Against Ranked Teams (football) Week 10

[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 a couple years ago. 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 10
Georgia beat #6 Florida 24-17 = +27 points
Memphis beat #15 Southern Methodist 54-48 = +17 points
Washington lost to #9 Utah 28-33 = +12 points
Florida lost to #8 Georgia 17-24 = +11 points
West Virginia lost to #12 Baylor 14-17 = +11 points
Georgia Southern beat #20 Appalachian 24-21 = +9 points
Mississippi lost to #11 Auburn 14-20 = +9 points
Virginia Tech lost to #16 Notre Dame 20-21 = +9 points
East Carolina lost to #17 Cincinnati 43-46 = +6 points
Southern Methodist lost to #24 Memphis 48-54 = -4 points
San Jose State lost to #21 Boise State 42-52 = -5 points
Southern California lost to #7 Oregon 24-56 = -13 points
Maryland lost to #14 Michigan 7-38 = -19 points
Wofford lost to #4 Clemson 14-59 = -23 points
Kansas lost to #22 Kansas State 10-38 = -24 points
North Carolina State lost to #23 Wake Forest 10-44 = -31 points

Comments: A lot of ranked teams had byes as only 16 of the top 25 were in action. Georgia and Florida both gained by playing each other. Louisiana State and Alabama are about to get a similar boost. Southern California is finally starting to slip in the standings. Clemson wants to dance but has no partner, at least until Wake Forest.


TOP 25

Louisiana State +77 points
Michigan +72 points
Ohio State +69 points
Auburn +64 points
Southern California +52 points

Georgia +50 points
Florida +48 points
Washington +41 points
South Carolina +32 points
Clemson +28 points

Kansas State +28 points
U of Miami +28 points
Wisconsin +28 points
Utah +27 points
Texas +26 points

Arizona State +24 points
North Carolina +24 points
Oklahoma State +23 points
Oklahoma +22 points
Alabama +21 points

Texas A&M +21 points
Texas Christian +21 points
Pittsburgh +18 points
Memphis +17 points
Penn State +17 points

The worst team so far is Rutgers with -99 points.

Syracuse has -10 points