predictions for Texas game

Let the new season begin.  The post-season, that is.  It's a different Jayhawk
team than the one that cruised to a #1 ranking, defeating highly regarded
Michigan State, Tennessee, Villanova, and Marquette in the process.  Doke is
out.  Vick is gone.  Grimes never could repeat his mastery over the Spartans.
Enter Agbaji.  And now DMac is showing signs of emerging, perhaps giving Self
the opportunity to run the sort of offense he had in mind with Doke in the
line-up.  Is this new team peaking at the right time to make a deep run in
the new season?

The first test comes against a Texas squad that played Kansas close in Allen
Field House and defeated the Jayhawks in their own crib.  The Jayhawks
averaged 7 points below expectation in those two games.  The overall negative
trend for Kansas is of marginal statistical significance, while the weakly
positive trend for Texas most definitely does NOT carry statistical
significance.  Meanwhile, the negative mental toughness rating for Kansas
does have some statistical significance to it, as does the positive value
for Texas.  The overall effect would be to take 3.5 points from the Jayhawks
but add just 1 point to the Longhorns, suggesting a 0.9 point margin for
Kansas.

Coincidentally, that's pretty much what the common opponent analysis also
says.  But after three consecutive below-expectation performances, one
might think that Kansas is due for an above-expectation performance.  Not
necessarily.  The five-game stretch starting at West Virginia were all
below expectation.

What many of the prognosticators don't realize is that although technically
it's a neutral court game, in reality it's more of a home crowd for Kansas,
if not a home court, having played in the Sprint Center on numerous
occasions, including earlier this season, so the court is not all that
unfamiliar.

Then again, the home court advantage in the Big 12 was the smallest I've
seen in all the years I've been tracking the statistic, which explains
why my use of last year's home court advantage produced worse predictions
than Sagarin's, on average, over the course of the conference season.  The
swap of venue amounted to just a 7.3 point swing, much less than the 10.9
point swing of last season, though still a tad more than the 6.2 point
swing implied by Sagarin's 3.1 point home court advantage value.  So if you
want to give Kansas the home court advantage in the Sprint Center, add about
3.7 points to the predictions below.

Sagarin's eignevector analysis is the most optimistic, favoring Kansas by 7.7
points, while the common opponent analysis is the most pessimistic, favoring
Kansas by just under a point.  At least they all favor Kansas.  I should mention
that Whitlock's web site is gone, so I'm still using the ratings as of the
second-last game of the regular season.  And although Real Time does not
have a prediction up for the game, one can use the gamer predictor, much
like Dolphin's, to match arbitrary teams, and if you do that for Kansas and
Texas men at a neutral site, it comes back with Kansas 73, Texas 68, which
is also my personal prediction.

Greenfield Stats Comparison
===========================
Offensive Stats      UT     KU       Defensive Stats        UT     KU
Points/Game         71.2    75.6     Opp Points/Game       67.1    70.1
Avg Score Margin    +4.1    +5.5     Opp Effective FG %   49.7%   47.7%
Assist/Game         12.8    13.4     Off Rebounds/Gm        9.1     9.1
Total Rebouds/Gm    33.8    37.7     Def Rebounds/Gm       22.5    25.9
Effective FG %      50.9    52.8     Blocks/Game            4.1     3.7
Off Rebound %       28.6    28.0     Steals/Game            6.0     6.8
FTA/FGA            0.298   0.335     Personal Fouls/Gm     16.8    17.1
Turnover %         14.3%   16.4%

Common Opponents
================
There are nine common opponents, eight in conference plus Michigan State, giving
us nineteen scores to compare:

KU   +5 MSU neutral ( +5 neutral court)
UT  -10 MSU neutral (-10 neutral court)
KU  +15 UT  neutral (+15 neutral court)

KU   -7 KSU on road ( -3 neutral court)     KU  +15 KSU at home (+11 neutral court)
UT  +20 KSU on road (+24 neutral court)     UT   -7 KSU at home (-11 neutral court)
KU  -27 UT  neutral (-27 neutral court)     KU  +22 UT  neutral (+22 neutral court)

KU  +25 WVU at home (+21 neutral court)     KU   -1 WVU on road ( +3 neutral court)
UT   +7 WVU at home ( +3 neutral court)     UT  +22 WVU on road (+26 neutral court)
KU  +18 UT  neutral (+18 neutral court)     KU  -23 UT  neutral (-23 neutral court)

KU   +5 OSU on road ( +9 neutral court)     KU  +12 OSU at home ( +8 neutral court)
UT   -3 OSU on road ( +1 neutral court)     KU  +12 OSU at home ( +8 neutral court)
KU   +8 UT  neutral ( +8 neutral court)     KU    0 UT  neutral (  0 neutral court)

KU  +16 TTU at home (+12 neutral court)     KU  -29 TTU on road (-25 neutral court)
UT   -6 TTU at home (-10 neutral court)     UT  -19 TTU on road (-15 neutral court)
KU  +22 UT  neutral (+22 neutral court)     KU  -10 UT  neutral (-10 neutral court)

KU   +7 OU  at home ( +3 neutral court)     KU  -13 OU  on road ( -9 neutral court)
UT   +3 OU  at home ( -1 neutral court)     UT   -2 OU  on road ( +2 neutral court)
KU   +4 UT  neutral ( +4 neutral court)     KU  -11 UT  neutral (-11 neutral court)

KU   +5 TCU on road ( +9 neutral court)     KU   +9 TCU at home ( +5 neutral court)
UT   -4 TCU on road (  0 neutral court)     UT  -13 TCU at home (-17 neutral court)
KU   +9 UT  neutral ( +9 neutral court)     KU  +22 UT  neutral (+22 neutral court)

KU  -17 ISU on road (-13 neutral court)     KU   +4 ISU at home (  0 neutral court)
UT   -5 ISU on road ( -1 neutral court)     UT  +17 ISU at home (+13 neutral court)
KU  -12 UT  neutral (-12 neutral court)     KU  -13 UT  neutral (-13 neutral court)

KU   +8 BU  at home ( +4 neutral court)     KU   +5 BU  on road ( +9 neutral court)
UT  +12 BU  at home ( +8 neutral court)     UT   -1 BU  on road ( +3 neutral court)
KU   -4 UT  neutral ( -4 neutral court)     KU   +6 UT  neutral ( +6 neutral court)

KU  -10 UT  on road ( -6 neutral court)     KU   +2 UT  at home ( -2 neutral court)
UT   -6 UT  neutral ( -6 neutral court)     KU   -2 UT  neutral ( -2 neutral court)

Nine of the comparisons favor Kansas, while nine favor Texas; one is a wash.
The average is 0.95 points in favor of Kansas, but with a scatter of 14.96 points.

Players to Watch
================
most minutes       Matt Coleman (guard)
most points        Kerwin Roach Jr. (guard)
most rebounds      Dylan Osetkowski (forward)
most assists       Matt Coleman (guard)
most steals        Kerwin Roach Jr. (guard)
most blocks        Jaxson Hayes (forward)
most turnovers     Kerwin Roach Jr. (guard)
most fouls         Jaxson Hayes (forward)

                                                          23-8            16-15
                       Margin   Predicted   Win Prb      Kansas           Texas
Predictor              points     Score     percent   Rating   SOS    Rating   SOS 
====================   ======   =========   =======   =============   =============
Sagarin Overall         +3.84   72   68                # 13   #  1     # 34   #  4 
Sagarin Predictor       +3.23   71   68       62.1     # 13   #  1     # 27   #  4 
Sagarin Golden Mean     +5.03   72   67                # 10   #  1     # 30   #  4 
Sagarin Recent Games    +5.92   73   67                # 32   #  1     # 75   #  4
Sagarin Eigenvector     +7.69   74   66       76       
Massey                  +3.00   72   69       61       # 18   #  3     # 48   # 11
Pomeroy                 +1.86   70   68                # 18   #  1     # 27   # 13
Greenfield              +2.50   70   67.5              # 15   #  4     # 41   # 42
Dunkel                  +5.00   73.5 68.5              # 13            # 43       
Vegas (via Dunkel)      +2.50   70   67.5                                         
Dolphin Predictive      +1.92   71   69       56.8     # 20   #  9     # 30   # 17
Real Time                 .                            # 10   #  1     # 83   #  4 
Seven Overtimes         +4.00   73   69       80       #  6   #  4     # 33   #  6
DPPI                    +1.00   72   71       51.3     # 22   #  1     # 29   #  7 
ESPN BPI                +3.70                 64.3     # 19   #  1     # 30   # 14
Whitlock                +4.05                          #      #        #      #   
Colley Matrix          +14.66                          #  8   #  1     # 51   #  3
NCAA NET                                               # 20            # 38
common opponents        +0.95                                                                     
====================   ======   =========   =======   ============    ============ 
average                 +4.2    71.8 68.1   139.36
scatter                  3.2     1.3  1.2   142.00

Here is Kansas' season:

SITE   OPPONENT                         SCORE    PREDIC    ERROR    PROB.
----   -----------------------------   -------   ------    -----    -----
NEUT   #  4 Michigan State              92  87    -5.10   +10.10
HOME   # 89 Vermont                     84  68   +13.75    +2.25
HOME   #165 Louisiana                   89  76   +19.97    -6.97
NEUT   # 24 Marquette                   77  68    +2.33    +6.67
NEUT   #  6 Tennessee                   87  81    -2.45    +8.45
HOME   #108 Stanford                    90  84   +15.22    -9.22
HOME   # 37 Wofford                     72  47    +7.75   +17.25
HOME   # 63 New Mexico State            63  60   +11.62    -8.62
HOME   # 17 Villanova                   74  71    +4.21    -1.21
HOME   #215 South Dakota                89  53   +23.14   +12.86
AWAY   # 51 Arizona State               76  80    +3.69    -7.69
HOME   #162 Eastern Michigan            87  63   +19.83    +4.17
HOME   # 31 Oklahoma                    70  63    +6.86    +0.14
AWAY   # 16 Iowa State                  60  77    -2.10   -14.90
HOME   # 38 TCU                         77  68    +8.02    +0.98
AWAY   # 40 Baylor                      73  68    +1.99    +3.01
HOME   # 27 Texas                       80  78    +6.36    -4.36
AWAY   # 70 West Virginia               64  65    +6.12    -7.12
HOME   # 16 Iowa State                  80  76    +4.16    -0.16
AWAY   #  7 Kentucky                    63  71    -5.52    -2.48
AWAY   # 27 Texas                       63  73    +0.10   -10.10
HOME   #  9 Texas Tech                  79  63    +1.31   +14.69
AWAY   # 21 Kansas State                67  74    -1.29    -5.71
HOME   # 75 Oklahoma State              84  72   +12.53    -0.53
AWAY   # 38 TCU                         82  77    +1.76    +3.24
HOME   # 70 West Virginia               78  53   +12.38   +12.62
AWAY   #  9 Texas Tech                  62  91    -4.95   -24.05
HOME   # 21 Kansas State                64  49    +4.97   +10.03
AWAY   # 75 Oklahoma State              72  67    +6.27    -1.27
AWAY   # 31 Oklahoma                    68  81    +0.60   -13.60
HOME   # 40 Baylor                      78  70    +8.25    -0.25
NEUT   # 27 Texas                                 +3.23             0.621

Here is Texas' season:

SITE   OPPONENT                         SCORE    PREDIC    ERROR    PROB.
----   -----------------------------   -------   ------    -----    -----
HOME   #299 Eastern Illinois            71  59   +25.03   -13.03
HOME   # 49 Arkansas                    73  71    +6.27    -4.27
HOME   #156 ULM                         65  55   +15.83    -5.83
HOME   #268 The Citadel                 97  69   +23.14    +4.86
NEUT   #  5 North Carolina              92  89    -8.12   +11.12
NEUT   #  4 Michigan State              68  78    -8.33    -1.67
HOME   #138 Radford                     59  62   +14.59   -17.59
HOME   # 50 VCU(Va. Commonwealth)       53  54    +6.37    -7.37
HOME   # 10 Purdue                      72  68    -1.78    +5.78
HOME   #106 Grand Canyon                98  60   +11.56   +26.44
HOME   # 58 Providence                  65  71    +7.86   -13.86
HOME   #148 UT Arlington                76  56   +15.27    +4.73
AWAY   # 21 Kansas State                67  47    -4.52   +24.52
HOME   # 70 West Virginia               61  54    +9.15    -2.15
AWAY   # 75 Oklahoma State              58  61    +3.04    -6.04
HOME   #  9 Texas Tech                  62  68    -1.92    -4.08
AWAY   # 13 Kansas                      78  80    -6.36    +4.36
HOME   # 31 Oklahoma                    75  72    +3.63    -0.63
AWAY   # 38 TCU                         61  65    -1.47    -2.53
AWAY   # 97 Georgia                     88  98    +4.94   -14.94
HOME   # 13 Kansas                      73  63    -0.10   +10.10
AWAY   # 16 Iowa State                  60  65    -5.33    +0.33
HOME   # 40 Baylor                      84  72    +5.02    +6.98
AWAY   # 70 West Virginia               75  53    +2.89   +19.11
HOME   # 21 Kansas State                64  71    +1.74    -8.74
HOME   # 75 Oklahoma State              69  57    +9.30    +2.70
AWAY   # 31 Oklahoma                    67  69    -2.63    +0.63
AWAY   # 40 Baylor                      83  84    -1.24    +0.24
HOME   # 16 Iowa State                  86  69    +0.93   +16.07
AWAY   #  9 Texas Tech                  51  70    -8.18   -10.82
HOME   # 38 TCU                         56  69    +4.79   -17.79
NEUT   # 13 Kansas                                -3.23             0.379