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Statistics are an important part of basketball and there are myriad rating systems out there that will tell you whether your favorite team is a bag full of trash or not. Let’s take a look at what they all say about our favorite basketball team!
- KenPom
Ken Pomeroy is the godfather of college basketball advanced statistics. He has the Badgers at No. 45 in his rankings with an AdjEm (adjusted efficiency margin) of +14.90. That is squarely on the NCAA Tournament bubble if I’m remembering past rankings correctly. It also puts the Badgers at tenth in the B1G, but only four overall spots behind the eighth team in the conference, No. 41 Iowa.
He has the offense as the No. 67 most efficient in the country, while the defense is No. 29. Their adjusted tempo is No. 347 which is the seventh slowest in the nation.
- T-Rank
Compiled by Bart Torvik from sacred data and secret formulas, T-Rank is another excellent formula to tell you if your team is good or not. (Disclaimer: Bart used to write for B5Q and like all of us, he is extremely good looking and well-read) T-Rank is a bit more bullish on the Badgers, having them ranked at No. 25 overall with the No. 7 defense and No. 59 offense.
The Badgers are the seventh best team in the conference and, according to Bart, have an 80.9% chance to make the NCAA Tournament. In an interesting rankings note, Michigan State is not the No. 1 team in T-Rank, Florida is. Has Bart succumbed to SEC BIAS?!?!
- BPI
So, uh, ESPN’s Basketball Power Index has Wisconsin ranked...really high. The Badgers sit at No. 6 IN THE WHOLE COUNTRY! Here is how these rankings are decided according to ESPN:
A breakdown of the machinations of BPI can be found right here, but the abridged version is that in the preseason, ratings are built on four factors:
- Quantity of experience on roster (including transfers)
- Quality of that experience
- Recruiting rankings for incoming freshmen, with an extra emphasis on five-star players
- Coach’s past performance
Obviously these will be adjusted as games are played, but the Badgers are sitting pretty currently. Michigan State and Florida are first and second in BPI followed by a whose who of recent title winners: Virginia, Villanova and Duke.
The Badgers have a 95% chance to make the NCAA Tournament and a 6% chance to WIN THE NATIONAL TITLE! Wild.
- RPI
Lol, jk, we aren’t talking about this incredibly bad and dumb and also bad rating system.
- NET
They don’t do a preseason NET ranking, but here is what goes into them.
- Joe Lunardi Bracketology
Updated Monday morning because Joey Brackets doesn’t sleep, Lunardi has the Badgers as a 10-seed in the East bracket playing 7-seed Florida State in Tampa Bay (what the hell, Joe?!?). The 2-seed in their little pod is Florida so it would be back-to-back road games for Wisconsin if they were able to make it to the second round.
- Andy Katz Bracketology
Katz has the Badgers as an 8-seed playing 9-seed, and familiar tourney foe, Arizona in the West bracket. They would be in Louisville’s bracket and that’s not a team I’d want to play early on in the Tourney.