The Continuity of Calipari’s Cats

Since taking the job prior to the 2009-2010 season, John Calipari has recruited a wealth of talent to Kentucky. Based on team rankings at 247Sports.com, Kentucky has had the number 1 or 2 ranked recruiting class every season. Given the number of teams playing NCAA basketball, the non-linear maturation process of college-aged players and the inherent randomness and luck involved in winning an NCAA Championship, this ranking does not preordain Kentucky to finish as the top team. But it can often provide a rough estimate of the talent on hand in a program.

Despite their bench being filled with eventual NBA talent, there have been seasons where despite that talent, the Cats end up as an afterthought or even relegated to the NIT. For example, in 2012-2013 Kentucky had 4 Top 25 recruits in their regular rotation, but their season ended in the NIT with an unlikely loss to Robert Morris, the David to Kentucky’s Goliath. Kentucky was coming off a National Title and lost six players to the NBA Draft, including #1 pick Anthony Davis and #2 pick Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, but brought in the #2 class in the nation. During their 24th game, they lost arguably their best player, center Nerlens Noel. Still even to that point, they had played well below their #3 preseason rank going 17-7 and were far from assured an NCAA berth.

Given the current one-and-done environment of the college game, specifically at the programs that are able to recruit top tier talent, yearly roster turnover like this can be expected. But does the yearly loss of players have a clear effect on the performance of the team or is the ability to recruit a way of mitigating those losses?

I looked at each Kentucky team during the John Calipari era (2009-current) and reviewed their returning minutes from players who had appeared in at least 20%[1. Somewhat arbitrarily chosen.] minutes the previous season (to weed out any non-rotational players). Comparing this “returning minutes” percentage with that seasons’ winning percentage produces the following:

Each year the returning minutes decreased, the Kentucky winning percentage went down. The low season in minutes returning (6%) coincided with their relatively putrid and aforementioned ‘12-13 campaign. Their two best teams (‘09-10 w/Wall, Cousins and ‘11-12 w/A. Davis, Kidd-Gilchrist) both benefited from terrific freshman classes, but also had the two highest percentage of minutes returning during the Calipari era.

Common sense indicates the benefits of experience and continuity. In the case of Kentucky coupling that continuity with the annual influx high level of talent almost naturally leads to better the result on the court. In other situations (i.e. losing teams) returning many of the same players might not be so beneficial, but this is not generally a problem in Lexington.

Looking at the relationships between returning minutes and recruiting points independently (a number I used to measure the talent on hand each year) versus the winning percentage change from the previous year, the effect of continuity on the Wildcats appears stronger than the talent on hand.

But this is where Kentucky, is not like every other team in America.

Teams with lesser base level talent (pretty much everyone else nationally) that add one high level recruit often see a huge spike in winning percentage from year to year, independent of their returning talent. The better the talent added, the less continuity matters.

But the reason continuity has such a large effect on Kentucky is because that base level talent is staying relatively static, but high, each year. Having the #1 or #2 recruiting class each year makes continuity the variable with more year-to-year fluctuation than overall talent level. Based on the projected returning minutes for Kentucky this year, their success last season, the incoming recruits, and the high degree of correlation (95%) when incorporating both overall talent level and minutes, Kentucky is projected to have their fourth most successful season under Calipari.

Interestingly Duke seems to be starting to employ the same practices as Kentucky. The 2014 recruiting  class with 3 Top-25 recruits[2.  Jahlil Okafor, Tyus Jones, and Justise Winslow.] garnered them the National Championship, building on the dramatic spike in talent level from the previous year[3. Duke had only 1 Top-25 recruit in 2013, Jabari Parker.]. Looking forward, Duke has the #2 recruiting class this season followed by the projected #1 class in 2016, thanks for the #1 and #2 prospects in the country committing to them. Going forward, Duke will provide a second annual test case for the need to retain some players with sizable roles outside of those sure-fire one-and-dones in terms of seasonal success.