Inside-Outside in the Big East

The percentage of 3s is down a bit this season (see Ken Pomeroy) -- the pace is up (is there a relationship between the 2?). I wanted to take a look at the Big East teams to see who has moved "inside" and who has moved "outside". The table, using stats from the entire regular season has a few surprises...

Team	Min	FGA	3FGA	FTA	PomIO	PelIO
Connecticut	6025	1700	389	773	22.59	6.37
St. John's	6625	1864	453	692	12.82	3.61
Villanova	6225	1768	558	757	11.26	3.20
Marquette	6426	1868	642	823	9.69	2.82
Syracuse	6477	1888	614	757	7.57	2.21
Georgetown	6100	1534	551	652	6.58	1.66
Providence	6225	1892	664	754	4.76	1.45
South Florida	6225	1660	528	580	3.13	0.84
Pittsburgh	6200	1893	551	597	2.43	0.74
Seton Hall	6475	1942	608	653	2.32	0.69
West Virginia	6400	1913	644	676	1.67	0.50
Rutgers	6425	1748	565	562	-0.17	-0.05
DePaul	6600	1920	635	609	-1.35	-0.39
Louisville	6025	1786	663	584	-4.42	-1.31
Cincinnati	6473	1869	702	563	-7.44	-2.15
Notre Dame	6425	2051	709	535	-8.48	-2.71

Note -- I have shown both Pomeroy's and Pelton's Inside/Outside statistic. The team's ranking is the same irrespective of the formula used. Difference between the two is more an expression of magnitude of the tendency to use the three point shot.

Mr. Inside/Mr. Outside
Remember the team(s) that show no predisposition will be 0 (zero -- or near zero) on the scale. The more "inside oriented" the greater the non-negative number; the more negative the number, the more predisposed the team is to be "outside oriented". Connecticut and St. John's as the "inside" teams was no surprise. Connecticut was ranked "most inside" last season, with ratings, 23.4/6.62, much like this season. Notre Dame as an the "outside" team was a mild surprise given the presence of Luke Harangody in the paint. The Irish were ranked #11 in the conference (#1 is most inside, #16 is most outside) last season, with (Pomeroy/Pelton) ratings of 0.50/0.15 (respectively -- like the 2008 season, only 5 teams had ratings <0.0), with most outside team (Georgetown) rated at -6.19/-1.98 (not quite the same magnitude as Notre Dame this season). Villanova's move to the inside was a surprise. I suspected Cunningham's growth as an inside force this season (both points scored and percentage of shots taken) had "focused" the offense to look more often for points in the paint, but finding the Wildcats ranked #3 in the conference with numbers, 11.26/3.20, clearly multiples of last season's (ranked #7) 3.97/1.14 was a more significant shift to the inside than I expected.

Observations
1. Pittsburgh continues it's slow but steady shift to the outside. The Panthers of Ben Howland's tenure remain by reputation an inside team, but Jamie Dixon has recruited perimeter guards and developed a more balanced attack. Ranked #9 this season, the Panthers quietly dropped down from a #6 ranking last season.
2. With well publicized inside threats in Mike Williams, Yancy Gates, Steven Toyloy, Darnell Wilkes and Anthony McClain, I was surprised to see Cincinnati with an outside orientation second only to Notre Dame. Deonta Vaughn may well have taken a good many shots (especially from the outside it seems...), but he was hardly alone. Dion Dixon, Larry Davis and even Alvin Mitchell were also predisposed to take the 3 point shot. The predisposition to shoot 3FGAs, coupled with the team's not particularly high percentage of makes (about 33.3%), may well explain their sinking offensive efficiency at the end of the season. The Bearcats were a bubble team largely on the strength of a fast start in conference play. They stumbled a bit at the end of the season (4-6 in their last 10), but losing the 1st round of the BET to DePaul definitely knocked them off the bubble.
3. The conference continues to be inside-oriented. Of the 16 members, only 5 are outside-oriented, the same number (though not the same teams) as last season. The conference "average" using Pomeroy's calculation is 3.93.