Happy New Year, fellow Red Raiders! With conference play beginning on Saturday I wanted to start up a weekly post going over the analytical predictions for Texas Tech’s season. I’ll typically post early in the week to give an outlook for the Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday game as well as the game later that weekend. I’ll skip next week to let Tech get three games under their belts, and will be back with another weekly preview after that.
ESPN Basketball Power Index
BPI predicts the margin of victory for a team against an “average” team on a neutral court. Here is how the Big 12 stacks up nationally.
| National Rank | Team | BPI |
| 3 | Kansas | 14.4 |
| 15 | Baylor | 11.3 |
| 24 | W. Virginia | 10 |
| 31 | Texas Tech | 9.3 |
| 39 | Oklahoma St | 8.5 |
| 48 | Iowa St | 7.7 |
| 64 | Texas | 6.7 |
| 71 | TCU | 6.2 |
| 74 | Oklahoma | 6 |
| 92 | Kansas St | 4.6 |
BPI predicts individual game outcomes as well. Here are Texas Tech’s odds to win each conference game. The average remaining win percentage is 53.4 percent, which we can use to calculate the probability of Texas Tech’s final conference record.
| Opponent | Chance to Win (%) |
| Oklahoma St | 69.2 |
| Baylor | 56 |
| @ W. Virginia | 28.2 |
| @ Kansas St | 56.9 |
| Iowa St | 74 |
| @ TCU | 49.7 |
| W. Virginia | 66.3 |
| @ Kansas | 11.6 |
| Oklahoma | 78.3 |
| @ Texas | 45.5 |
| TCU | 77.9 |
| @ Oklahoma St | 37.8 |
| Kansas St | 82.9 |
| @ Iowa St | 33.3 |
| @ Oklahoma | 50.1 |
| Texas | 75.7 |
| @ Baylor | 27 |
| Kansas | 41.6 |
| Big 12 Record | Probability (%) |
| 6-12 | 4.5 |
| 7-11 | 8.8 |
| 8-10 | 13.9 |
| 9-9 | 17.8 |
| 10-8 | 18.4 |
| 11-7 | 15.3 |
| 12-6 | 10.3 |
| 13-5 | 5.4 |
BPI only gives Kansas (78.8 percent) and Baylor (20.1 percent) much of a chance to win the Big 12. West Virginia is next at 8.9 percent, Texas Tech with 5.2 percent, and Oklahoma State at 3.5 percent. No other team has even a 1 percent chance to win the Big 12 according to BPI. The total percentages are more than 100 due to the possibility of a split championship.
Ken Pomeroy
“KenPom” is one of the most widely cited and well respected models for college basketball. Here is how KenPom has the Big 12 prior to conference play.
| National Rank | Team | KenPom Rating |
| 2 | Kansas | 26.99 |
| 11 | Baylor | 20.92 |
| 17 | W. Virginia | 19.39 |
| 33 | Texas Tech | 16.28 |
| 40 | Oklahoma St | 15.6 |
| 53 | TCU | 13.65 |
| 55 | Oklahoma | 13.63 |
| 56 | Iowa St | 12.87 |
| 60 | Texas | 12.26 |
| 89 | Kansas St | 8.39 |
Sagarin
Sagarin is a model that predicts outcomes for many sports, including college basketball. Here’s how it has the Big 12.
| National Rank | Team | Sagarin Rating |
| 2 | Kansas | 93.1 |
| 9 | W. Virginia | 88.53 |
| 10 | Baylor | 88.47 |
| 32 | Texas Tech | 85.05 |
| 44 | Oklahoma St | 83.04 |
| 47 | Oklahoma | 82.84 |
| 53 | TCU | 82.21 |
| 61 | Iowa State | 81.22 |
| 69 | Texas | 80.66 |
| 97 | Kansas St | 77.25 |
Haslametrics
Eric Haslam has a model that predicts outcomes for every team in the country if it were to play any other team in the country on a home court, at a neutral site, or on the road. Here are his score predictions for Texas Tech’s first three games.
- Texas Tech 65 – Oklahoma State 62
- Texas Tech 64 – Baylor 64 (Baylor is favored by a couple tenths of a point)
- Texas Tech 59 – West Virginia 69
Tourney Talk
I’ll add a section this year outlining a couple different NCAA Tournament predictions and metrics
- NET rating: 42
- NET is a fairly new rating but is one of the widely cited metrics when it comes time to decide who makes the NCAA Tournament and where they’ll be seeded. NET has its flaws like all metrics do, but it’s a notable starting point.
- RPI rating: 107
- RPI is another widely cited rating come tourney time. Some believe it is antiquated and have started giving more credence to other metrics. Interestingly, the Big 12 has the top two RPI teams right now in Kansas and West Virginia.
- Bracket Matrix: 8 seed
- bracketmatrix.com compiles an average of many “bracketologists” forecasts. Texas Tech is currently sitting at an 8 seed. This is obviously subject to a lot of change, so I wouldn’t put too much stock into any of it yet. I’m just including it to track how it changes throughout the season.
- Haslam: Second team out
My Two Cents
Given how things have shaped up so far, it’s a very interesting three game stretch to start conference play. Tech opens with Oklahoma State, who is listed as the fifth best team right behind Tech in many of these models. It would be a solid win, and a pretty bad loss considering it’s in Lubbock.
Then, Tech plays the two teams ranked directly above them according to the analytics – Baylor and West Virginia. The Baylor game seems like a true toss up that wouldn’t be a bad loss but would be a great win. The trip to Morgantown seems daunting, and would be a major win and not at all a bad loss.
Overall, I think 0-3 in this stretch would be very worrying, 1-2 would be slightly disappointing but not the end of the world, and 2-1 or 3-0 would be very solid.