I really, really don't want to turn this into another hot hand discussion, so I will just make this post and let it be.
In order to have a conversation on this (on another thread, or via PM) I would want to see the following:
1. A definition of the hot hand (as in when does it start, when does it end?. It seems to me that "hot hand" is defined all too often after the event has already taken place. Meaning, "oh, X has made his last 4 shots in a row, he has the hot hand".
2. How do you know when the hot hand ends? In theory, if you have a "hot hand" then you would never cool down until the game ends (maybe???), yet players all the time have 5 makes in a row, and then miss 2 or 3 of their next shots.
Players make 4-5 shots in a row all the time in nearly every single college basketball game played a night. In a data size of so many attempts there are going to be runs that fall on the outside of the average/norm.
Kennard hitting 10 shots in a row is pretty rare, especially since a lot of them were threes. It's clear that he was playing very, very well, and also against a pretty poor defensive team. That allowed him to take shots from rather open spots in the flow of a good offense. That increases the likelihood of making shots as opposed to playing a team like Virginia, where every single shot would be contested and he rushes bad shots out of rhythm from places that he isn't used to.
Of course players have odd strings of shots made, but that doesn't mean their next shot is any more likely to go in than what they "average" as a shooter is, unless they are shooting from the exact same spot on the floor, in which case there is a slight (1-2%) change to their "average" chance of making that shot to begin with. Basically I am arguing that each shot is more of an independent variable than a dependent variable on the last shot. Has there been data that shows if you make one shot you are more likely to make the next shot? What about if you've made 2 in a row, is the 3rd more likely? And so on.
That's it for this thread, as I don't want to ruin it.