Big Ten: Are Yogi Ferrell and James Blackmon The Best Duo?
By Jacob Rude
On Saturday, the Indiana Hoosiers let a big opportunity slip through their hands directly before the start of the Big Ten season, losing in overtime against the Georgetown Hoyas. Despite dropping the overtime contest, Indiana’s starting back court of James Blackmon Jr. and Yogi Ferrell lit up the scoreboard, combining for 49 points on 16 of 32 shooting from the field and 11 of 22 three-point shooting.
The contest marked the eighth time this season at least one of the duo had put up at least 20 points and the first time both had cleared the hurdle. Combined, Ferrell and Blackmon are averaging 35.1 points and are shooting just shy of 46% from three-point land. Together, they have led Indiana to a 10-3 record with quality wins over Pittsburgh, Butler, and SMU.
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But is the Hoosiers’ back court the best in the Big Ten?
To get an idea, we took a look at some of the best back courts in the Big Ten, with emphasis on back court. While Caris LeVert and Zak Irvin may both be considered guards for Michigan, we wanted a starting point guard and starting shooting guard, as is the case with Ferrell and Blackmon.
With the stipulations in place, we took a look at the top four, which included Ferrell and Blackmon from Indiana, D’Angelo Russell and Shannon Scott of Ohio State, LeVert and Derrick Walton of Michigan, and Melo Trimble and Richaud Pack from Maryland. First, let’s look at their overall stats.
You can see that Ferrell and Blackmon rank first in third of those listed in points. While they’re among the tops in most others, they are among the best in terms of offensive rating and effective field goal and true shooting percentages (although holy Moses is Melo Trimble having a great season for Maryland).
For a clearer idea of where they rank as a duo, let’s look at the totals between the two. We totaled up points, assists, rebounds, then averaged out field goal and three-point percentage as well as the offensive rating and effective field goal and true shooting percentages.
Again, Ferrell and Blackmon rank 1st in points, 2nd in FG%, 1st in 3PT%, 1st in ORTG, 1st in eFG%, and 2nd in TS%. From a stats perspective, at least offensively, these two are the top in the Big Ten quite definitively. Unless you put extra incentives in assists and rebounds, it’s safe to say that the Hoosier back court is the best in the Big Ten.
However, what if you simply used the best duos in the Big Ten, regardless of position? So I then compiled stats for the best duos in the Big Ten. I excluded certain schools simply because their top duos didn’t compare to the conference’s top duos (Penn State, Iowa, Purdue, Minnesota, Northwestern, Michigan State and Rutgers). The list of those included:
Indiana – Ferrell, Blackmon
Ohio State – Russell, Marc Loving
Michigan – LeVert, Irvin
Maryland – Trimble, Jake Layman
Illinois – Rayvonte Rice, Malcolm Hill
Nebraska – Terran Petteway, Shavon Shields
Wisconsin – Frank Kaminsky, Sam Dekker
For sake of brevity, I’ll save the individual stats as those can be more easily found and jump to the combined stats from the duos. Same calculations as before. Here’s what we got:
Once again, Indiana’s duo ranks second in points and first in assists and offensive rating. They do come up fifth in effective field goal percentage and fourth in true shooting percentage. Keep in mind, however, that many of those ranked above them do not consistent of two guards like Indiana. Proving that is the fact that only Ohio State and Michigan have shot more threes than Indiana and the former has a high true shooting and effective field goal percentage. Three-pointers comprise 44% of Ferrell and Blackmon’s shots, third most of the duos listed.
No other duo is as efficient and effective yet still prolific at scoring as the Hoosier duo. Only Nebraska tops them in points, but they’re offensive rating and eFG and TS percentages are far below Indiana’s. Scoring is only a single facet of the game, albeit it arguably the most important. Even then, the Hoosiers are joint top in assists with Ohio State and average a respectable 8.9 rebounds a game as guards.
When everything is taken into consideration, the case for Ferrell and Blackmon as the top duo in the Big Ten is a strong one. Certainly you have teams with more talent leaving less room for stars to shine (notably Wisconsin with Dekker and Kaminsky), but through the first half of their schedule, Blackmon and Ferrell might be the best combo in the Big Ten so far.