After defeating Indiana on Saturday, the Nebraska Cornhuskers have already matched their win total from last season and are off to their best start (6-0) since 2001 when they won their first 11 games and lost in the BCS Championship Game against Miami.
Mike Riley deserves credit for the Huskers' turnaround, but maybe there is a secret to their success that is rooted in data and statistical analysis.
Nebraska is the only Division I college athletic program that employs a sport analytics department spanning all sports. Headed by Tucker Zeleny, Nebraska's full-time director of sports analytics and data analysis hired in 2015, the department is in charge of working with Nebraska's 24 varsity sports teams to collect, analyze and summarize data for the coaches and staffs.
In the simplest terms, Zeleny and his team look at anything and everything that can help Nebraska win games including scouting, recruiting, health and nutrition, player exertion, injury prevention and more.
A native of Carleton, Nebraska, Zeleny grew up loving Nebraska sports. He earned his doctorate in statistics from the university in 2015 and convinced the Nebraska brass that sports analytics can make an impact in college athletics.
Zeleny understands that his role is not to replace coaches and scouts; rather, he can provide them data to inform their decisions.
"Maybe it's something new or something they suspected and we can reinforce that idea." Zeleny said.
One example of a study the analytics department recently completed is an analysis of what wins football games. Looking back at the past five seasons, they determined what makes a successful team (beyond scoring more points than its opponents) and provided the coaching staff with benchmarks relating to turnovers, penalties, third downs, yards per point differential and more.
Beyond looking at conference and national trends, the analytics team also dives deeper into scouting, situational decision-making and player exertion than ever before.
"We do player tracking with Catapult [a GPS tracker] and that is mostly done from a health perspective," Zeleny said. "Coaches get that data and monitor the player loads. We dive deeper in the analytics department to do more predictive injury risks."
Additionally, the team provides coaches with information on opponent tendencies, formations and personnel to help with scouting, and have looked at specific situations (such as fourth downs) to supplement coaches in-game strategy.
Maybe this type of data analysis impacts only a few plays or players per game, but if any team understands how much one or two plays can impact the entire season, it's the Nebraska football team, which lost four games on the final play in 2015.
Zeleny notes that the Nebraska's coaching staff has been receptive to this added data, but the key is to present their findings in a way that coaches can relate to.
"We know that if we go in there guns blazing and act like you have all the answers with someone who has worked there for years, you aren't going to have a lot of success," Zeleny noted. "Coaches are coaches for a reason, so we try to help them as much as possible and supplement them rather than replace them."
Over the years, sports analytics has gotten a bad rap from some purists; skeptics fear that the "nerd behind the computer" will take over their time-honored game, but the main goal for groups such as the one at Nebraska is to simply provide one more tool for coaches and staffs to make decisions.
The sports analytics revolution has already begun in college football, and as teams and coaches continue to recognize the value it can provide, it will only continue to grow.
While Nebraska's 6-0 start should not be unduly credited to the school's year-old sports analytics department, it certainly doesn't hurt to have extra data that can provide the slightest edge.