/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/45500500/usa-today-8332271.0.jpg)
Another week of ACC games is in the books. Last week when we introduced the matrix, we found that, of the 23 games then played, 13 of them were won by the home team, or 56.5%. We also learned that certain teams were either really good, or just really good at home. Those teams included Virginia, Duke, FSU, Louisville, NC State, and Syracuse. Most of those were just 1-0 records, but NC State did win all three home games, losing their sole road contest, to Virginia.
We check in on this week's ACC Matrix:
We've now had 39 games go down, of which 22 games were won by the home team, or 56.4%.
Again, there are some teams who are defending their house well -- Virginia and Syracuse are the only two teams who have not suffered a home loss yet. Meanwhile, Virginia, Notre Dame, and UNC have each performed well on the road, winning all of their respective road wins.
As Schwartz mentioned in the comments last week, of course there's going to be some home court advantage. But, in a conference where there's a pretty stark difference between the top and the bottom, as opposed to parity throughout, you would expect that home court "advantage" to fizzle, since the upper echelon should be winning against the bottom regardless of locations. In other words, for conferences with completely even talent and coaching, you should have a much higher percentage of home team wins (since the only advantage is the home court), while with conferences with a growing gap, you should see closer to 50-50, since the better teams are defending their home AND winning on the road (i.e., other teams are losing at home when they play the upper echelon).
I think it'll be another week or two before we start seeing some trends here, but you can look across a row to see how much orange there is in determining how strong of a home court advantage that team has, and you can look down a column to see how much blue there is to see how well a team diffuses that advantage when they're on the road.