State of the game 2011

Last week, Matt Norlander introduced you all to the idea that scoring is down across college basketball this season. This is something I should have done, but despite several people mentioning to me over recent weeks that they thought scoring was down, I never took the matter seriously enough to investigate. You should read the piece for yourself, but the summary is that it appears this season may challenge the modern record for scoring average. After running a few more numbers, it turns out that probably won’t happen. For Matt’s piece, I computed scoring average using only games that involved two Division I teams which I think is how it should be done. But the NCAA uses all games that a D-I team plays which is going to inflate the numbers slightly. Using that method puts the current scoring average at 68.9 points per game, which would be the second-lowest in the shot clock era. The previous low occurred in 2009, the first season of the extended three-point line. The post-1952 lo...