EIGHT times out of 10, Port Adelaide's Jay Schulz has kicked straight from a set shot in 2014.

 

But as he lined up to kick a goal that would put Port Adelaide in front of Melbourne with just two minutes remaining on Sunday, that history meant little.

 

Schulz stood on the boundary line 40m out, twirled the ball in his hands a dozen times to gather his breath then ran in and kicked the goal.

 

In that moment, his scoring accuracy from set shots for 2014 moved to 83 per cent having kicked 44.9 for the season.

 

Only Hawthorn sharpshooter Luke Breust tops that effort, with 21.2 (91.3 per cent) from set shots in 2014.

 

The game's result depended on Schulz's kick but it looked no different to the other 53 he has aimed at goal this season.

 

Twirl the ball, gather breath then burst out of the blocks before settling into a loping rhythm and kick through the ball.

 

He never gives himself a lot of time to think but he always allows enough time to settle. Even when Port Adelaide was trailing the Sydney Swans in round 13 by 10 points with less than a minute to go, Schulz quickly went through his routine.

 

Muscle memory took over and, as usual, he kicked straight.

 

He follows to the letter the goalkicking principles master coach David Wheadon set out in his recent book The Art of Coaching.

 

He doesn't always win goalkicking games at training but when the heat is on, he's the best in the team.

 

And he's been doing it for so many years now, his goalkicking routine is too routine for him to say much about it.  

 

In nine games this season Schulz has kicked at 100 per cent accuracy from set shots.

 

Schulz's goal wasn't the only set shot match-winner kicked in round 18.

 

Geelong's Joel Selwood kicked straight from beyond 50m midway through the last quarter against the Giants.

 

It interrupted five last-quarter goals from the Giants and gave the Cats enough breathing space to hang on and win.

 

Geelong kicked 6.7 from set shots compared to its opponents' 8.3 and Selwood was guilty of missing three set shots before landing the killer blow late in the game.

 

Essendon's Jake Carlisle kicked 8.2 from set shots against the Western Bulldogs in a match-winning performance. He had kicked 10.7 from set shots before his big day out on Sunday.  

 

Those three individuals were responsible for steering their teams from disaster.

 

Individuals can change their goalkicking performance too as North Melbourne's Lindsay Thomas has shown.

 

He has kicked 19 set shot goals this season from 25 kicks, an accuracy percentage of 76. Given Thomas kicked 21.36 (from set shots and in general play) in 2011, it is a remarkable turnaround.

 

Funnily enough Essendon, Geelong, North Melbourne and Port Adelaide sit in the bottom half of the competition when it comes to set shot accuracy this season.

 

Richmond has been the most accurate set shot team in the competition, having kicked at 67.4 per cent putting it just ahead of Hawthorn (67.2) and the Sydney Swans (67.0) in 2014.

 

With Hawthorn's line-up including Breust and Jack Gunston (76.9) and the Swans Franklin (who has kicked at 67.4 per cent this season), it's a reasonable assumption that the Hawks midfielders have been less accurate this season than the Swans' bunch.

 

Despite fatigue often being cited as a reason for inaccuracy from set shots, six of the 18 teams are at their most inaccurate in the first quarter.

 

Melbourne is the worst offender kicking at 41.9 per cent from set shots in the first quarter, the worst one quarter percentage of any team in 2014.

 

Greater Western Sydney has kicked at 47.5 per cent accuracy in the first quarter with the only other teams tracking at below 50 per cent for set shots in a quarter being St Kilda (48.7) and Collingwood (44.4) in the third quarter and the Brisbane Lions (48.3) in the final quarter. 

 

Collingwood is the fourth worst team for set shots and has the second worst scoring ratio in the AFL. Key forward Travis Cloke has the worst accuracy for set shots of the seven players who have kicked more than 40 set shots at goal this season, with 29.21 from 50 set shots (58 per cent accuracy).

 

However, Cloke's small forward offsider Jamie Elliott has kicked 17.5 from 22 set shots this season, the third most accurate kick in the competition for players who have kicked at least 20 set shots.

 

That won't surprise too many Magpie fans.

 

The truth is that players aren't called upon to win games from a set shot too often.

 

Only Western Bulldogs veteran Daniel Giansiracusa (v Richmond in round three) and Melbourne's first-year player Christian Salem (v Essendon in round 13) have changed the lead with a set shot goal to win a game within the last two minutes this season.

 

Those kick hit the headlines but the best footballers consistently perform the basics under pressure.

 

It's what separates quality from mediocrity.

 

Port Adelaide's Schulz has been all quality in 2014.