How Tough Is It To Win On The Road In Conference?
Turn on ESPN any night and you will hear "expert" analysis on college basketball. These analysts repeat many phrases over the year. They talk about how certain teams rebound well, some teams shoot the three well, and quirky teams seem to do all the little things. What they always seem to come back to, when doing general analysis, is how hard it is to win on the road. In particular, this talk reaches a fever pitch during conference season. The question remains, is it really that hard to win on the road in conference?
Our eyes tell us yes. We watch our favorite team lose to a less talented team on the road, and everything we've heard on the analyst's shows rings true. We lose a bet when a sub-par team holds serve at home against a quality team. We're continually bombarded by talk of road victories being very hard to come by, but we have to be careful when listening to our eyes some times.
The bottom line: is it all true? Well, fortunately we can look at the numbers and make a reasonable argument one way or another. To do this, we'll look at the conference home records of the six major (BCS) conferences for the 2009-2010 season (through 02/17). Here are the home winning percentages, by conference, for the season thus far.
| Conf | Home W | Home L | Home Win % |
| ACC | 48 | 21 | 69.57% |
| Big East | 67 | 37 | 64.42% |
| Big 10 | 42 | 31 | 57.53% |
| Big 12 | 44 | 22 | 66.67% |
| PAC 10 | 44 | 19 | 69.84% |
| SEC | 44 | 20 | 68.75% |
In this case, the statistics tell all. Looking at the home win percentages we see that five of the six major conferences are right at, or above, 65% in home winning percentage. This says in a college season that sees about 8 conference games at home, the average team can expect to go 5-3 or 6-2 in these contests. That's a pretty solid figure, and it says that it is truly difficult to win on the road.
It is interesting that the Big Ten stands out with the 58% home winning percentage. What does this say about the Big Ten? Well, the teams are, on average, pretty evenly matched. In addition, watching one Big Ten game is like watching every Big Ten game all season. The pace of play in Big Ten games is typically slow, grind-it-out type play. Case in point, Wisconsin-Minnesota is on in the background and the score is 14-8 with 12 minutes to go in the first half. If that held up, there would be a 47-27 finish. Yes, I know that's a ridiculous leap to make, but most of the Big Ten games you see are played in the low to mid 60's. This results in games that are close at the end, allowing a road team to make a couple of key shots, or get a couple of key stops, and escape with a victory.
The analysts seem to be right this time. In the major six NCAA basketball conferences, the home teams have a combined 65.8% win percentage at home in conference. With over 400 games played, we can assume this is a significant statistical figure. If you bet the home team to win every conference match up you could expect to win two of every three bets you make. More importantly, what this really tells us is that when your team goes on the road an secures a win in January and February it should be a cause for celebration, no matter the opponent.
