Based on the data, NC State basketball is one of the most unlucky programs in the country

Ken Pomeroy is one of the most respected data analysts in the college basketball space.

He runs KenPom.com, which was one of the first deep-data type sites out there for public consumption (subscription.) The platform looks at things like ‘4-factors’ and adjusted offensive and defensive efficiency.

The one other cool metric he’s added is ‘Luck Rating,” which measures how much better or worse a college basketball team’s record is than what their efficiency numbers say they “deserve” to be.

So here is how it works…

KenPom looks at every game the team has played. Then, using his adjusted efficiency margins (AdjOE/AdjDE), he calculates the expected win probability in each game. For every close game (especially one-possession games in the last few minutes), he figures out roughly how often a team with their efficiency should win that specific game. He then compares the actual wins in those games to the expected wins.

• • If a team won more close games than expected → positive Luck (they’ve been lucky)
  • If they lost more close games than expected → negative Luck (they’ve been unlucky)

So where does NC State slot in here? Well, they are one of the most unlucky teams in the country.

They rank 318th out of 365 teams, with a luck rating of -.092.

(pictured 307 through 328)

The good news for NC State is that ‘luck rating’ tends to regress to zero over time (especially by March). A very lucky team early in the season usually cools off, and a very unlucky team usually improves by season’s end.

It’s also reported that bracketologists look at this metric when evaluating teams in March.