Pourover: Count the ‘Ifs’ but for Mizzou Basketball

The Blogfather of RockMNation.com, Bill Connelly, did a ‘Count the Ifs’ piece for basically every football season. Since coming aboard, Nate Edwards has rekindled the piece in Bill’s absence and the accuracy remains intact.

Count the Ifs has been, and continues to be, one of my favorite preseason pieces. Mainly because I think it fits what this site has long been about, hopeful optimism routed in reality.

Nearly every season starts with hope, even if things are dire we still hope for the best. But taking on ‘Ifs’ comes with an understanding that college basketball remains wildly different than college football. Some basic truths remain, it’s hard to win in league play and road games are far more difficult than home games. Being good on both sides of the ball is certainly helpful and efficiency when you have the ball is king.

Earlier this year I spent some time looking at how Mizzou could trim at the margins both on offense and defense in order to get themselves back on the right side of the bubble. The crux became this short quote:

We don’t need Mizzou to be the 5th best team (although I’d take that!), we just need a tournament team. Let’s pick 35th. Solidly in the NCAA Tournament for a major conference team. Texas A&M finished 35th with an adjusted efficiency margin of 17.02, a difference of 15.23 over 100 possessions, or 0.1523 ppp. Over a 68 possession game that’s a 10.35 difference.

So now you’re looking at shaving 0.1523 points per possession to go from being a last place team to being a tournament team. Or 0.076 on offense, and 0.076 on defense. That’s a 50/50 split, and it’s unlikely the Tigers will even off their offensive improvement equally with defensive improvment.

Since then the projections for the upcoming season have been released, KenPom.com has Missouri as the 52nd rated team in the country with an efficiency margin of +14.50. That equates to the 39th best offense and the 72nd best defense. I imagine this sort of result aligns with our own projections from the Mizzou Preview.

We projected the following:

• Tony Perkins ~74% minutes, 14.3 points per game
• Mark Mitchell ~72% minutes, 12.9 points per game
• Tamar Bates ~68% minutes, 12.5 points per game

These projections ended up with Missouri at a 112.7 offensive rating, unadjusted. For context on the last number, Mizzou’s unadjusted ORtg last season was 105.8 which was adjusted for opponents to 108.4. Two years ago the Tigers ORtg was 112.6 unadjusted. and 118.3 adjusted. One thing to keep in mind is last season the offensive efficiencies ballooned, and another efficiency boon is expected thanks to the remaining COVID seasons playing out this year. So a 112.7 ORtg two years ago would be a top 10 offense, but last season would barely crack the top 20.

So that’s our baseline, basically the average outcome. A rating in the 50s is purely bubble territory, a high quality offense and a so-so defense. Bubble team.

But what happens, if say, they’re better on defense?

NCAA Lock? Top 50 defense

Dennis Gates has yet to field a good defense at Missouri. Context matters always. And while his defenses at Cleveland State were nothing to write home about, within the conference they were quite good. His first season they were 5th, year 2 they were 2nd, and his last season they were 3rd in the Horizon League for defensive efficiency. So while Gates hasn’t yielded good defensive teams at Missouri, it doesn’t mean he’s incapable of doing so in comparison to his peers.

Moving from 72nd to top 50 would be about a 1.5 PPP over 100 possessions, so that’s not a huge difference. And it’s still only 10th in the SEC (From 14th). But taking 1.5 PPP in efficiency would just Mizzou from 52nd (bubble territory) into the 40th.

Currently Mizzou is projected to be the 13th best SEC per KenPom.com, 1.5 PPP would jump them to 10th. That’s not an NCAA lock, but I think you’re in, maybe playing in Dayton at the worst.

So you see where this is going.

3-point shoot your way to being safely in the Tournament!

There isn’t a projection for how the Tigers are going to shoot from outside. However it’s probably safe to assume the Tigers are projected to shoot about as well as their talent has shot in the past. Collectively the 10 Tigers who have attempted a three point shot in NCAA competition have shot 33.9%.

Two years ago the Tigers shot 36%, last year they shot 31.9%. Much of good shooting comes down to shot selection. It’s easy to see a path for Mizzou to get closer to 36% with better shot selection from Marques Warrick, Tamar Bates, and Jacob Crews. 36% would land them 4th in the league if the numbers from last year are similar. An increase from 33.9% to 36% would jump the offense a full point per 100 possessions,

A full point plus a top 50 defense would land Missouri around 35th in the country. That is a place only one power conference team in the last 10 years has missed the tournament, and that team was not from a top 4 league, which the SEC is projected to be a top two league.

But what if Mark Mitchell plays his way onto NBA Draft boards?

Now we’re getting into the human element, and way from the numbers. Truthfully, we expect certain things from Tony Perkins and Tamar Bates. Even Caleb Grill has set expectations.

The biggest unknown on the roster might be Mark Mitchell’s ceiling.

If Mitchell is more like the version we saw at Duke, a nice complementary player capable of giving you efficient garbage-man-like production then I think you’re happy. There’s nothing wrong with a productive 4-man who can give you 13 points and 6-8 rebounds a night.

But what if Mark Mitchell can be more?

What if Mitchell’s productivity can be Kobe Brown 2.0?

We’re currently projecting Mitchell’s efficiency to be 118.0. But increase his productivity to Brown levels and 125.0 and suddenly you bump Mizzou’s efficiency up another point.

Now you’re top 30.

Missouri guard Anthony Robinson II (0) dribbles towards the basket on Saturday, Oct. 26, 2024 at the Mizzou Arena in Columbia. (MICHAEL BANIEWICZ/ROCK M NATION)

EvanMiya.com site founder Evan Miyakawa did a simulation of the season, a few hundred times over and the highest efficiency season in those simulations for the Tigers was 17th.

What that would entail is virtually all of those things above happening, except the defense isn’t top 50, it’s top 20. Last season a top 20 offense and a top 50 defense landed 24th in KenPom. Top 30 in both was 25th, then a top 20 in both was 13th.

Top 15 is getting into protected seed territory.

We’ve seen as recently as last season things can go awry. A big issue in having a special season is health. For the Tigers they really need their top guys to be healthy. This season is about Perkins, Bates, Mitchell, and Grill. Warrick and Crews can help lift this team with solid scoring and defense. The younger guys can knock down some shots, but things are better if you’re experienced and talented players are hitting or exceeding their expected minutes allotment.

I’m hopeful this season. I think Missouri has a tournament team on their hands. I wish they had a better non-conference slate lined up so the margin of error were greater. But you win 9-10 games in SEC play you’re in the NCAA Tournament. So why not win 11 or 12?