Days between games

After a long (exam) break, next up for the Tar Heels is Tennessee on Sunday, 12/17. 11 days since the last game against Western Carolina seemed unusually long to just another casual fan here, and I was curious how usual or unusual 11 days between any two games are.

I started with the frequency of days between two consecutive regular season games since 1949-50 season.

Ok, it looks like the majority of regular season games were 3 days apart, with such games accounting for approximately 28% (or 504 games) of all the regular season games played since 1949-50 season. Next frequent pair of games were 4 days apart (21%, 389 games).

What is more interesting to me, however, was the fact that there were some consecutive games played more than 2 weeks apart. What were those games anyways?

Table 1: Consecutive games played more than 2 weeks apart
Season next_dt next_opp next_result last_dt last_opp last_result days_apart
1950 1949-12-28 West Virginia L 1949-12-09 George Washington L 19
1953 1952-12-29 Holy Cross L 1952-12-10 Clemson W 19
1954 1954-02-02 Washington & Lee W 1954-01-19 North Carolina State L 14
1955 1955-02-04 Duke L 1955-01-18 North Carolina State W 17
1956 1956-02-04 Duke L 1956-01-18 North Carolina State W 17
1957 1957-01-30 Western Carolina W 1957-01-15 North Carolina State W 15
1958 1958-02-01 South Carolina W 1958-01-18 Clemson W 14
1959 1959-01-30 Clemson W 1959-01-14 North Carolina State W 16
1960 1960-02-03 Maryland W 1960-01-16 Virginia W 18
1962 1962-01-06 Notre Dame W 1961-12-11 Indiana L 26
1962 1962-02-03 Duke L 1962-01-17 North Carolina State W 17
1963 1963-01-02 Yale W 1962-12-17 Kentucky W 16
1963 1963-02-02 Duke L 1963-01-19 Virginia W 14
1964 1964-01-04 Notre Dame W 1963-12-18 Georgia W 17
1964 1964-02-03 Virginia W 1964-01-18 Virginia Tech L 16
1965 1965-01-04 Maryland L 1964-12-21 Florida L 14
1965 1965-01-30 Maryland L 1965-01-16 Virginia W 14
1966 1966-02-03 Wake Forest W 1966-01-15 Virginia L 19
1967 1967-01-28 Virginia W 1967-01-11 North Carolina State W 17
1968 1968-01-27 Georgia Tech W 1968-01-13 Clemson W 14
1969 1969-02-01 Maryland W 1969-01-18 Wake Forest W 14
1970 1970-01-31 Maryland W 1970-01-17 Wake Forest L 14
1971 1971-01-30 Maryland W 1971-01-16 Wake Forest L 14
1992 1992-01-02 Purdue W 1991-12-17 Jacksonville W 16

So the two games against Indiana and Notre Dame were played 26 days apart (!!!) during 1961-62 season. Wonder what was all that about. A quick search didn’t turn up anything about the specifics of those two games, but a gentle reminder that 1961-62 season was coach Smith’s first season at Carolina. I like running into things like this while exploring the match data :) (and what about those pairs of NC State/Duke games in 1954-55 and 1955-56 seasons!?)

Next, I became curious what’s the most frequent pair of game days. Easily weekends must be the most frequent game days, I guessed.

So I was half right, because the Tar Heels indeed played the most on Saturdays, but the next most frequent game day was Wednesdays. I wonder if there’s any particular reason as to why Wednesdays have seen unusually many game actions compared to other weekdays.

In any case, the two observations seem to match, i.e., (1) two consecutive regular season games were played 3 days apart mostly, and (2) the games were played on Wed and Sat mostly. However, a Wed game may or may not have been followed by a Saturday game, nor a Saturday game may or may not have followed the previous Wed game. So I was wondering if indeed the two game days (Wed and Sat) are the most frequent consecutive game days.

So indeed, Wed/Sat (3-day apart) was the most frequent game day pair, followed by Sat/Wed (4-day apart) pair. Below chart shows the same thing, with each row representing previous game day vs. each folumn the next game day.

So then what about the results of those games played after a long break?

For games at least 10 days apart, Tar Heels won both games right before and after breaks mostly. For example, for consecutive games that are exacxtly 10 days apart, 6 times (purple fill) we won both the last game before the break and the first game after the break, and one time (green fill) we lost the last game before the break and won the first game after the break.

Now for Sunday’s game against Tennessee, with 11 days apart from last game, we have a chance to even the results. So far 3 times (turquoise) we won the last game before the break and lost in the first game after the break, and 2 times (purple) we won both the last game before the break and the first game after the break.