SWC75
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We often hear teams being evaluated at the end of the season by how they did “against ranked teams”. A couple of years ago I came up with a simple system for evaluating this, one with an acknowledged flaw but which nonetheless produced interesting results so I’ll do it again this year.
The system is very simple. First I hand out points to teams based on the ranking of their opponent. If you play the #1 ranked team, you get 25 points for playing such a powerful team. You get 24 points for playing the #2 team, 23 for playing the #3 team, etc. I’ll call them schedule points. Here’s a chart to make it easy:
1-25, 2-24, 3-23, 4-22, 5-21, 6-20, 7-19, 8-18, 9-17, 10-16, 11-15, 12-14, 13-13, 14-12, 15-11, 16-10, 17-9, 18-8, 19-7, 20-6, 21-5, 22-4, 23-3, 24-2, 25-1.
That’s step one. Now we play the games and see how these teams actually do on the field. What cued me into this is that most games will be won or lost by 25 points or less, so the points involved are comparable. You just compare the point differential to the points teams have gotten for playing a ranked opponent. If they beat the ranked opponent, their points will grow by the margin of victory. If they lose, you subtract the margin of victory from the schedule points. If that reduces them to zero or less, they get zero points. I’m not going to deal with minus points, just add up the positive points earned, or else my rankings would be cluttered up with a lot of inferior teams who were below the Mendoza line because they’d gotten blown out by their ranked opponents. If you play the #1 team and lose by 21 points, you’ll get 4 points: 25 schedule points minus the 21 points you lost by. If you play the #10 team and lose by 13 points, you’ll get three points. If you play the #15 team and lose by 14 points, you’ll get nothing, (11-14 = 0 in this system).
I’ll record the points earned each week and how the teams got them and add them up over the course of the season. That will show us how each team did “against ranked teams”. Like all cumulative standings, they will sort themselves out as the season goes on and come more and more into focus. Later listings will be more meaningful than early ones as more and more teams get through the meat of their schedules. The cumulative listing should I think be less a ranking of teams than a statistic you look at in determining where to rank the teams.
WEEK #14
Alabama beat #15 Florida 54-16 = 49 points
Washington beat #8 Colorado 41-10 = 49 points
Oklahoma beat #10 Oklahoma State 38-20 = 34 points
Temple beat #19 Navy 34-10 = 31 points
Penn State beat #6 Wisconsin 38-31 = 27 points
Virginia Tech lost to #3 Clemson 35-42 = 16 points
Wisconsin lost to #7 Penn State 31-38 = 12 points
Clemson beat #23 Virginia Tech 42-35 = 10 points
Baylor lost to #16 West Virginia 21-24 = 7 points
Ohio U. lost to #17 Western Michigan 23-29 = 3 points
Comment: People are talking about Penn State getting in over Washington because of their more difficult non-conference schedule and they won the toughest division – the Big 10 East. But they have only 54 points vs. ranked teams and Washington has 163, second to Alabama. Ohio State is third with 143. Clemson has only 56 points. And Michigan only 46. Oklahoma has 88 points. Just sayin’
SEASON STANDINGS
Alabama 261 points
Washington 163 points
Ohio State 143 points
Wisconsin 134 points
Auburn 100 points
Mississippi 95 points
Florida State 92 points
Oklahoma 88 points
Louisville 82 points
Houston 80 points
Texas A&M 77 points
Arkansas 74 points
Iowa 72 points
Louisiana State 64 points
Clemson 56 points
Virginia Tech 56 points
Oklahoma State 55 points
Penn State 54 points
Michigan State 53 points
Texas Christian 49 points
Georgia 48 points
Michigan 46 points
Southern California 46 points
Texas 45 points
Indiana 40 points
Southern Methodist 37 points
Washington State 37 points
California 35 points
North Carolina 33 points
Mississippi State 32 points
Colorado 31 points
Temple 31 points
Vanderbilt 30 points
Utah 27 points
Georgia Tech 26 points
Navy 26 points
Pittsburgh 25 points
South Alabama 24 points
Duke 23 points
Syracuse 23 points
Tennessee 23 points
Northwestern 20 points
Florida 18 points
Kentucky 18 points
Troy 18 points
South Carolina 17 points
Nebraska 16 points
North Carolina State 16 points
Oregon 16 points
Virginia 16 points
Nicholls State 15 points
North Dakota State 15 points
Texas Tech 15 points
Wyoming 15 points
Air Force 14 points
Iowa State 12 points
Brigham Young 11 points
Georgia State 11 points
South Florida 11 points
UCLA 11 points
Appalachian State 10 points
Arizona 10 points
Memphis 10 points
Missouri 9 points
Baylor 7 points
Central Michigan 7 points
Kansas State 7 points
Colorado State 6 points
Minnesota 6 points
Notre Dame 6 points
Tulsa 6 points
Ohio University 5 points
Purdue 5 points
U of Miami 2 points
Wake Forest 1 point
The system is very simple. First I hand out points to teams based on the ranking of their opponent. If you play the #1 ranked team, you get 25 points for playing such a powerful team. You get 24 points for playing the #2 team, 23 for playing the #3 team, etc. I’ll call them schedule points. Here’s a chart to make it easy:
1-25, 2-24, 3-23, 4-22, 5-21, 6-20, 7-19, 8-18, 9-17, 10-16, 11-15, 12-14, 13-13, 14-12, 15-11, 16-10, 17-9, 18-8, 19-7, 20-6, 21-5, 22-4, 23-3, 24-2, 25-1.
That’s step one. Now we play the games and see how these teams actually do on the field. What cued me into this is that most games will be won or lost by 25 points or less, so the points involved are comparable. You just compare the point differential to the points teams have gotten for playing a ranked opponent. If they beat the ranked opponent, their points will grow by the margin of victory. If they lose, you subtract the margin of victory from the schedule points. If that reduces them to zero or less, they get zero points. I’m not going to deal with minus points, just add up the positive points earned, or else my rankings would be cluttered up with a lot of inferior teams who were below the Mendoza line because they’d gotten blown out by their ranked opponents. If you play the #1 team and lose by 21 points, you’ll get 4 points: 25 schedule points minus the 21 points you lost by. If you play the #10 team and lose by 13 points, you’ll get three points. If you play the #15 team and lose by 14 points, you’ll get nothing, (11-14 = 0 in this system).
I’ll record the points earned each week and how the teams got them and add them up over the course of the season. That will show us how each team did “against ranked teams”. Like all cumulative standings, they will sort themselves out as the season goes on and come more and more into focus. Later listings will be more meaningful than early ones as more and more teams get through the meat of their schedules. The cumulative listing should I think be less a ranking of teams than a statistic you look at in determining where to rank the teams.
WEEK #14
Alabama beat #15 Florida 54-16 = 49 points
Washington beat #8 Colorado 41-10 = 49 points
Oklahoma beat #10 Oklahoma State 38-20 = 34 points
Temple beat #19 Navy 34-10 = 31 points
Penn State beat #6 Wisconsin 38-31 = 27 points
Virginia Tech lost to #3 Clemson 35-42 = 16 points
Wisconsin lost to #7 Penn State 31-38 = 12 points
Clemson beat #23 Virginia Tech 42-35 = 10 points
Baylor lost to #16 West Virginia 21-24 = 7 points
Ohio U. lost to #17 Western Michigan 23-29 = 3 points
Comment: People are talking about Penn State getting in over Washington because of their more difficult non-conference schedule and they won the toughest division – the Big 10 East. But they have only 54 points vs. ranked teams and Washington has 163, second to Alabama. Ohio State is third with 143. Clemson has only 56 points. And Michigan only 46. Oklahoma has 88 points. Just sayin’
SEASON STANDINGS
Alabama 261 points
Washington 163 points
Ohio State 143 points
Wisconsin 134 points
Auburn 100 points
Mississippi 95 points
Florida State 92 points
Oklahoma 88 points
Louisville 82 points
Houston 80 points
Texas A&M 77 points
Arkansas 74 points
Iowa 72 points
Louisiana State 64 points
Clemson 56 points
Virginia Tech 56 points
Oklahoma State 55 points
Penn State 54 points
Michigan State 53 points
Texas Christian 49 points
Georgia 48 points
Michigan 46 points
Southern California 46 points
Texas 45 points
Indiana 40 points
Southern Methodist 37 points
Washington State 37 points
California 35 points
North Carolina 33 points
Mississippi State 32 points
Colorado 31 points
Temple 31 points
Vanderbilt 30 points
Utah 27 points
Georgia Tech 26 points
Navy 26 points
Pittsburgh 25 points
South Alabama 24 points
Duke 23 points
Syracuse 23 points
Tennessee 23 points
Northwestern 20 points
Florida 18 points
Kentucky 18 points
Troy 18 points
South Carolina 17 points
Nebraska 16 points
North Carolina State 16 points
Oregon 16 points
Virginia 16 points
Nicholls State 15 points
North Dakota State 15 points
Texas Tech 15 points
Wyoming 15 points
Air Force 14 points
Iowa State 12 points
Brigham Young 11 points
Georgia State 11 points
South Florida 11 points
UCLA 11 points
Appalachian State 10 points
Arizona 10 points
Memphis 10 points
Missouri 9 points
Baylor 7 points
Central Michigan 7 points
Kansas State 7 points
Colorado State 6 points
Minnesota 6 points
Notre Dame 6 points
Tulsa 6 points
Ohio University 5 points
Purdue 5 points
U of Miami 2 points
Wake Forest 1 point