisconsin has more Big Ten wins over the last X years, where X equals 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 or 14. In other words, all the Xs:

Big Ten Wins Since...	Wisconsin	Michigan	Michigan State	Ohio State	Indiana	Illinois	Purdue
2015	16	8	12	11	9	9	12
2014	28	23	24	21	16	16	17
2013	40	35	37	34	30	24	25
2012	52	48	50	47	41	30	35
2011	65	57	59	63	44	39	49
2010	78	64	73	77	48	49	63
2009	88	73	88	87	49	60	74
2008	104	78	100	97	63	65	89
2007	117	86	108	112	73	74	98
2006	126	94	116	124	82	85	101
2005	137	98	129	132	92	100	104
2004	149	106	141	138	99	113	111
2003	161	116	151	145	107	124	121
2002	172	121	161	156	118	135	126

The arch-mage of basketball efficiency

It is fitting that Bo's era at Wisconsin began in 2002, which is also when the records for Kenpom's "tempo-free era" begin. During that time, Bo's teams have consistently dominated in both offensive and defensive efficiency. Only Duke and Kansas have a better average efficiency rating in the tempo-free era:

Team	Conference	Average OE	Rank	Average DE	Rank	Pyth. Calc.
Duke	ACC	117.0	1	92.4	3	0.9379
Kansas	Big 12	113.8	5	90.1	1	0.9357
Wisconsin	Big Ten	113.6	6	92.8	7	0.9103
Kentucky	SEC	112.9	10	92.6	5	0.9071
Florida	SEC	114.0	3	94.1	15	0.9005
Louisville	ACC	110.3	23	91.1	2	0.9000
North Carolina	ACC	113.3	8	94.0	14	0.8956
Pittsburgh	ACC	112.5	11	94.0	13	0.8879
Michigan State	Big Ten	111.9	13	93.5	9	0.8876
Ohio State	Big Ten	112.1	12	93.8	11	0.8868

Among Big Ten teams, Bo's Badgers have, on average, had the best offense and the second-best defense (behind Illinois, strangely) in the conference:

Team	Average OE	Rank	Average DE	Rank	Pyth. Calc.
Wisconsin	113.6	6	92.8	7	0.9103
Michigan State	111.9	13	93.5	9	0.8876
Ohio State	112.1	12	93.8	11	0.8868
Illinois	108.5	48	92.5	4	0.8616
Maryland	108.7	44	94.3	18	0.8366
Purdue	107.4	58	95.1	22	0.8013
Michigan	109.2	37	97.1	50	0.7952
Indiana	109.4	33	97.6	60	0.7877
Minnesota	107.3	60	96.6	45	0.7700
Iowa	107.2	61	96.8	47	0.7635
Nebraska	103.5	119	96.2	38	0.6978
Northwestern	105.1	89	99.9	107	0.6426
Rutgers	101.5	172	98.7	83	0.5790
Penn State	103.0	134	100.6	127	0.5664

The 2015 Badgers had the best adjusted OE (127.9) of any team in the Kenpom era. The 2013 Badgers had the third-best defensive efficiency (85.6) of any team in the Kenpom era (only 2009 Memphis and 2012 Louisville had better seasons). To quote John Gasaway, "The man doesn't specialize in either offense or defense, just excellence."

Bo Ryan in the NCAA tournament: Really good

At some point, Bo developed a reputation as a choker in March. It was nice to see that reputation implode the last two seasons. All told, Bo's record in the NCAA tournament looks a lot like his overall record: a testament to excellence.

Let's start with the most basic metric: NCAA tournament appearances. Over the past 14 years, Bo has coached the Badgers into the Round-of-64 14 times, joining just four other coaches in that club:

Coach	Round-of-64 appearances
Mike Krzyzewski	14
Tom Izzo	14
Bill Self	14
Bo Ryan	14
Mark Few	14
Roy Williams	13
Rick Barnes	13
Rick Pitino	12
Thad Matta	12
John Calipari	11

This was not a matter of squeaking into the dance, as Bo’s teams earned a No. 5 seed or better in nine of the 14 seasons, including each of the last six:

Coach	Top-Five Seed
Bill Self	14
Mike Krzyzewski	13
Roy Williams	10
Jim Boeheim	10
Billy Donovan	9
Rick Pitino	9
Bo Ryan	9
John Calipari	8
Jim Calhoun	8
Thad Matta	7
Jamie Dixon	7
Tom Izzo	7

In the tournament, Bo piled up the wins. Only eight coaches won more tournament games in this period:

Coach	NCAA Wins
Roy Williams	40
John Calipari	36
Mike Krzyzewski	32
Tom Izzo	30
Bill Self	30
Rick Pitino	27
Billy Donovan	27
Jim Calhoun	26
Bo Ryan	25
Thad Matta	23

Those wins resulted in seven trips to the second weekend of the tournament, or one every other year:

Coach	Sweet 16s
Mike Krzyzewski	10
Tom Izzo	9
Roy Williams	9
John Calipari	9
Bill Self	8
Bo Ryan	7
Rick Pitino	7
Sean Miller	7
Thad Matta	6
Billy Donovan	6

With the last two seasons' Final Fours, Bo put himself into a very select group of coaches who got to the sport's ultimate stage multiple times in this period:

Coach	Final Four
Roy Williams	5
John Calipari	5
Tom Izzo	4
Rick Pitino	3
Billy Donovan	3
Jim Calhoun	3
Mike Krzyzewski	3
Ben Howland	3
Bill Self	2
Thad Matta	2
Bo Ryan	2
Jim Boeheim	2
Brad Stevens	2

Famously, Bo did all this with very few highly touted or exceptionally talented players. So far, only four of his players have been drafted in the first round of the NBA draft. His teams (the red dot below) stand out as a clear outlier from the general rule that it takes NBA talent to succeed in March:

There were a couple of disappointments -- most notably in 2007 and 2013 –- but on the whole Bo’s teams slightly overachieved in the tournament both in terms of wins against Kenpom expectations ("+/-" below) and Performance Against Seed Expectation (PASE):

Year	Seed	Actual Ws	Exp. Ws	+/-	PASE
2015	1	5	3.2	1.8	1.7
2014	2	4	2.3	1.7	1.6
2013	5	0	1.3	-1.3	-1.1
2012	4	2	1.9	0.1	0.4
2011	4	2	1.7	0.3	0.4
2010	4	1	1.5	-0.5	-0.6
2009	12	1	0.9	0.1	0.4
2008	3	2	2.2	-0.2	0.0
2007	2	1	2.2	-1.2	-1.4
2006	9	0	0.6	-0.6	-0.4
2005	6	3	1.4	1.6	2.1
2004	6	1	1.5	-0.5	0.1
2003	5	2	1.7	0.3	0.9
2002	8	1	0.8	0.2	0.1
	Total:	25	23	2.0	4.4

Not done yet

From the start, Bo Ryan has always found ways to surprise us. Consider his first four seasons at UW:

First season: Unbelievable, out-of-nowhere share of the Big Ten title, the first since 1947.

Second season: Outright Big Ten champs (what?) and a Sweet 16.

Third season: Devin Harris Big Ten MVP and a Big Ten tournament championship.

Then, 2004-05: a surprise run to the Elite Eight, and a second-half lead against eventual champion North Carolina.

Next year's team, Bo's last, bears striking resemblance to the somewhat disappointing 2005-06 team (as I will get around to writing about one of these days). But even that team showed great promise before Marcus Landry and Greg Stiemsma had to sit out the second semester.

I've got a feeling Bo's got one more surprise for us.