Case Study: Davidson College achieves better sports analytics insights with JMP

Davidson College - Customer Case Study

Davidson College’s math professor Tim Chartier leads Cats Stats, an extracurricular sports analytics group that helps coaches turn large volumes of basketball data into usable, “coachable” insights. The challenge was finding which statistics actually mattered for improving performance, especially amid the growing amount of available game data. JMP was used as the main analytics tool to explore and visualize the data without requiring complex coding.

Using JMP, Davidson College’s Cats Stats team analyzed lineup efficiency, shot prediction, scouting, and other performance metrics for Davidson athletics and beyond. JMP helped uncover key correlations, including one between fouling and shooting average, and supported work on March Madness bracket prediction using data from all 351 Division 1 teams. As a result, Davidson’s athletics staff saved time in game prep, the student analysts strengthened their skills, and several went on to careers in professional sports analytics.

Davidson College

Tim Chartier

Professor of Mathematics