By: Evelyn Tjoa, Daniel Bittner, Victor Zeidenfeld, Matt Melucci, Matthew Doctoroff, Jennifer Yu, Andrew Christie, Arthur Macedo, Praveen Kumar, Cyril Leahy What do Tom Brady, Johnny Manziel, Brian Bosworth, Shannon Sharpe, and Terrell Davis have in common? Whether they exceeded expectations or were simply underwhelming, their performance in the NFL came as a big surprise. It remains partly a mystery as to why performance in the NCAA doesn’t necessarily coordinate with performance in the NFL, and many turn to explanations relating to playing style, injury, and chemistry. However, in this artic ..read more

The 2023 Florida Panthers’ Unprecedented Playoff Surge By Nicholas Lopez and Victor Zeidenfeld Historically Unparalleled Success In a word, the 2023 Florida Panthers’ playoff performance was nothing less than unprecedented. Saturday, June 3rd, marked the start of the Stanley Cup Finals, a matchup between the Golden Knights and Florida Panthers, who were given just a 3% chance to make it this far at the end of the regular season. Once given 150-1 odds after Game 4 of the First Round to win the Stanley Cup, the Florida Panthers were miraculously favorites heading into the finals. Had they won, t ..read more

By Elliot Chin Do you ever turn on a game in the fourth quarter, only to see that you’ve caught the tail end of a barely competitive blowout? Alternatively, do you ever watch your team go blow-for-blow for three quarters (or one-and-a-half halves!) but fall apart at the end, making it feel like all the effort was for naught? The flow of a game is crucial to a fan’s experience. It’s even more crucial to a coach, whose decisions on when and who to sit and start can decide the outcome of the game. This Spring, as I devoured every minute of March Madness I could in between midterms, I began wonder ..read more

Recently, as the Boston Celtics were on the brink of history, attempting to be the first team to come back from a 3-0 series deficit, a friend asked me if streakiness had anything to do with the Celtics’ nail-biting Eastern Conference Finals performance. This got me thinking: what does it mean for a team to be streaky? And if a team is streaky, will that influence their future play? These questions are related to the “hot hand” debate, one of the earliest forays of mathematics into sports. Indeed, streakiness has been analyzed in many sports, but usually on a player level. Some results—such as ..read more

Carl Morris, 1938-2023 As many readers of the HSAC blog may have heard, beloved HSAC founding advisor Carl Morris recently passed away. Carl was instrumental in the creation of HSAC and the club would not exist in its current form without his dedication, mentorship, and support. As many HSAC members and mentees of Carl can attest, the guidance and support that he has provided the club cannot be overstated. Past HSAC members talk of his curiosity, zeal, and patience, and HSAC owes him a profound sense of gratitude for where the group is today.  HSAC alum Danie ..read more

By David Arkow, Ronan Jachuck, Luke Kolar There are 30 teams in the NBA summing to over 400 players each season. Maximizing points scored (offense) and minimizing points allowed (defense) are criteria that each team’s general manager is looking to optimize to improve their winning percentage. There are many statistics that can be measured that affect the offense and defensive sides of the game and it is the job of each team to identify players that improve these areas given their current roster. However, this is not an easy task as there are complex salary regulations that limit a team’s abili ..read more

By Evelyn Tjoa, Matthew Sheridan, Kalman Strauss, Ty Isaksen, and Elliot Chin It’s that time of year again! March has arrived and the madness is sure to follow. The Harvard Sports Analysis Collective returns with our 68 facts to help you construct a winning bracket. Overall Trends Champions typically dominate the regular season, as 28 of the last 30 tournament winners had an average margin of victory of 10 or more. Houston leads the country in scoring margin (+19), and other contenders, such as Gonzaga, UConn, UCLA, Alabama, and Tennessee also have average margins above 10. On the other hand ..read more

By: David Arkow Novak Djokovic just won his 22nd Grand Slam and his 10th Australian Open. Now that he has tied Rafael Nadal for the Slam record, fans are wondering how much more he has to go. I published an article at the end of 2020 making an analytical case for Djoker as the GOAT. At the time he had 17 Slams, but the argument for his greatness extends beyond pure Slam count with him having the highest peak performance of the Big 3, the most longevity, the best head-to-head record, and the most versatility across surfaces. Based on the aging curves of the Top 15 Open Era players, I projected ..read more

By: Kobe Chen, Steve Dalla, Michael Hume, Andrew Kelser, Jason Kwak, Ben Meron, and Paurakh Rijal Introduction Money talks… or at least the saying goes, and why wouldn’t it? In sports, common sense leads most fans to believe that the more money their team spends on superstars, the more wins and success it would achieve, but is that actually the case? From the Oakland A’s magical 2002 season run to the ’95-’96 Chicago Bulls, we’ve seen teams achieve unprecedented results with payrolls that barely crack the top half of their respective league–if at all–while alleged all-star teams like the ’04 Y ..read more

By: David Arkow, Abe Atwood, Cael Berg, Noah Chung, Josephine Elting, Josh Rosenblum, Zach Stack, Kira Gabriel, Matthew Gross, Stephanie Yoshida, Victor Zeidenfeld Every year, MLB fans vote on their favorite players to make the All-Star game. The Midsummer Classic always features the best talent in the league but there are always debates about players who were snubbed or shouldn’t have made the squad. As we have done in the NFL and in the NBA, HSAC set out to create our own All-Star teams but instead of choosing just the best players in a single year, we looked at four different decades from t ..read more