Tracking the ACC vs Other Leagues (2025/2026)

[jncuse]

Some early season tracking of the ACC vs the other "P5" conferences.

If you want to see some rationale for this, the why, the importance of doing well in Q4 games, whatever, it might be covered here at some point, but you can read my first few posts in last year's thread linked below.

Thread 'Tracking the ACC OOC vs Other Leagues (24/25)'

Nov 9, 2024

I'll provide some more context behind the tracking (See Post #2 and #4 - I will try to keep that as the extent of my "theory posts" on this topic. See post #5 for what I will try to limit this thread to.

I have created a spreadsheet with various links, data pulls, that make it fairly easy to track - I just need to update the scores. I will be updating about 5 various tables as the season progresses related to OOC win%, margin , record against top 6 conferences, % of games by quad, and the summary table below.

Here are the initial results through the end of last night. Difficulty is...

• jncuse
• Replies: 94
• Forum: Syracuse Men's Basketball Board

• 

 

[jncuse]

It's been a good start for the ACC so far, but in a very small sample.

(Note - For difficulty below, the higher the number the easier the schedule - most are in the same range, except for the B12 who has played less bottom feeders)

In terms of NET impact so far it would go.
1. SEC
2. ACC
3. B10
4. B12
5. BE

B12 margin of 18.6 is a bit understated because they have played the toughest schedule of the bunch. But they would still be 4th.

Not tracking "quality" and "head to head" matches yet which matter too. Too small a sample.

In last year's thread, I seem to have something that would have been up to the end of the first weekend, so I'll compare the two after the games tomorrow.

 

[jncuse]

This was the final tally when I stopped tracking around December 20th last year. So about 85% of the total OOC games.

On similar schedule difficulties we were comfortably in 5th place in win% and margin. The SEC was absolutely dominant last year, and we were bad. Let's hope things change this year.

 

[jncuse]

After the first week of games the argument can be made that the ACC had the top week when we look at performance, and mostly margin at this point because everybody mostly starts soft.

My rankings would be #1 ACC, #2. SEC, #3 Big Ten, although the three are all tight in the margin game... I'll give the tie-break to ACC because of doing well in a small sample of head to head, and SEC struggling in those. There is a gap then, B12 is in 4th and BE is 5th. Tables will be posted tomorrow.


- From a margin perspective and impact on NET, right now the ACC has the best margin at 25.9 per game. (SEC is at 23.7 and Big 10 is at 23.5). That being said the SEC and BIG played tougher schedules so far, so when you consider that they are all about equal. I use a ratio of margin to difficulty to try to equate sched's and have SEC at 10.2%, ACC at 10.1%, and BIG at 9.8%... then there is a gap with B12 coming in at 8.0% and BE at 6.6%.

ACC has played the softest schedule to date.

- In a very small sample. ACC is also doing well in head to head between the 5 conferences (I also add Q1+Q2 games against other conferences.

ACC is 3-1
B12 4-2, B10 2-2, SEC 2-5, BE 1-4.

Its very early, but SEC won over 75% of head to head matchups last year, so 2-5 is indicative that they will not have that same level of historic year again in OOC. To be fair the SEC has played a lot of head to head road games, which most others have avoided.

I'd say after this week (and 3-4 games per team) trends are going to form that may well hold.

 

[jncuse]

I have updated for games played up to end of tonight.

I'll try to explain the why I ranked them this way tomorrow. but here are my current rankings.
#1-#3 are very close, and could go either way, but I have it as follows.

#1. ACC
#2. SEC
#3. B10

#4. B12

#5. BE

BE is way back.
B12 is doing the opposite (early) of what they did in prior years. They are doing well in quality and head to head games against other conferences (6-3), but Q4 margin is a little sub par.

By this point last year ACC was already clearly #5, and kept heading in the wrong direction. So big improvement.

 

[jncuse]

I'll also note that the ACC has now played 23% (50 of 216) of its OOC games as a conference.

A small enough sample where they could fall out of the top tier by the end of December.

BUT, 23% is also a large enough sample to conclude they will do much better in OOC than the last 3 years. The question is how much.

 

[Niastri]

This was the final tally when I stopped tracking around December 20th last year. So about 85% of the total OOC games.

View attachment 256805

On similar schedule difficulties we were comfortably in 5th place in win% and margin. The SEC was absolutely dominant last year, and we were bad. Let's hope things change this year.

According to recruiting sites who are not reliable, but at least try to stay on top of these things, the ACC had a massive infusion of talent both from the transfer and high school recruiting pools.

I wrote some posts about it, but the ACC had something like 9 schools earn top30 places in 247's combined rankings. (working from memory) Something like 11 schools made either the transfer or high school rankings top30. The conference really did well this off season.

This kind of tracks with the improved early season results. More talent=more victories.

My hypothesis is that the ACC realized what a disaster last season was, and conference wide, Athletic Departments did a better job fund raising for NIL.

We have seen that Red just didn't have the NIL firepower to compete last season, but was able to do really well with a little more money.

 

[jncuse]

The ACC Margin so far is the best, although they do have the softest schedule. When I try to adjust for schedule (with a very rough method of taking the margin/difficulty, the SEC is just ahead of the ACC at 10.0% vs 9.8%.

So in terms of NET impact it has to be pretty close between the SEC, ACC, B10.

The SEC has actually struggled in head to head games this year compared to last year when they were very good.

In head to head games against other conference:
ACC 4-3, Margin of 4.9
SEC 4-7, Margin of -4.8
B10 4-2, Margin of 2.0

So when you bring in tough games the SEC drops.

Last year the SEC dominated in head to head -- crushing everybody else where nobody was close. Their Q4 games were not that much better than others (although it was the best), but its the higher quality games that separated them. Its a different story this year for them.

 

[jncuse]

Q4 games are still by far the majority of the games. 80% of the ACC games, and 77% on average for the P5. That number will reduce to below 60% by end of OOC, but for now its the biggest factor.

In those games the margin is:
SEC 31.8 (Last year 27.9)
ACC 27.8 (Last year 19.2)
B10 26.9 (25.9)
B12 22.8 (28.3)
BE 21.7 (22.4)

So the improvement from the ACC has been massive. Going from 19.2 to 27.8, probably means you are a whole lot better as a conference, and it will help the Conference NET a lot.

In terms of head to head games, very small sample - we will know more by end of next week. But compared to last year way ahead so far
)
ACC 2025: 4-3, (postive margin of 4.9)
ACC 2024 - 20-54 (negative margin of 5.8)

 

[jncuse]

According to recruiting sites who are not reliable, but at least try to stay on top of these things, the ACC had a massive infusion of talent both from the transfer and high school recruiting pools.

I wrote some posts about it, but the ACC had something like 9 schools earn top30 places in 247's combined rankings. (working from memory) Something like 11 schools made either the transfer or high school rankings top30. The conference really did well this off season.

This kind of tracks with the improved early season results. More talent=more victories.

My hypothesis is that the ACC realized what a disaster last season was, and conference wide, Athletic Departments did a better job fund raising for NIL.

We have seen that Red just didn't have the NIL firepower to compete last season, but was able to do really well with a little more money.

That's a good analysis of the turnover. Something has happened to trigger the large improvement (at least so far) from last year.

 

[jncuse]

Sbucketball

I know on another thread you had recorded the KP at the beginning of the season, and you mentioned you would track the progression / regression.

If you do track it and post it, would be great to do it here.
I'm fairly certain the KP is moving up as a conference compared to season start... and it will move up even higher as preseason weights wear off.

 

[Sbucketball]

Sbucketball

I know on another thread you had recorded the KP at the beginning of the season, and you mentioned you would track the progression / regression.

If you do track it and post it, would be great to do it here.
I'm fairly certain the KP is moving up as a conference compared to season start... and it will move up even higher as preseason weights wear off.

Yes I'll do that!

 

[Sbucketball]

When NET comes around, we want nearly the whole ACC in the Top 75 of NET, which would be a Q1 away game and at least Q2 home game. In the last few years the ACC has had terrible Q3 and Q4 games, which was especially horrible when against a team that did poorly in non-conference play but became more competitive in January. NET is different from KenPom but KenPom can be used as a comparison for the next few weeks until net is released.

• Duke –
  • Preseason 7
  • 11/13/25: 2
• Ville –
  • Preseason 14
  • 11/13/25: 9
• Clem
  • preseason 32
  • 11/13/25: 21
• UNC –
  • Preseason 33
  • 11/13/25: 27
• NC State –
  • Preseason 38
  • 11/13/25: 24
• SMU –
  • Preseason 43
  • 11/13/25: 53
• WF –
  • Preseason 49
  • 11/13/25: 57
• Virg –
  • Preseason 59
  • 11/13/25: 45
• Pitt –
  • Preseason 63
  • 11/13/25: 63
• SU –
  • Preseason 68
  • 11/13/25: 59
• GT –
  • Preseason 70
  • 11/13/25: 94
• VT –
  • Preseason 71
  • 11/13/25: 50
• Miami –
  • Preseason 76
  • 11/13/25: 61
• ND –
  • Preseason 77
  • 11/13/25: 70
• Cal –
  • Preseason 87
  • 11/13/25: 83
• Stan –
  • Preseason 89
  • 11/13/25: 90
• BC –
  • Preseason 90
  • 11/13/25: 105
• Fl St –
  • Preseason 96
  • 11/13/25: 72

 

[Sbucketball]

Averages aren’t great since a couple bad teams doesn’t really drag down an otherwise good conference, but, anyways, ACC has a current average KenPom of 54.7. The ACC as a whole moved up an average of 4.3 spots from pre-season KenPom rankings. Without GT and BC it would be 7.3 spots.

ACC still has work to do, but it’s the only power conference that moved in a positive direction in KenPom so far. As jncuse said, the data is still weighted from bad expectations for the ACC due to last year, but it’s moving in a positive direction.

Comparing to SEC:

Pre-season: 2, 4, 9, 19, 23, 24, 26, 28, 29, 31, 35, 39, 44, 56, 58, 86
Now, 11/13/25: 5, 10, 12, 13, 19, 26, 28, 29, 31, 35, 36, 38, 41, 47, 62, 97
Preseason Ave Kenpom: 32
SEC current Ave KenPom: 33

Comparing to B10:

Pre-season: 3, 6, 10, 11, 20, 22, 25, 27, 34, 37, 40, 45, 46, 51, 57, 73, 85, 95
Now, 11/13/25: 4, 7, 15, 16, 17, 23, 32, 33, 34, 40, 42, 46, 49, 58, 60, 75, 84, 87
B10 pre-season Ave KenPom: 38.1
B10 current Ave KenPom: 40.1

Comparing to B12:

Pre-season: 1, 12, 13, 15, 17, 18, 21, 36, 61, 64, 66, 67, 69, 74, 75, 83
Now, 11/13/25: 1, 8, 11, 14, 18, 20, 25, 39, 52, 56, 78, 79, 81, 91, 98, 100,
B12 pre-season Ave KenPom: 43.25
B12 current Ave KenPom: 48.2

Comparing to BE:

Pre-season: 5, 16, 41, 47, 48, 50, 62, 72, 78, 82, 93,
Now, 11/13/25: 6, 22, 43, 51, 54, 69, 71, 76, 89, 102, 114
BE pre-season Ave KenPom: 54
BE current Ave KenPom: 63.4

Not sure how long until pre-season weights are shaken off but maybe jncuse knows.

 

[jncuse]

When NET comes around, we want nearly the whole ACC in the Top 75 of NET, which would be a Q1 away game and at least Q2 home game. In the last few years the ACC has had terrible Q3 and Q4 games, which was especially horrible when against a team that did poorly in non-conference play but became more competitive in January. NET is different from KenPom but KenPom can be used as a comparison for the next few weeks until net is released.

• Duke –
  • Preseason 7
  • 11/13/25: 2
• Ville –
  • Preseason 14
  • 11/13/25: 9
• Clem
  • preseason 32
  • 11/13/25: 21
• UNC –
  • Preseason 33
  • 11/13/25: 27
• NC State –
  • Preseason 38
  • 11/13/25: 24
• SMU –
  • Preseason 43
  • 11/13/25: 53
• WF –
  • Preseason 49
  • 11/13/25: 57
• Virg –
  • Preseason 59
  • 11/13/25: 45
• Pitt –
  • Preseason 63
  • 11/13/25: 63
• SU –
  • Preseason 68
  • 11/13/25: 59
• GT –
  • Preseason 70
  • 11/13/25: 94
• VT –
  • Preseason 71
  • 11/13/25: 50
• Miami –
  • Preseason 76
  • 11/13/25: 61
• ND –
  • Preseason 77
  • 11/13/25: 70
• Cal –
  • Preseason 87
  • 11/13/25: 83
• Stan –
  • Preseason 89
  • 11/13/25: 90
• BC –
  • Preseason 90
  • 11/13/25: 105
• Fl St –
  • Preseason 96
  • 11/13/25: 72

Thanks for that.

So 12 teams up and 5 down (1 tie). And on average up about 5 spots per team.
And since it's a net positive, they are still getting restricted by preseason weights.
IF, and bolding IF, the ACC continues to trend as it has, the average KP number is going to keep moving upwards a fair bit as the preseason weights wear off.

Seems like there is only one clear dud in the ACC right now. BC at #105... and they are headed to far worse than #105, but right now their preseason ranking is helping them.

To me what is interesting is the number of teams initially ranked below #50, that have moved up a lot already (10 spots or more). Florida St, Miami, Virginia Tech, Syracuse, Virginia. That's quite a few teams, and that bodes well for the depth of the conference which builds on itself to create more Q1 and Q2 wins.

Also had to do a double check on Wake Forest - wasn't expecting them to go down in rank based on what I saw against Michigan. But then I looked at what they did in the other 2 games, and it was subpar modest wins (12 and 16) against Morehead and American. Just goes to show you heavy margin against bad teams will influence things.

 

[jncuse]

Not sure how long until pre-season weights are shaken off but maybe jncuse knows.

I don't know KP's secret sauce in that regard. I believe I have saw him respond before that it take 8-10 games and most of it goes away (so maybe 10-15% per game). Perhaps now he has them roll off quicker, preseason projections are so hard to d.

Part of the reason he does it is he doesn't like blowouts, and particular last 5 minutes of game time skewing things due to a small sample. In theory it makes sense, the problem in the new NCAA makes preseason rankings so suspect.