To compare
the returning talent of the two teams, I’m going to use Basketball Reference’s
Win Shares from the year before, an estimate of how many of a team’s wins a
player contributed, as well as the rate statistic Win Shares per 40 Minutes.
Here’s how the returners stack up:
A quick glance at the tables shows that while Kentucky
brings back more total Win Shares, Duke brings back the best overall player in
Grayson Allen and a higher quality of player on average. Both teams return two
players that can essentially be labeled non-contributors, posting a WS/40 of
under 0.1. Neither Dominique Hawkins nor Derek Willis saw meaningful minutes
for Kentucky in the 2014-15 season, and with both playing in a frontcourt
crowded by more talented players, it appears safe to say that neither Chase
Jeter nor Sean Obi will this year for Duke. Removing those two players from
each side gives total WS and WS/40 of 15.3 and 0.682 for Duke and 17.8 and .915
for Kentucky. While removing those small contributors increases Kentucky’s
advantage in total, it adds to their deficit on average. Duke’s new averages
come in at 3.825 and 0.171 while Kentucky’s are 2.967 and 0.153.
While Duke
is bringing back better players on average than Kentucky, how those players are
used could come a long way in determining team success. That Kentucky team
blitzed opponents with a seemingly never-ending line of reinforcements- they
had 10 players average double-digit minutes per game. It seems unlikely that
Coach K uses a similar strategy- he returns less contributing players than
Coach Calipari did at Kentucky (4 players with WS/40 over 0.1 compared to 6).
Additionally, in the past 3 seasons, only one Duke player outside of the team’s
top 7 played more than 10 minutes per game. That player was Semi Ojeleye in
2014-15 who averaged 10.8 MPG over 6 games played, all coming in the easier
nonconference portion of their schedule. While Kentucky relied on a long line
of players ready to come in and compete, Duke will likely try to use their
massive talent advantage over a shorter rotation to win games.
To evaluate
the recruiting classes of the two teams, I am going to use the Recruiting
Services Consensus Index (RSCI), a service that combines a number of recruiting
rankings from different expert sources to get a more normalized ranking. Duke’s
class is composed of five players on this list while Kentucky, returning more
players from the year before, had just four:
Despite getting one more prospect, Duke has the better
average ranking. Because of Coach K’s shorter rotations and the aforementioned
crowded frontcourt, it is possible that Javin Delaurier doesn’t see meaningful
minutes unless Duke’s young bigs encounter serious foul trouble. Removing him
brings their average ranking down to 7.25, half of Kentucky’s. These rankings
are by no means infallible- Towns went on to be one of the best players in the
nation and the #1 overall pick in the NBA Draft. Because of Kentucky’s larger
rotation, however, the impact of those freshman were limited- the four played a
combined 3348 minutes, or an average of 837. In comparison, the three marquee
freshman on Duke’s 2015-16 squad (Brandon Ingram, Luke Kennard, and Derryck
Thornton) played a combined 3142 minutes, or an average of just over 1047 each.
Because of Coach K’s shorter bench, his best freshman should have the
opportunity to play more than Kentucky’s did. By all indications, Duke’s
incoming class is set up to have a bigger overall impact than Kentucky’s
did two years ago.
While they
may not tear through the regular season like Kentucky did, this year’s Duke
team stacks up favorably. It seems likely that a deep March run is in their
future, especially since they’re headed by one of the top coaches in the NCAA,
and one with a history of winning at that. If things go well and they click as
a team, they could be the better overall team and capture the championship
Kentucky couldn’t.
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