Against Ranked Teams- Week 3

[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 a bit differently this year. The old 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 year and last year 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 3

Mississippi State beat #12 Louisiana State 37-7 = +44 points
Clemson beat #14 Louisville 47-21 = +38 points
Texas lost to #4 Southern California 24-27 = +19 points
Vanderbilt beat #18 Kansas State 14-7 = +15 points
San Diego State beat #19 Stanford 20-17 = +10 points
Colorado State lost to #1 Alabama 23-41 = +7 points
Memphis beat #25 UCLA 48-45 = +4 points
Air Force lost to #7 Michigan 13-29 = +3 points
Louisville lost to #3 Clemson 21-47 = -3 points
Mercer lost to #15 Auburn 10-24 = -3 points
Fresno State lost to #6 Washington 16-48 = -12 points
Army lost to #8 Ohio State 7-38 = -13 points
Southern Methodist lost to #20 Texas Christian 36-56 = -14 points
Samford lost to #13 Georgia 14-42 = -15 points
Brigham Young lost to #10 Wisconsin 6-40 = -18 points
Tulsa lost to #2 Oklahoma 14-56 = -18 points
Illinois lost to #22 South Florida 23-47 = -20 points
Pittsburgh lost to #9 Oklahoma State 21-59 = -21 points
Oregon State lost to #21 Washington State 23-52 = -24 points
Georgia State lost to #5 Penn State 0-56 = -35 points
East Carolina lost to #16 Virginia Tech 17-64 = -37 points

Comments: I didn’t get that LSU score before I went to bed last night. It could be that they aren’t as good as we thought. It could also be that they will be angrier than they were going to be. Clemson must not have read the stories that they were rebuilding this year and thus couldn’t win consecutive national titles. They are the most impressive team so far, handling Auburn with their defense and putting up 47 points and over 600 yards against Louisville. They are our hope for a big home upset this eyar. it would be a big one, all right.


TOP 25

Clemson +59 points
Mississippi State +44 points
Alabama +40 points
Oklahoma +39 points
Southern California +30 points

Michigan +25 points
Texas +19 points
Vanderbilt +15 points
Maryland +13 points
Virginia Tech +11 points

Notre Dame +10 points
San Diego State +10 points
Auburn +8 points
Florida State +8 points
Colorado State +7 points

Ohio State +6 points
Memphis +4 points
Western Michigan +4 points
Air Force +3 points
Boise State +3 points

Georgia +3 points
Purdue +3 points
Rutgers +2 points
Stanford +2 points
Florida Atlantic 0 points
Georgia Tech 0 points