ADVERTISEMENT

Virginia @ West Virginia

Double Oaked Juice

Blue Chip Prospect
Apr 8, 2015
631
382
63
Kenpom is calling for a 1 point WVU victory.

So it seems rather unbelievable that West Virginia is trending at -5.5 at the sharper books.

What gives? What am I missing?
 
Kenpom is calling for a 1 point WVU victory.

So it seems rather unbelievable that West Virginia is trending at -5.5 at the sharper books.

What gives? What am I missing?
Talk about two contrasting styles. Reason for the line is that WVU is a terribly hard place to come away with a win. KU has been blown out there the last two trips.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Wildcats1st
Talk about two contrasting styles. Reason for the line is that WVU is a terribly hard place to come away with a win. KU has been blown out there the last two trips.

Sure, but it's finals week, the students are finally studying, and this just doesn't strike me a vintage Press-Virginia team. I mean, they got smoke checked by Texas A&M in Germany!
 
  • Like
Reactions: EliteBlue
This always comes down to turnovers.

WVU forces a ton of turnovers and feasts on offensive boards
UVA hardly turns the ball over and doesn't allow rebounds on defense.
 
Sure, but it's finals week, the students are finally studying, and this just doesn't strike me a vintage Press-Virginia team. I mean, they got smoke checked by Texas A&M in Germany!

It's not. They are missing Esa Ahmad for the first half of the season which certainly doesn't help them
 
KenPom tends to overrate Virginia (and Wisconsin). I think it's because both those schools tend to have a lot of 70-40 type games against crap teams where they put up unbelievably good defensive numbers. They're both outliers that his system can only account for so much, and since the system is evaluating efficiency, it's always going to value a 70-40 win more than a 90-60 win (fewer possessions, so the 70-40 win was more efficient), when the practical difference is nil.

In this specific case, though, I'm not so sure that KenPom isn't a better gauge than the Vegas line. Virginia always starts out hot, and West Virginia hasn't looked all that great. I think the line is so high because of location, and because people are generally down on Virginia after they got slaughtered in the tourney last year. If I had to bet the game, I'd take Virginia.
 
I took Virginia. UTAM embarrassed WVU so I'm banking on another physical team controlling tempo and doing the same
 
They said that WVU is expected to get a "difference-maker" Esa Ahmad back in January. Of course, we play them in late January.
 
KenPom tends to overrate Virginia (and Wisconsin). I think it's because both those schools tend to have a lot of 70-40 type games against crap teams where they put up unbelievably good defensive numbers. They're both outliers that his system can only account for so much, and since the system is evaluating efficiency, it's always going to value a 70-40 win more than a 90-60 win (fewer possessions, so the 70-40 win was more efficient), when the practical difference is nil.

In this specific case, though, I'm not so sure that KenPom isn't a better gauge than the Vegas line. Virginia always starts out hot, and West Virginia hasn't looked all that great. I think the line is so high because of location, and because people are generally down on Virginia after they got slaughtered in the tourney last year. If I had to bet the game, I'd take Virginia.

Less possessions for these teams to rate might have something to do with it tho I'm not sure.

You know the thing is I wonder if they really are overrated in these systems. If they continue to be overrated in the system, they will continue to underperform based on their KP ranking which in turn would move them down in the rankings. So if KP says they should win by 10 and the only win by 5, and this kept happening, they would move down. But that doesn't seem to be the case.

I think more likely they are rated correctly. It's just that when you come down to a one and done tournament, anytime you play a game with such few possessions as their games typically are, that's usually a recipe for an upset. The low possession games makes them more likely to be upset in other words.
 
ADVERTISEMENT