Kansas Basketball 50 in 50, No. 12: Bill Self vs. Other Great Coaches (And Parity)

by fetch9 on Oct 20, 2011 12:15 PM CDT in Kansas Jayhawk Basketball 2011-12

50 in 50 is a feature here at RCT counting down until the Jayhawks kick off the 2011 basketball season on November first. Got an idea for something you'd like to see featured here? tweet @rockchalktalk or @fetch9 or email me at fetch9 at gmail dot com.

When I did my post about first year coaches in the Big 12, I mentioned CBB Reference's formula for how well coaches resist the pull of parity. So I thought I would compare Bill Self to a couple other coaches who seem to be mentioned as among the nation's elite.

Quick disclaimer: In each of the coaches I took out their first year at each school, as it didn't seem to reward or punish someone based on what his predecessor did.

Also, a mini glossary: XWP% = expected winning percentage. WAE = Wins Above Expected

First, let's give HCBS his own table:

If you don't want to click to enlarge, HCBS is 80 wins over what he should have been expected to win, or just shy of 6 per season. This is good, but how good? Let's find out.

Coach	Years	WAE	WAE/Year	Seasons w/ negative WAE
Bill Self	14	80	5.714	0
Mike Krzyzewski	34	138	4.059	7
Roy Williams	21	101	4.810	5
Tom Izzo	15	44	2.933	3

To put the above table into layman's terms: HCBS is a wizard. If he keeps up his current pace, by the time he is retired he could end up the best coach in the history of the game in terms of WAE. Obviously in order to be considered one of the greats he'll have to win a couple more national titles, but let's all pause and consider how lucky we are to have HCBS in charge of our program. Coach K is thought of as one of the best coaches ever, and in one season out of every five he had a year of regression. Tom Izzo is generally thought to be the best coach currently, and he too has had a season of regression in one season our of five. And as for Ol' Roy? Once out of every four. (not to mention he missed the NCAA Tournament one year)

But HCBS? Goose egg. I've said it before and I'll say it again: there are some in game coaching decisions of his I disagree with, but there is a grand total of zero human beings I'd rather have in charge of the basketball program at the University of Kansas.

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Comments

sorry for the horrendously blurry table

I either make it way too small or blurry. No idea.

I write everywhere. You're probably better off following me on twitter

by fetch9 on Oct 20, 2011 12:33 PM CDT reply actions

Why not start using html tables instead of images?

Glad I came, just wish I hadn't stayed so long.
Rock Chalk Talk

by Warden11 on Oct 20, 2011 1:46 PM CDT up reply actions

then I have to enter everything twice, no?

I write everywhere. You're probably better off following me on twitter

by fetch9 on Oct 20, 2011 2:08 PM CDT up reply actions

Best Way

I know of to do it:
http://www.codeproject.com/KB/vbscript/exportHTML.aspx

Gotta know a little about macros to install but not too bad.

by bigreed on Oct 20, 2011 5:02 PM CDT up reply actions

yeah that might as well be written in Chinese

I write everywhere. You're probably better off following me on twitter

by fetch9 on Oct 20, 2011 5:37 PM CDT up reply actions

Yeah

Definitely recommend my way.

Glad I came, just wish I hadn't stayed so long.
Rock Chalk Talk

by Warden11 on Oct 20, 2011 7:50 PM CDT via mobile up reply actions

Install that

In excel and you can export to HTML. Otherwise Microsoft includes all their crap and uglifies…

by bigreed on Oct 20, 2011 8:25 PM CDT up reply actions

So XWP% this year is 0.743

This could be our year of regression. Especially with how hard the out of conference schedule is. But I have faith in HCBS. Win we win the B12, then make the sweet 16, and finish 27- 8, and pick up 1.00 WAE.

I always drink the Kool-Aid

by bt01 on Oct 20, 2011 12:54 PM CDT reply actions

Very impressive

If he avoids regression this year, it may be his best coaching job ever.

by KSinDC on Oct 20, 2011 1:23 PM CDT reply actions

What would the values have been for 2004, 2001, and 1998?

I’m not sure I understand the rationale for removing them.

by KSinDC on Oct 20, 2011 1:23 PM CDT reply actions

just cause

I didn’t really think it was fair to have what he did in his first season be compared to what a different coach did

I write everywhere. You're probably better off following me on twitter

by fetch9 on Oct 20, 2011 1:31 PM CDT up reply actions

But regression mainly has to do with turnover of talent right?

I guess if you’re a good coach replacing a failed coach that first year could overstate your actual ability to avoid regression (most would just be the difference in coaching skill) but replacing a very good coach like he did at Tulsa, Illinois and Kansas wouldn’t really suffer from that problem.

by KSinDC on Oct 20, 2011 2:13 PM CDT up reply actions

It's amazing that he's sustained the same rate at Kansas that he had in his pre-Kansas career

You’d expect as the competition gets stiffer that it’s harder to outperform your talent level, but he’s continued to beat his expected wins at Kansas at the same rate he did at Illinois/Tulsa/Oral Roberts combined.

by KSinDC on Oct 20, 2011 1:25 PM CDT reply actions

Does it make a difference that HCBS has coached at 4 schools in 14 years?

Coach K 1 in 29 of 34 yrs, Roy at 2 in 21, and Izzo at 1 in 15?

w/o the 2 Tulsa years HCBS is 4.8, or rather for the time that the coaches have been at major schools, the coaches listed are all within +/- 1 W of each other. I wonder how they compare to a larger population set?

by dagger108 on Oct 20, 2011 11:46 PM CDT reply actions

I don't think it makes sense to cherry-pick his two highest years to remove

Self has sustained the exact same rate at Kansas that he at the non-Kansas schools. So if you limit it only to his time at big-time programs, the result would be just the same as it is now.

by KSinDC on Oct 21, 2011 7:41 PM CDT up reply actions