+/- for Austin Peay

Eric, it is probably worth another primer on the various numbers. Each column has a different value or indicator. The ones I usually focus on are the per minute values. So starting with the KU Pts per min. This is a measure of the effectiveness of KU's offense when a player is in the game. Anything over 2 is very effective. That equates to 80 points per game. You need to be cautious since pace of game matters. The Opp Pts per min is a measure of the team defense when a player is in the game. Obviously you are looking to be below 2. But the real key is the +/- per min which is the difference between the two. This sort of normalizes for the pace of game. The final measure is the delta. The delta is a bit of a tricky metric. It does not really give a direct indication of how a player performs so much as which player had the biggest difference between when he was on the floor and when he was on the bench. So the quintessential example is say you have player "A" that plays very well and really helps the team and you have another player "B" that plays equally well. So their Pts per min and opponent points per minute were very comparable. But let's say the sub for player A is a big drop off from player A whereas the sub for player B is almost as good as player B. So the x-(+/-) for player A (data while he is on the bench) is much worse whereas the x-(+/-) for player B is pretty close to his +/-. The delta for player A will be much higher than for player B even though they played very similarly. So the delta is really used to gauge who was most missed when he was on the bench. Tonight, the good Traylor showed up and when he subbed for Lucas he played very well. So in a game like tonight, Lucas clearly helped the team and played well. But when he was on the bench his subs played very well as well. And as always, the +/- is a team stat so to use it as an individual stat is a little tricky because if you get stuck playing with some guys who are having a bad night your numbers will suffer even if you play well. So Lucas' numbers tonight were more a factor of the great play of the team when he was on the bench and not poor play on his part. I hope this helps.