Everyday data
Did you know?
Los Angeles Lakers logo
Did you know that the record for a team winning streak is 33?
In 1971 and 1972, the Los Angeles Lakers won 33 games in a row on the path to winning the NBA championship.
Are you ready to learn about data analysis? Let’s begin!
Data is everywhere—in ads, on radio news reports, a high score in a video game, in newspapers and magazines, and on websites. Every day people encounter a system of numbers that represent something.
Where do you encounter data in your life? Why may data be relevant to sports?
Try it!
A player needs to notice and interpret data & information. What kind of data can be found in a basketball game?
Record your ideas in the following mind map provided or in another method of your choice.
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Data analysis
Jayson Tatum
Talent level, I feel like if I'm not the best, I'm one or two. I think it's just opportunity, the situation that you're in, and who's on your team. I think I've done all right.
Jayson Tatum, #0 of the Boston Celtics (2022), with James Harden, #1 of the Philadelphia 76ers (2022), and Joel Embiid, #21 of the Philadelphia 76ers (2022).
What is data?
Data is a collection of values or observations. When carefully analyzed and interpreted, information can be found from data. Data is used to represent, analyze, make predictions, and provide insight into real-life situations.
Think
When do you use data most often? In what way is data useful in your life?
Basketball can be interpreted through the statistics associated with it, like player heights, shots-on-net, penalties per season, etc. All that information can be used as a reference to track changes, successes, and trends.
Data analysis skills
The following skills can help you interpret data. Press the following tabs to learn more.
Finding and recording data is the first step towards useful data analysis.
An analysis is discovering patterns in the data, making note of trends, and making predictions based on the data.
We can communicate the data by creating images, equations, and text that share information with another audience. When presenting data to an audience, the method of presentation is an important point to consider. You want the information from the data to be represented accurately and you don’t want your audience to form incorrect conclusions.
There are many ways to display data, some of which you are already familiar with. You probably already have experience making bar graphs, pie charts, and line graphs.
Try it!
Consider the points scored in a game between two teams summarized in the following table.
While examining the points, describe what information you know about each team just by reviewing the data.
| Team A Points | Team B Points |
|---|---|
| 12, 6, 9, 10, 12, 15, 8, 16 | 16, 10, 12, 8, 16, 10, 17, 13 |
Press Show Suggested Answer to check out an analysis.
You might notice that Team B has the highest score overall.
NBA Moment
In February of 2023, LeBron James became the NBA’s all-time top scorer.
Single variable statistics
Data, or information, collected and presented as a list of numbers is called single variable data, or one-variable data. This is because there is only one piece of information being collected, like points scored by a group or a player.
In the previous activity, you examined the variable points a player may score in a game.
Other examples of single variable data include examining the goals scored by a team during their season, people’s favourite dessert, or marks earned in a course. When examining single variable statistics, there are a few pieces of information that help describe the data.
Calculating the range, the difference between the highest and lowest number, is sometimes helpful when trying to understand how spread out the data is.
Also, calculating the mean, median, and mode helps identify important information about the data. Together, the mean, median, and mode are called the measures of central tendency.
Central tendency calculations
Let’s consider the scores of two teams as an example while we work through the following calculations.
The data of points for two teams has been summarized in the following table.
| Team A | 12, 6, 9, 10, 12, 15, 8, 16 |
|---|---|
| Team B | 16, 10, 12, 8, 16, 10, 17, 13 |
Press the following tabs to explore how to calculate the measures of central tendency for a data set.
The data is ordered from lowest to highest for each team.
| Team A | 6, 8, 9, 10, 12, 12, 15, 16 |
|---|---|
| Team B | 8, 10, 10, 12, 13, 16, 16, 17 |
The range is calculated by subtracting the lowest number from the highest number.
| Team A | 16 − 6 = 10 The data for Team A has a range of 10. |
|---|---|
| Team B | 17 − 8 = 9 The data for Team B has a range of 9. |
The mean is the sum of all the scores divided by the total number of games.
- First, calculate the sum of the scores by adding all the data points.
- Each team played a total number of eight games. Therefore, in each case, the sum is divided by eight to find the mean.
Check out the following calculations.
| Team A | Sum of all scores: 6 + 8 + 9 + 10 + 12 + 12 + 15 + 16 = 88 Total number of games: 8 Mean = Sum of scores ÷ Total number of games Mean = 88 ÷ 8 Mean = 11 Therefore, the mean is 11. |
|---|---|
| Team B | Sum of all scores: 8 + 10 + 10 + 12 + 13 + 16 + 16 + 17 = 102 Total number of games: 8 Mean = Sum of scores ÷ Total number of games Mean = 102 ÷ 8 Mean = 12.75 Therefore, the mean is 12.75. |
The median is the middle data point when the values are arranged in order.
One method to calculate the median is by crossing out the first and last piece of data in the ordered list, until the middle number is identified.
If there are an even number of entries, calculate the mean of the two middle entries to determine the value of the median.
Check out an example in the following table.
| Team A |  The median is a number between 10 and 12. |
|---|---|
| Team B |  The median is a number between 12 and 13. |
In this case, there are an even number of data points, so the median lies between the two values identified as the middle numbers. Since there are an even number of terms in the set, take the two middle entries in the ordered data (in this case, the fourth and fifth number) and determine the mean.
Check out how to calculate the median for each data set:
| Team A | 10 + 12 = 22 22 ÷ 2 = 11 The median is 11. |
|---|---|
| Team B | 12 + 13 = 25 25 ÷ 2 = 12.5 The median is 12.5. |
The mode is the data point that is most repeated.
To determine the mode, analyze your data and determine which number is repeated most often.
| Team A | Recall the data set: 6, 8, 9, 10, 12, 12, 15, 16 The mode is 12. Notice that the score 12 is repeated two times, whereas the other numbers are only listed once. |
|---|---|
| Team B | Recall the data set: 8, 10, 10, 12, 13, 16, 16, 17 The mode is 10 and 16, because both numbers are repeated twice, whereas the other numbers are only listed once. |
Summary
The following table is a summary of the data and the measures of central tendency. This information can be used to make decisions of the teams' statistics.
| Central tendency | Team A | Team B |
|---|---|---|
| Range | 10 | 9 |
| Mean | 11 | 12.75 |
| Median | 11 | 12.5 |
| Mode | 12 | 10 and 16 |
An important conclusion from this activity is the knowledge that statistics can describe data, but a person needs to make the actual decisions.
Take a moment and reflect on your learning!
Explore this!
Explore the following video in which researcher Rajiv Maheswaran explains how modern technology can be used with sports to record primary data.
Beyond points on a graph, Maheswaran puts forward that technology can be used to calculate the angles of shots, shot type, and velocity.
Which other factors in data could influence the outcome of a game?
You may record your ideas in a method of your choice.
Determining skills
Describing single variable statistics using measures of central tendency is an important first step in representing data and summarizing it. Whether it’s in sports or school, representing data in different forms is a valuable way to ensure the information you would like to convey can be understood.
Try it!
Explore the following table of points scored by 25 players in a game.
Player points
| 88 | 93 | 89 | 92 | 91 |
| 93 | 82 | 113 | 75 | 100 |
| 86 | 66 | 110 | 99 | 98 |
| 85 | 68 | 94 | 94 | 94 |
| 86 | 98 | 85 | 104 | 93 |
Refer to the previous section on central tendency calculations and examine the information for the team’s players.
Then, calculate the range and measures of central tendency by finding the mean, median, and mode.
You may record your calculations in a method of your choice.
Excellent work! You’ve learned a lot about how data is collected and analyzed and why it’s important in life as well as in sports. You deserve a break!