[OC] The Wolves win more games near a full moon
The Minnesota Timberwolves are named after wolves, so naturally I wanted to know whether they actually get better when the moon is full.
I took every Timberwolves regular-season game and classified it as a full-moon game if it was played within 1.5 days of a full moon.
The result is that:
Timberwolves near a full moon
154-160: 49.0% win rate
Timberwolves the rest of the time
41.2% win rate
I also controlled for season.
The full-moon effect barely changed:
+7.75 percentage points, p=.0065
So historically, Minnesota has been significantly more likely to win when the moon is full.
Furthermore, when you look at the Wolves’s best player, at least according to many(Some advanced stats have Lamelo as better)
Ant near a full moon:
71.7% win rate
Otherwise:
52.3%
Difference: +19.4 percentage points
The franchise-wide sample is fairly large: 314 games near a full moon, and the season-adjusted association still comes out at p=.0065.
tl;dr: The Timberwolves have won 49.0% of games near a full moon versus 41.2% otherwise. After controlling for season, the difference is still +7.75 percentage points (p=.0065). Anthony Edwards is at 71.7% vs 52.3% himself. He got that dawg in him.
Btw the wolves next full moon game is on October 26 vs Cavs: https://www.nba.com/timberwolves/schedule