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A Great Stat If You Can Get It

Related Topics: Atlantic Coast Conference

The equation, though seemingly simple, is actually uncommon, bordering on rare.

Make more free throws than your opponents attempt, and a team is apt to enjoy a pronounced advantage on the scoreboard. That’s true in a game and across a season and appears to be a likely mark of team superiority.

Since the early 2000s 21 ACC squads, about one per season, enjoyed such an edge.

Between them UNC and Duke, the league’s perennial powers, gained a notable margin in free throws a dozen times in this century, on average better than once every other year.