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Some data from my time in II:

Season 58: All teams between 73.8% and 79.8% opponent FT%. Can't see any pattern and it's a small gap.

Season 59: All teams between 64.9% and 79.4% opponent FT%. A large gap, but the three teams "best" at defending FT% are in the weaker conference where FT% is lower. Again I don't see any pattern between defense and opponent FT%, some of the best defensive teams gave up a high FT%.

Season 60: All teams between 64.6% and 84.5% opponent FT%. There's no pattern related to team ability, if anything so far better teams are conceding a higher FT%.

It's an interesting theory and worth checking, but at least for my small sample it doesn't hold up.

Mind sharing the data you have which made you infer that?

It's a small sample size, but one of my top FT shooters actually shoots better in a competitive Div I than in the bot infested div II. This season he has been almost perfect from the line in NT tourneys, which have very much better team defense rating than every club I've faced, but cans his shots against teams I thrash easily. Going by that, it appears as if the opposite is actually true (though we know it's just biasness of a small sample size)

Last edited by BuzzRBeater at 3/4/2023 7:11:53 PM

Hello,

It wouldnt make any sense team defense to impact the FT%.

Game shape and also when a team is playing with the reserves (because of the Cup) is two of the factors except luck that you already mention it.

I don't have large data gathered to make a study but, over the years, every time I looked up, I've always seen large gap in opposing team FT% in my leagues. And it doesn't seem right.

I've always felt the same but never really looked deeper.

Analysis of the 1-seeds and 8-seeds in my league for their first seven games of the season has produced varying results. Overall, I tend to believe that teams tend to have a very slight bump to their FT percentage when facing a better team, but this difference is, for the most part, marginal at best. These %s are based on the opponent’s records CURRENTLY (not at the time they were played- though I will do some looking on that at another point).

C.C (8 seed)
% against Bottom 3 (below .500 teams): .600 (39/65)
% against Top 4 (above .500 teams): .719 (41/57)*
% Away games: .688 (33/48)
% Home games: .635 (47/74)
*The game against the 4-seed could be considered an outlier at 1.00 (9/9). The top 3 teams’ % against was .667 (32/48).

DMC (8 seed)
% against Bottom 3: .592 (32/54)
% against Top 4: .584 (38/65)
% against Top 2: .610 (25/41)*
% Away games: .618 (47/76)
% Home games: .535 (23/43)
* Top 2 isolated because a team from this conference decided to tank suddenly at mid-season, possibly skewing standings/data.

DIA (1 seed)
% against Bottom 4: .750 (69/92)
% against Top 3: .759 (60/79)
% Away games: .775 (69/89)
% Home games: .732 (60/82

CUT (1 seed)
% against Bottom 2: .500 (23/46)*
% against Bottom 4: .468 (36/77)
% against Top 3: .662 (45/68)
% against Top 1: .762 (16/21)*
% Away games: .397 (29/73)
% Home games: .583 (42/72)
* isolated Bottom 2/Top 1 due to mid season tanking mentioned regarding DMC.

Aside from CUT, all three teams have a better percentage in away games than in home games, and all four teams have better percentages against the clear top tier than against middling or underperforming teams. The % Away for CUT is also skewed by an abnormally low number of attempts in the game against that tanking team (5 attempts, with no other games below 20 attempts). Extrapolating the percentage against the tanking team to a comparable number of attempts would give the team and Away% of .432 (38/88), and removing the outlier completely would result in an Away% of .382 (26/68).

Overall conclusion is that FT% takes into account player levels for overall results, but suggests that teams shoot slightly higher when they have to “step up” against a stronger opponent. Whether this is true, or the small sample size just leads to incorrect inferences, remains to be seen.

not sure if this is true, but IF good defenses have a lower free throw percentages against that might not be THAT weird.

For example.
If a team has good defense it might lower the touches and shot attempts the opponents best player gets. Which will result in other players maybe getting more shot attempts which might also result in more free throw attempts for players who are less good and who shoot a lower percentage.

Not sure it this is the case though, something I thought about that could be worth looking at.

i think you are missing in your study the attitude used by those teams. I would guess that a team with TIE would shoot a lower percentage.

maybe that is why you see teams that shoot better against top opponents as they play with normal or CT ?