Marquette Basketball Four Factors: vs Alabama A&M

If you're not familiar with the Four Factors as featured on KenPom.com, the concept is very simple: There are four main parts of a basketball game that contribute to a team's success. They are:

• effective field goal percentage, or FG% with a bonus for made three pointers
  
• turnover rate, or the % of possessions that end in a turnover
  
• offensive rebound rate, or the % of possible offensive rebounds that the team grabbed
  
• and free throw rate, or the ratio of free throws attempted to field goals attempted expressed as a percentage

We'll look at the numbers for Marquette and their opponent in both categories for each game. The opponent number doubles as Marquette's defensive numbers, since it's what they're allowing. Along side each of the individual game numbers, you'll see two numbers after that.  The first is Marquette's season long average in that category, and the second is their national ranking on KenPom.com.

Effective Field Goal Percentage (eFG%)

Marquette: 66.3% (Season: 52.2%, #70)
Alabama A&M: 39.2% (Season: 51.5%, #258)

Well, that's about as wonderful as you could expect to see.  Yet again, Luke Fischer was the difference, draining all eight of his shots.  He was helped by a 4-5 night from Juan Anderson, and a 7-8 effort from Steve Taylor, Jr.  19-21 from those three dudes is going to win games for Marquette on most nights.  The Golden Eagles shot a completely acceptable 5-13 behind the arc against the Bulldogs, so nothing special to add there.

As far as defense goes, I really don't think MU could have done better.  Yes, Rakiya Battle shot 7-12, but he also had three teammates that combined to go 8-29, including an amazingly terrible 0-12 behind the arc.  In any case, with the way the front end of the season had gone, you'd be hard pressed to find anyone to complain about a sub-50% defensive effort, much less a sub-40% one.

Turnover Rate (TO%)

Marquette: 15.6% (Season: 17.2%, #46)
Alabama A&M: 22.4% (Season: 24.6%, #17)

A little lower than average on both ends of the court, but when you're in the top sixth of the country already, a few percentage points either direction is nothing to worry about.

Offensive Rebounding Rate (OR%)

Marquette: 25% (Season: 26.5%, #302)
Alabama A&M: 20.6% (Season: 36.5%, #303)

Another lousy night on the offensive glass, but a really great one on the defensive end.  This was possible due to Marquette holding AAMU to just 1 offensive rebound in the entire second half. I could try to complain about Nicolas West coming up with four caroms on the offensive end for the Bulldogs, but it would be disingenuous at best and flat out lying at worst. Luke Fischer was the only Golden Eagle who grabbed more than one offensive rebound.  As was the case against Arizona State, MU shot the ball incredibly well, so you can't be very worried about this effort here. Concerned, perhaps, as MU is going to have to grab offensive rebounds to win Big East games.

Free Throw Rate (FTR)

Marquette: 42.9% (Season: 44.1%, #67)
Alabama A&M: 33.3% (Season: 29.8%, #60)

Other than pointing out that MU rescued their game long number by posting a 100% in the second half (19/19), I don't really have much to say about this one.