Where Do We Stand? December 17th
From one set of NERDstats directly into another. Posts beginning with "So..." are so November 2024. It's December, so it's time to evaluate Where We Stand every week.
First, your reminder of why I use the term "NERDstats." It comes from the old version of IlliniBoard. The message board version of the site when I was just a commenter and not the publisher. Back then, I was an analytics hater. I used "NERDstats" as a pejorative.
Over the years, I came to understand that I simply disliked the way that NERDstats were used. The "that's not what these analytics say you big dumb oaf" tone of the early adopters of all things NERDstat. The NERDstats themselves? They actually told us a lot.
As a result, all these years later, I still use the term "NERDstats" as a reference to all of that. The term speaks to my journey from hater to embracer. I now understand that they're a frame, not the canvas, and I try to stay in that mindset when I write these articles.
I wrote 14 of them throughout the football season, and now it's December, so let's discuss Where We Stand.
The IlliniBoard NERDstat Index
Yes, there's a basketball I-N-I. For football I use Bill Connelly's SP+, ESPN's Football Power Index, Kelley Ford's K-Ford rankings, and Brian Fremeau's FEI. For basketball, I do use ESPN's index again (the BPI instead of the FPI) but then I use KenPom (Ken Pomeroy), T-Rank (Bart Torvik), and EvanMiya (Evan Miyakawa).
The reason I don't use the NCAA's "NET" rankings? Those are more on the "who have you played and how have you done?" end while KenPom et al. are in the "let's not focus on who won and who lost and think a little more about who does All The Things at a very high level" category. The thought with these I-N-I rankings is to see Where We Stand. If we're 11-0 but ranked 39th in the I-N-I, there are concerns we need to talk about. If we're 7-4 but ranked 8th, then I'll want to discuss how we're poised to go on a run.
As I do with football (and as I did all of last season with basketball), I compile the I-N-I for the entire Big Ten to see Where We Stand in the conference. Last year the I-N-I absolutely screamed "it's Purdue & Illinois and then a massive gap." It tried like hell to say that Michigan State was a thing all season before finally giving up in March. In the end – and in both the Sweet 16 and the Elite Eight – it was just Purdue and Illinois.
With basketball, I usually wait until mid-December to put together the first I-N-I. With so many variables (and so many games), some of these metrics are a bit shaky the first six weeks of the season. I'm of the belief that preseason assumptions are much easier to do for football than basketball, so I start the I-N-I in Week One for football and wait until some time around December 15th for basketball.
And here it is. The current I-N-I for the Big Ten:
