Up and down stats hold up season’s jumbled standings
Going by how teams finished last season, no one could have predicted that 18 games into the UAAP Season 88 men’s basketball tournament would look the way it does now.
Ateneo and National University missed last year’s Final Four, and here they are, both sharing 4-1 (win-loss) records to lead an eight-team field that has had its share of surprises.
And as crazy as the standings look, the numbers fueling the teams look even crazier.
It’s hard to pinpoint the right statistics that show winning trends—although a combination of three-point shooting, passing, and defense seems to show a winning statistical pattern, although mildly.
But so far, teams are winning—and losing—with their own signature style, based on statistics provided by Pong Ducanes and the UAAP Stats Group.
NU, for example, leads the league in defense, allowing just 62.8 points per game so far this season. However, Adamson is second in that department, surrendering just about half a point more per game, and yet the Falcons are at the opposite end of the standings with just one win to show in five games.
NU also leads the league in steals (10.4), blocked shots (3.6), and turnovers forced (17.0). The Bulldogs have been great at scoring off those errors with a league-best 20.0 points off turnovers each outing, anchored by a tournament No. 1 14.0 fastbreak points per game.
Adamson’s problem lies in its offense. The Falcons average only 58.0 points per game—the only team averaging less than 60 an outing. But NU sits just above Adamson at No. 7 with 69.4 points per game and it is tasting early success.
Ateneo’s closeout defense is peerless, holding opponents’ three-pointers to just 23.2 percent shooting, an outing to backstop the league’s best three-point shooters—the Eagles are No. 1 at 31.5 percent a game.
Both the Tigers and the Eagles have lost just once this season and are No. 2 and No. 3 in assists. Those passes allowed both teams to hit open shots. While Ateneo leads the league in three-point rate, UST is tops in total field goal percentage (44.5) and 2-point field goal percentage (52.6).
But La Salle, which leads the field in assists (18 per game) is out of the top half in all three shooting departments, ranking fifth in each of them.
Defending champion University of the Philippines has been stuck in the middle of a lot of statistical categories largely because of its back-to-back losses to start the season, but its three-game winning streak—the longest active win run right now—is fueled by an equal attention on both sides of the court.
The Maroons are now No. 3 in both scoring (73.4) and points allowed (70.4).
