What a difference a week makes. This time last week, I had to use analytics to show that the world was not falling. I believe we’re all on the same page now that South Carolina is a team capable of making a bowl (or better) in 2024.
While last week was about maintaining optimism, I’m not going to go out of my way to temper expectations. You (the reader) typically do a good job of that without help. So, while you shouldn’t expect a national championship, this team is capable of quite a bit, especially as the schedule becomes clearer. Here, I’ll use some analytics metrics to break down what we saw against Kentucky and preview a few matchups in the LSU game on Saturday.
Analytics Metric Check-in
This will be a shorter check-in today as I’ll expand on what actually moved the numbers later in the column. First, I’ll look at SP+ and CFN’s Strength of Schedule Metric.
SP+ Ratings
The Gamecocks moved significantly in Bill Connelly’s SP+ metric, which shouldn’t surprise people. What might surprise people is that both the defense and the offense improved significantly in the metric. Here’s where South Carolina stands heading into Week 3.
Offense: 28.1 (62nd, Up 16 spots)
Defense: 18.6 (20th, Up 15 spots)
Special Teams: 0.0 (64th, Up 18 spots)
Overall: 9.6 (32nd, Up 16 Spots)
I’ll expand on the specifics later, but South Carolina moved up significantly in every aspect of the game. The offense improved by about 1.8 points in the metric (Think of that as an extra 1.8 expected points per game going forward). The defense went down three points (Again, think of that as allowing three points less) and as special teams doesn’t do a ton in the metric (field position is largely attached to the defense, not special teams) that isn’t having a huge effect.
That’s good for almost five expected points better in the metric (the overall rating is Offensive Rating – Defensive Rating + Special Teams Rating). Given that a differential of one point is around a 3-5% boost in expected win probability, depending on how close the teams are, that’s significant.
CFN Strength of Schedule Metric
As a reminder, the College Football Network Strength of Schedule metric assigns win probabilities (and thus, implied spreads) to every game on the schedule based on actual results. Those win probabilities can be turned into decimals and added to create an expected win total for the year.
Since South Carolina had a 45% chance to win the Kentucky game, per the metric, South Carolina gained 0.55 expected wins.
However, while the metric has moved the Gamecocks up a bit, it has also moved a few of their opponents up. Right now, the metric gives South Carolina an expected record of 6.36-5.64. This changes weekly, so I wouldn’t put too much stock into it right now. The metric likes LSU a lot though, so a win Saturday would likely move South Carolina over seven expected wins for the season.
Kentucky Analytics Review: Three Things
To make this easier to read, I’m taking a basic “three-point sermon” approach and talking about three things that either moved the needle of some metrics or simply caught my eye against Kentucky.
1. South Carolina’s Second Half Offensive Efficiency
The top question I anticipate getting is, “How did the offense make such a jump in SP+ while only gaining 252 yards?”
First, great question.
Second, SP+ is both opponent-adjusted and pace-adjusted. First, the opponent. Kentucky came in with a defensive SP+ rating of 19.9, good for 27th in the country, and tied for the fifth-best the Gamecocks will face this year. Playing at home (1.5-point boost) and at a standard pace (more on that in a second), Kentucky would be expected to allow about 17 points to an average offense. South Carolina (prior to this week, considered a slightly below-average offense) scored 24.
But that doesn’t tell the whole story. South Carolina and Kentucky did not play at an average pace. An offense gets about 12.5 full drives per game, but South Carolina had just 11 on Saturday. So the Gamecocks scored about a touchdown more than expected despite having a drive and a half less than the average.
[Win two tickets to the South Carolina-LSU football game]
But these metrics also factor out garbage time. Garbage time has a weird official analytics definition but it kind of makes sense. Some sites use a simple, “If the score difference is greater than x with this much time left or greater than y with this much time left, it’s garbage time.” The more exact definition though is to retroactively go through and ignore any drive where the winning team’s score was unreachable even if the losing team had scored a touchdown on every remaining drive.
So, for Saturday’s game. South Carolina took a 24-6 (three-score) lead with 28 seconds left in the third quarter. Kentucky had three drives after that. Theoretically, if Kentucky had scored touchdowns on all three, the Wildcats could have won. So Nick Emmanwori’s interception was not in garbage time. However, everything after that (given that it was a four-score game ad Kentucky only had two more drives) is garbage time for both teams.
So, take those 11 drives and cut them down to nine. Analytically-speaking, South Carolina’s final two drives (a 6-play, 36-yard grinder an a kneel down) aren’t significant or indicative of the team’s play. Oh, South Carolina also took a knee when it got the ball back with 12 seconds left in the first half either, so that doesn’t count.
On the eight drives that actually mattered, South Carolina gained 219 yards and scored 24 points. That’s not bad against a good defense. (Note: This also applies to Kentucky’s final two drives, so the Gamecock defense gave up 119 yards on the 12 statistically-significant drives. Ridiculous.)
In the second half, South Carolina was limited (or limited itself) to four real drives, scoring touchdowns on two of them and salting the game away on a third. Those three drives took a combined 13 minutes off the clock and gained 137 yards. If that’s the type of efficiency the offense can expect, the Gamecocks will have a chance to win every game on the schedule, aside from Ole Miss and Alabama.
2. More (Inside) Power!
It seems that every year South Carolina struggles in the running game only to find success with a particular scheme halfway through. We’ve had a couple inside zone years and the famous pin-and-pull year that I can recall immediately. Is it inside power this year?
Per SEC StatCat, the Gamecocks didn’t run much power against Old Dominion, but it was highly effective when they did. South Carolina ran inside power (more specifically duo and counter) eight times against Kentucky, the offense’s most-run concept. In that, the Gamecocks had just three successful runs (not necessarily a bad number) and 45 yards.
[On3 App: Get South Carolina push notifications from GamecockCentral]
Those three successes were Robbie Ashford’s 15-yarder, Rocket Sanders’ 21-yard touchdown that was brought back to the goal line and his subsequent touchdown.
Against Old Dominion, they had just four times, but for 20 yards (Also of note, they ran a bunch of outside quarterback power with success in game one, but tried not to run him against Kentucky).
Look for the Gamecocks to use more lead blockers and double teams going forward.
3. Under Pressure
I don’t think it’s possible to understate how good South Carolina’s defensive line has been. The Gamecocks have 49 pressures in two games, including on 13 of 18 dropbacks against Kentucky. When the Wildcats dropped back in true pass sets (Straight dropbacks) an average of 1.6 Gamecocks per play generated pressure.
When pressured, the Kentucky quarterbacks were a combined 2-9 with five yards and four sacks. All told, 12 different Gamecocks recorded a pressure.
Four qualifying Gamecocks have a pass rush win rate (% of times a guy beats the block in under 2.5 seconds) in true pass sets over 33%. Kyle Kennard and TJ Sanders slightly beat out Dylan Stewart here. That’s how good the entire line has been.
Analytics Preview: LSU
Checking the Metrics
College Football Network’s Strength of Schedule metric loves the Tigers and gives South Carolina just a 24.9% chance to win with an implied spread of about 8-8.5 points. But, SP+ gives the Gamecocks a 41% chance to win, with an estimated final score of 31-27.
A win would add about 0.75 wins to South Carolina’s expected season total on CFN.
Three Stats to Track
1. South Carolina’s DL vs. LSU’s OL
I’m not being groundbreaking by mentioning the Gamecock defensive front and LSU’s ridiculous tackle duo. Will Campbell and Emery Jones are three-year starters with nearly 3,000 combined snaps. But, the duo wasn’t perfect against USC and could possibly be exploited.
[Newsletters: Get breaking news and analysis from GamecockCentral]
Nussmeier excels at avoiding sacks, but he’s not very accurate under pressure, completing under 45% of his 51 career passes under duress. This is the week we see if South Carolina’s front is elite or just really good. If it’s the former, Nussmeier will be rushed, South Carolina can win this game and every other team on the schedule will be on notice.
2. Rocket Sanders After Contact
I pointed out last week on the Insiders Forum that Rocket Sanders has never been great before contact and rather he excels at running through light contact and getting to the second and third levels. Last week, he wasn’t all that good at that (Though he was hit behind the line some) but Nicholls showed that the Tigers can be exploited before contact. The Colonels ran for 2.1 yards a rush before contact against their SEC foes last week.
If Rocket can be decent before contact and his typical self after, South Carolina can control the tempo and really dictate the game script.
3. Offensive Havoc Rate
Through two games, it’s obvious that this offense isn’t going to be as explosive as last season, but that’s not the primary issues for its struggles. There’s nothing wrong with grinding down the opposition and the Gamecocks have shown the ability to consistently get 4-5 yards a play. The issue becomes when the offense gets behind the sticks, something that has plagued South Carolina under Shane Beamer.
We don’t have great college stats, but a study last year found that the average NFL sack cost a team about 1.5 expected points. That’s heightened for teams that aren’t explosive. South Carolina is moving the ball well, but sacks, penalties and negative plays in general (havoc plays) are ruining the offense’s chances at being consistent.
LSU hasn’t caused much havoc, so this is a chance to limit the negative plays and in turn, boost the offense.
South Carolina-LSU Prediction
I had already circled this one on the calendar before the year. Garrett Nussmeier will pick apart even the best of defenses if given time. South Carolina has to get pressure and has to move the ball on the ground to take pressure off of Sellers.
This is a big one. GameDay is in town. It’s a chance to go 3-0 and likely 4-0 to before resetting expectations and perhaps setting sights higher than anyone initially thought.
It’s a spot similar to ones where South Carolina has fallen flat in the past. I certainly don’t see a blowout, and we’ll see if Brian Kelly is actually thriving in Baton Rouge. A couple of the analytics metrics have this as a close game.
Call me an optimist, but give me the Gamecocks.
Prediction: South Carolina 27, LSU 23
The post South Carolina analytics breakdown: Three metrics for Week 3 appeared first on On3 .
Local News
Comments / 0