getnasty":226gusn9 said:
It's called home field advantage for a reason, enough with the 10:00am game thing. In fact i'm pretty sure our win percentage is better in 10:00am games then non 10:00am games this year.
I'm pretty sure it's not, but I'm pretty sure that's just anecdotal. There is zero doubt that it is a disadvantage, and it turns out that it's quite significant. You guys got screwed by the playoff scheduling. As I mentioned in another thread, west coast teams get screwed in the regular season by having to play at 10 am.
Some stats:
From '01 to '14, home teams win 57.5% of their games. This number is remarkably consistent, within 1% of that figure 9 of the 14 years.
Against West coast teams in non 10am games, home teams wins 55.8% of games. Against central teams home team wins 57.2% against east coast teams home team wins 56.7% of games. However, in 10 am games (which are exclusive to west coast teams) home teams wins 64.8%.
Since '01 Seattle has won 39.3% of 10am games, and 45.1% of non 10am road games.
FWIW, my niners have won 31.7% of 10am games, and 51.1% of non 10am road games.
(don't conclude that SF is worse in 10am games than seattle, there just isn't enough data points to have any meaning for the team by team stats, even with 14 years of games).
Want more stats?
in 10am games, the road team commits 7.29 penalties, turns the ball over 1.83 times and drops 5.22% of passes.
In non 10am games, the road team commits 6.42 penalties, turn the ball over 1.39 times and drop 4.97% of passes.
East coast teams playing primetime games on the west coast see a slight decline in performance, but not nearly as significant. (the above is "statistically significant", while the east coast primetime disadvantage is not). It's worth noting that west coast 10am games are far more prevalent (roughly 4x) than east coast primetime games back west.
Finally, some anecdotal evidence specific to your hawks. Since '01, you guys have played 6 playoff games at 10am. You're 1-5 in those games, the lone win coming last week.