Pressure
by Ken Pomeroy on Wednesday, October 5, 2005
As a stat-head, I’m not one that believes in hot streaks or clutch plays. That’s not to say that such things should be banned from the sports vernacular, just that they aren’t skills people have or can acquire. I do believe that people tend to perform better under pressure, be it in basketball or any other activity. I don’t know of a good way to support that in basketball, though. Clutch shooting can always be offset by clutch defense, so it’s not something that comes out in the stats. Free throw shooting can’t be defended, so maybe that can tell us something about how pressure affects players.
2005 Season MOV FT% Games 33+ 66.8 171 29-32 66.4 123 25-28 66.2 158 21-24 67.7 285 17-20 69.0 454 13-16 69.4 655 9-12 69.4 859 5-8 69.4 871
This data above shows how well Division I teams shot free throws…