Basketball Players Performance Analytic as Experiential Learning Approach in Teaching Undergraduate Data Science Course

Sports analytic is an informative and beneficial tool especially for a coaching team who closely follow the development of their team. For a sports coach, deciding the best team composition is crucial to ensure winning. This requires understanding the dynamics of the players and the game parameters. However, small sports communities do not usually have the chance to benefit from this advanced technology. In a Data Mining course at Universiti Putra Malaysia, a data analytic project of basketball players' performance has been conducted through experiential learning approach. This paper presents the experience and output of shooting performance analytic, attack profiling analysis, team performance analysis, player rating prediction and game outcome prediction. The achievements of the students on the project are high with low marks deviation, plus the students said that the pedagogy encourages them to be highly committed and independent. Engaging lessons have also been happening as students compassionately share about their findings.