http://www.basketball-reference.com/blog/?p=526 NBA & ABA Basketball Statistics & History Mon, 21 Nov 2011 20:56:04 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=4.6 http://www.basketball-reference.com/blog/?p=526&cpage=1#comment-7938 Mon, 15 Dec 2008 08:37:23 +0000 http://www.basketball-reference.com/blog/?p=526#comment-7938 Underdogs should want to play slow in general to have the most chance that favorable play would be enough to beat the favorite at the time the clock runs out. Then I wondered why so many good teams play slow. Well of course they play slow because they play good defense forcing the other time to use a larger share of the shot clock looking for a good shot and by being methodical on offense too. But I think they also play slow because if they can get a nice lead early then it makes sense for them to play slow and protect that lead from extra chances to reduce it. Dean and others have presented calculators for odds of winning based on lead of certain size and time on clock. The bigger the lead, the shorter the time, the better the chance of victory. So I assume a slower pace is in the same vein as shorter time and to the advantage of the team in the lead. Conversely an underdog who slipped well behind- at some point-, probably in second half- may benefit from playing faster I'd think but am not sure if these two tools and considerations need to be blended instead of just swapped for each other.

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