Big Night for Bango's New D: Total Win Contribution Boxscore from Game 2

I finally completed the Total Win Contribution boxscore from last night's Bucks win. The boxscore shows what would have been obvious to anyone watching: the Bucks defense, not its offense, won last night's game.

Click here to see the Total Win Contribution boxscore for Bucks vs. Thunder

Remember Nintendo's NHL hockey? Whenever you finished a game, you would see 3 "Stars of the Game". Well, whenever the Bucks win this season, and provided I complete a TWC boxscore afterward, I am going to award 3 "BucksDiary Stars of the Game" to the 3 Most Valuable Bucks, as mathematically determined by Total Win Contribution. Here are the 3 MVBs from last night's game:

BucksDiary Stars of the Game:

1. Richard Jefferson (+0.996)

2. Luke Ridnour (+0.698)

3. Andrew Bogut (+0.451)

Notes on the TWC boxscore results:

1. Last night's result was actually a combination of the Bucks defense and the Thunder's udderly incompetent offensive display. Kevin Durant was brutal (I may have a post comparing him to Tony Mandarich later today). Jeff Green continues to be useless... only PG Westbrook, among their young talent, seemed to show a pulse. The NBA really screwed OKC. They should have the Hornets playing their now, instead they have, essentially, the Supersonics. So they traded one of the NBA's rising young teams for a collection of junk. Nice job, Stern.

2. Last night I almost decided to stop doing the TWC boxscores and just go back to comparative Win Contribution boxscores, like I did for the NBA Finals last season. TWC's take too long... Comparative WC boxscores would be a lot quicker. But today I decided I wanted to keep doing as many of the TWC boxscores as possible. Why? If you just looked at a comparative WC boxscore, you would probably not pick up on the fact that Ridnour, Bogut, and Moute all had huge games. None of them shined offensively, but defensively they were all big.

3. Special commedation to Charlie Bell. He was the Bucks MHP (Most Harmful Player) on Opening Night, but he bounced back huge last night. He and Richard Jefferson were the only "+/-" players on the Bucks. ("+/-" means they were above the average Win Score at their position on offense, and their counterpart opponents were below the average Win Score on defense... Ridnour's box makes it look like he was a third "+/-", but he was actually just average on offense, so technically he was not a "+/-" last night).

4. The first shall be last: Redd and Gadzuric were two of the few Bucks who had good offensive nights in the Opener, but both had very poor offensive nights last night.

5. If you look at the bottom of the TWC boxscore, you will notice that the Bucks offensive WC was just the same as last year's Bucks. It was the defense that carried the day. I like that, because defense is a much more stable platform on which to build a team. It doesn't go into slumps, as they say.