Top yards per play defenses in losses

[Millhouse]

http://www.cfbstats.com/2014/leader/national/team/defense/split12/category10/sort02.html

Notice how many losses a lot of these teams have

When your offense is this bad it's hard to judge whether your defense is actually good or whether opponents take no risk knowing you can't score.

Do we believe wake and unconn are actually good on defense?

I wish I knew where to find yards per play stats limited to plays when score was close. Will have to dig

If shafer ever gets an offense, his defense will slip in yards and that's fine with me

 

[OttoinGrotto]

So you're telling me... stats are for losers.

 

[Millhouse]

So you're telling me... stats are for losers.

Defensive stats when you're a loser is for losers

 

[bcubs9497]

This might help: http://www.oddsshark.com/ncaaf/defensive-stats

The first column "SC" is average points per game given up. Syracuse sits at around 45-50. The second column "Y/PL" is yards per play. Syracuse ranked 28th in yards given up per play. That's pretty damn good, if you ask me.

Kinda think that if the offense hadn't been so beaten up, it would have been a much better year.

 

[Millhouse]

This might help: http://www.oddsshark.com/ncaaf/defensive-stats

The first column "SC" is average points per game given up. Syracuse sits at around 45-50. The second column "Y/PL" is yards per play. Syracuse ranked 28th in yards given up per play. That's pretty damn good, if you ask me.

Kinda think that if the offense hadn't been so beaten up, it would have been a much better year.

I'm digging for stats that would show yards per play when the game is close. My theory is that our yards per play looks good in part because opposing teams who get the lead know our offense can't do anything and figure that the only way they can blow the game is to do something stupid on offense. Seeing Wake and Uconn up there with us makes me a little more confident in that theory but that's all it is, i don't have any proof yet

 

[Millhouse]

In August/September 5.31 yards per play. Still pretty good but not great. 5.31 puts you at 49th in the country for the whole year.

October 4.86
November 4.83

did the defense make a 10% improvement or did teams just take the 2005 SU opponent strategy of "they can't score, we just need to run the clock out"

 

[Finwad32]

Defensive stats when you're a loser is for losers

You've hit it on the head. Gameplans typically change significantly when you're comfortably in the driver's seat. Good luck trying to find a filter for stats when the game is close, sounds like significant leg work.

Ultimately, I think this type of look at it helps us in some minor way. But, overall, most of our games minus Pitt and BC were competitive until the fourth anyway.

 

[Millhouse]

When Syracuse is losing by less than 7, they are 105th in opposing passer rating.

69th when tied, 67th when winning by less than 7

65th in the first quarter

When down less than 7, 97 rushes, 68 passes. Teams start running the ball a lot even when they don't have a big lead.

In the first quarter teams threw 93 times, ran 105 times.

When teams have a lead of less than 7, they run more. sure some of that is having a late lead. but this is a big difference

everyone knows our offense sucks, so they don't throw the ball once they get any lead. and it makes our defense look better than it actually is

 

[Millhouse]

You've hit it on the head. Gameplans typically change significantly when you're comfortably in the driver's seat. Good luck trying to find a filter for stats when the game is close, sounds like significant leg work.

Ultimately, I think this type of look at it helps us in some minor way. But, overall, most of our games minus Pitt and BC were competitive until the fourth anyway.

cfbstats has those breakdowns per team for rushing and passing defense but you can't compare one team to every other team