SEC Free Throw Attempts At Home Versus Away

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With so much talk about officiating today, we felt it was a good time to examine which SEC schools shoot the most free throws at home and on the road.  In other words: Who seems to get the biggest boost from playing in their own arena?

We’ve tallied up all of the free throw attempts from SEC game played so far this season.  From there, we breakdown the foul shot totals in a number of categories for you.

First are the current free throw numbers for each team in the conference through last night’s action.  These are total free throw attempts in league games only (and there have been 55 SEC games played so far):

In the 55 SEC games played so far, the home team has averaged 21.38 free throw attempts per game while the road team has averaged just 18.61 foul shots. 

With those averages in mind, below are the SEC schools ranked by the average number of free throw attempts they take in home games:

Granted, a lot of factors play into these numbers, not just intimidated officials.  Style of play obviously has an influence.  Also, whether or not a team plays close games — in which opponents might be forced to intentionally foul down the stretch — might also inflate the numbers.

Now let’s look at which schools attempt the most foul shots on the road.  Again, we’re looking at SEC games only:

 

Finally, let’s compare the two previous categories and see which schools get the biggest free throw attempts bounce from playing at home.  Below you’ll see the difference between home FT attempts and road FT attempts for each school.  This should give us a clue as to which SEC gyms are providing the best homecourt advantage (officials-wise) this season:

Observations:

* Betcha expected to see Kentucky as the school on top of the homecourt bounce chart.  Not so.  In fact, the Cats shoot just 2.1 more free throws at home (on average) than they do on the road and that’s below the SEC average bounce of +2.7.

* The four teams who get the biggest boost in FT attempts from playing at home (Georgia, LSU, Ole Miss and Arkansas) are a combined 15-22 in SEC play.

* Overall Vanderbilt is the team that earns the most trips to the charity stripe… both on the road and at home.

* Only three teams shoot more free throws in road games than home games — Auburn, Alabama and Florida.  Auburn is the worst team in the league (1-8) while Alabama (7-2) and Florida (8-2) lead their divisions.  Go figure.