FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. – Nova Southeastern University basketball coach Gary Tuell doesn't have the staff or the deep resources to rely too heavily on modern statistical analysis, but he believes a truth can often be hidden or revealed by the numbers. Heading into the Sunshine State Conference basketball tournament, where Tuell's Sharks will travel to Saint Leo for a 7 p.m. first round game on Wednesday night, the veteran coach used numbers to talk about his team, his players and what the Sharks may see from Saint Leo's Lions.

"I've said all year that our team is very, very close to being one of the best in the league," said Tuell. "The average fan judges a team by its won-loss record, and there is no denying that results tell one story. But just looking at a team's won-loss record doesn't reveal the story of a season. It doesn't reveal improvement, it doesn't reveal issues and problems or obstacles that a team may have had to overcome. It doesn't address injuries or key players who may have been lost or may have returned during the course of a journey. Won-loss records tell one story: how many did you win and how many did you lose? If your only interest is who won and who lost games, then a team's record is the easiest way to determine the strength of a team's season. But a won-loss record alone may not reveal some important truths. Sometimes the important numbers can be hidden, lost or overshadowed by something as simplistic as a won-loss record."

Tuell's 11-15 Sharks finished fifth in the SSC regular season. But Tuell believes strongly that this is one of the best teams, if not the best team, he's coached in his 12 years at NSU. To back up that argument he invited a visitor to compare NSU's results with the other SSC teams in their head-to-head matchups against Barry, Eckerd and Rollins, the three teams who tied for first place in the regular season race with 12-4 records. The results were startling … and supported Tuell's argument that the 2015-16 Sharks are stronger than the won-loss record indicates.

Taking the aggregate results of all eight teams (including provisional league members Palm Beach Atlantic and Embry-Riddle) in their six common regular season games against the league's tri-champions (Barry, Eckerd and Rollins), the statistics tell an interesting story. Totaling the results of all six regular season games against the SSC's three-headed monster, NSU finished at -7 (a 14-point win and a 3-point loss to Barry; 10 and 4-point losses to Eckerd; 1 and 3-point losses to Rollins, leaving NSU with a +/- of -7).

Divide the six total games played into the -7 result and you find that overall the Sharks lost by -1.1 point per game to the league's tri-champs. That total far exceeded the numbers posted by the other seven league members and provisional members. Here's how the teams ranked in their six common games against the SSC tri-champs:

1. NSU -7 (-1.1)
2. Lynn -36 (-6.0)
3. Tampa -39 (-6.5)  
4. Palm Beach Atlantic -41 (-6.8)
5. Saint Leo -45 (-7.5)
6. Florida Tech -65 (-10.8)
7. Embry-Riddle -74 (-12.3)
8. Florida Southern -92 (-15.3)

"What those numbers tell me is that we've been very competitive against the three teams who won the league championship," said Tuell. "If you look only at the won-loss record I don't think you can fairly or accurately evaluate how well our guys have played in six of the toughest, biggest games of the year. When we play well, we're certainly capable of playing with the best teams in this league. And over the past three weeks we've been playing as well as I could hope. I haven't had a team at NSU that has played as well down the stretch as we're playing right now. Our young guys have gotten better, our leadership has gotten better, our chemistry has gotten better, and our confidence and resolve to win has never been higher. As I said the other day, I wish we had another month to go in the regular season because I think this team is just beginning to figure it out and hit its stride."
 
The NSU coach also pointed out that his Sharks handed Barry its second-worst loss of the year (105-91), Palm Beach Atlantic its second-worst loss (98-79) and Embry-Riddle its second-worst loss (87-64). The Sharks are 7-9 in their 16 games that have been decided by single digits, with most of those contests coming down to the final possession or final possessions before winning or losing. 

"We've played extremely well in a few games, and we've been involved in a crazy number of games that went down to the wire," he said. "We definitely had a chance to win a lot more games than 11. We're oh-so-close to having a heck of a won-loss record, which is why I don't put that much stock in those things. I'm far more interested in whether we competed, night in and night out, and obviously as a coach I'm interested in the things we did well that helped us win those close games and the things we didn't do well that cost us a chance to win more often. But you can count on one hand the number of games we haven't competed and given ourselves a chance to win. That's why I've liked this team all year and that's why I feel good about us as we go forward."
 
Tuell knows the numbers against Saint Leo, Wednesday's opening round opponent in the SSC tournament, have not been good.

"We lost a tough game up there the first week of the season (93-88). We were tied with two minutes to play and they just wanted to win more than we did," he said. "They spanked us the last two minutes. When we played at our place (Jan. 23), they embarrassed us (an 80-61 Saint Leo victory). That was our fifth game in 11 days, fourth in eight days, and whether we were tired and stale physically and mentally, or whether they were just that much better than us, the bottom line is they beat us every way possible. I remember thinking after the game that Saint Leo might be the toughest team we've played all year. They were certainly great on that day."
 
Tuell also uses numbers to point out the success of senior guard Chris Page (Sr., Plainfield, Ind.) and junior center Harrison Goodrick (Jr., Sydney, Australia).

"Everyone knows Chris Page can score," he says. "He's averaged 21.6 points a game during the conference season, which is third best in the league. He's eighth in the league in three-point percentage (38.6) and fourth in the league in free throw percentage (84.9). But the statistic that people will overlook is that while Chris is third in the league in scoring, he's 28th in the league in minutes played.  He's scoring 21.6 per game in league play while playing 26.7 minutes. When you compare that to the two guys who ahead of him in scoring, Yunio Barrueta at Barry (35.0 minutes per game) and Dylan Travis at Florida Southern (36.9 minutes per game), it gives you a better idea of how effective Chris has been. He's sacrificed playing time for the good of our team, giving other guys an opportunity to play and to improve. It hasn't always been easy for Chris to accept and he's had to mature and learn to deal with it, but I could not be more proud of him and what he's done to help us be a better TEAM. A great example of that came Saturday night in our win at Florida Southern. He played 13 minutes in the second half, but he was darn near perfect. He took only four shots, but he made three. He was 2-2 on threes. He was 7 for 7 down the stretch at the foul line to seal the win. He needed four shots and 13 minutes to score 15 points. That's a great player.
 
"As for Harrison Goodrick, he's just been solid as a rock the entire conference season. He's eighth in the league in scoring (17.8), first in rebounding (11.3, including a school-record 21 in Saturday's win at Southern), second in field goal percentage (63.6), 12th in free throw percentage (73.5) and he ranks 10th in assists in the league (56 for 3.5 per game). We have a lot of great players in this league, but I don't know anyone who has had a better overall season than Harrison. His numbers tell the story."
 
Of course, the NSU coach knows numbers don't always tell a story. 

"There are no numbers that could tell you how well our freshmen have improved over the course of the year, or how well this team has come together in terms of chemistry and resolve to win," he said. "But if you were in our locker room Saturday at Florida Southern you would know that this team is together and focused. Going in there on Senior Night, facing a team with three players (Dominique Williams, Dylan Travis and Michael Volovic) who were hugely important to their team a year ago when they won the National Championship, and playing for a higher seed and something significant … that was a tough deal for our guys. We rode the bus for four hours, climbed off and went to work. We've been doing that for a while now. We haven't always won, but we've competed as hard and as well as we could. I couldn't be any prouder of a group of guys for the adversity they've overcome or for the attitudes and work ethic that they've brought to this season. This is a very good basketball team right now. The numbers don't tell it, but I see it in practice and in games. Chris Page and Harrison Goodrick have been very good, but our team is about more than those two guys. We've gotten great contributions from a lot of guys and to the man I believe every one of them has gotten better over the course of the year. Chris doesn't have to shoot it 20 times a night and Harrison doesn't have to have a double-double for us to win. Other guys are making significant contributions and when that happens, we're tough to beat."
 
Tuell knows Page, Goodrick and the rest of the Sharks will have to be at the top of their games Wednesday if NSU hopes to advance further in the tournament and keep the season going. 

"Saint Leo has had a great year and Vince Alexander has done a superlative coaching job for them," the NSU coach said.  "They have three potential all-conference players in Tyreece Brice, Marcus Dewberry and Caleb Stewart. Those three guys have been as good, collectively, as any three players in the league. And personally, I think Brice is just sensational. There are a lot of nights when I think he's the best overall player in the league. It's scary to think they will all be back next year.
 
"Saint Leo is a tough matchup for us for a lot of reasons. They lead the league in defending the 3-point shot, holding teams under 30 percent which is just amazing. They also lead the league in 3-point percentage, making 38.5 percent. For a team like us, that relies almost exclusively on zone defenses, that alone makes this a very problematic matchup. But the numbers that concern me most are the ones that are hidden or overlooked. 
 
"Trail Pierce is 6-10, Jonathan Childs is 6-10, Caleb Stewart is 6-9, Trey Griseck is 6-6, Pete Okonkwo is 6-8 and Lawrence Watt is a very tough, physical 6-5. Not only do they have all those high-scoring, explosive guards who shoot it great and have tremendous speed, but they have six very tough inside guys who are very, very physical, who bang you and bump you and wear you down and who are not afraid to use their fouls to make it tough on opponents to score. They just keep running big guys at you in the post. They've got 20 or 25 fouls to use inside if they want to use them, and against Harrison Goodrick, believe me, they use them. Those guys have fouled out of 20 games this year, including 13 in conference games. Okonkwo averages a foul every four minutes. So does Childs. Pierce averages a foul every six minutes, Watt and Griseck every six or seven minutes. They have so much depth inside and they do a great job of running guys in and out of the post to play very physical against your centers and forwards. We are so thin inside and over the course of the game they just wear us out in the paint. When people talk about Saint Leo they talk about how great their guards are, how well they run the floor and score, and rightfully so. But most people don't realize that they use a lot of big bodies to wear you out over the course of a game. 
 
"In league games, Saint Leo's opponents have taken 425 free throws, which is the most in our conference. They just run big guys in there to pound you and they don't care if they get fouls or not. They're smart. Rather than let your big guy score, they just get into him physically. If the game isn't called too tightly, your big is going to have a long, painful night. If the game is called closely, it doesn't matter to Saint Leo. If one guy gets a foul or two they just run another one in there to keep up the physical pressure. I think their use of bigs is very well-planned and I think their use of fouls in the post is one of those statistics that goes overlooked."
 
To emphasize the point, Tuell noted that Goodrick had an uncommonly tough shooting night in the January loss against Saint Leo (he was only 4 of 15 from the field with four turnovers).

"Harrison had one of two big bodies draped on him or bumping him on almost every shot," Tuell said. "Because of their depth and size in the post, they just kept running big bodies at him all night and did a great job of being physical without concerning themselves with personal fouls. It's something that concerns me Wednesday, and it's something we have to deal with."
 
Nevertheless, Tuell is optimistic about NSU's post-season chances. 

"We had four goals at the start of this season," he said. "Make the conference tournament, win the conference tournament, keep improving as a team and have fun. Other than winning the tournament, we've accomplished three of those four goals. If we play with the focus and resolve that we've shown down the stretch, especially on the defensive end, and if we continue to share the ball and execute offensively, I think we have as good a chance as anyone in this tournament. I think the statistics bear that out. Hopefully we'll go to Saint Leo and compete and play well. If we do those two things we'll have a chance. That's all you can hope for or ask of your players at this time of the year. Our record is not eye-popping, but everyone on our team, every man in our locker room, has stayed positive and because of it, we're in a good place right now. Of all the NSU teams I've coached, I'd rather play for a conference championship with this group of guys than any I've coached here."