Against Ranked Teams - Week 8

[SWC75]

This year I will be again charting how teams have done “against ranked teams”, which is something that always comes up at the end of the year when the arguments over who should be in the 4 team national championship playoff takes place. As usual, this is not meant to end those arguments, just to give those making them something to look at in forming their opinions.

I’m going to do it using the procedure I started last year. The original procedure was that I would first grant teams playing ranked teams a certain number of points based on who they are playing. If you played the #1 team, (I use the AP- writer’s poll for continuity), you get 25 points. If you are playing the #2 team, you get 24 points, etc. down to getting 1 point for playing the #25 team. I call these “schedule points”. Here’s a chart to make it simple:
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.
(Of course you can always just subtract the ranking from 26. That will work every time.)

Then I look at the point differential in the actual game. If you defeated the ranked team, you add the number of points you won by to the schedule points. If you lost to that team, you subtract the margin you lost by from the schedule points. (I call these ‘game’ points.) The difference between this procedure and the original one if that I didn’t count any deficit: if you got to zero, you got zero. This year I’m going to try to record negative points, too, so a team can get full ‘credit’ for a really bad performance.

WEEK EIGHT

Purdue beat #2 Ohio State 49-20 = +53 points
Clemson beat #16 North Carolina State 41-7 = +44 points
Washington State beat #12 Oregon 34-20 = +28 points
Louisiana State beat #22 Mississippi State 19-3 = +20 points
Michigan beat #24 Michigan State 21-7 = +16 points
Temple beat #20 Cincinnati 24-17 = +13 points
Michigan State lost to #6 Michigan 7-21 = +6 points
Mississippi State lost to #5 Louisiana State 3-19 = +5 points
Vanderbilt lost to #14 Kentucky 7-14 = +5 points
Indiana lost to #18 Penn State 28-33 = +3 points
Colorado lost to #15 Washington 13-27 = -3 points
Connecticut lost to #21 South Florida 30-38 = -3 points
Texas Christian lost to #9 Oklahoma 27-52 = -8 points
East Carolina lost to #10 Central Florida 10-37 = -11 points
North Carolina State lost to #3 Clemson 7-41 = -11 points
Tennessee lost to #1 Alabama 21-58 = -12 points
Oregon lost to #25 Washington 20-34 = -13 points
Maryland lost to #19 Iowa 0-23 = -16 points
Illinois lost to #23 Wisconsin 20-49 = -26 points

Comments: it was “get down to business” week. Every game was a conference game. No ‘guarantee’ opponents. Purdue’s win over Ohio State was the most impressive of the season, +53, the previous high being LSU’s +44 win over Georgia in Week Seven. Clemson’s win over Wake Forest also tied their fellow Tigers. It was Clemson’s first game against a ranked team. Meanwhile, Eddie Orgeron’s team became the first team to break the 100 point mark.



TOP 25 against ranked teams after week #1

Louisiana State +114 points
Notre Dame +83 points
Purdue +73 points
Texas +73 points
Michigan +59 points

Iowa State +54 points
Washington +52 points
Virginia Tech +47 points
Kentucky +45 points
Clemson +44 points

Texas A&M +44 points
Ohio State +41 points
Oregon +41 points
Texas Tech +41 points
Florida +39 points

Auburn +38 points
Mississippi State +37 points
Stanford +33 points
Utah +33 points
Oklahoma State +32 points

Washington State +28 points
Old Dominion +27 points
Alabama +26 points
Northwestern +25 points
Michigan State +22 points

Syracuse has +19 points
Connecticut’s -86 points is the worst