source: http://cfn.scout.com/2/1244032.html
League | Rating | OOC Schedule Rating | Home/Away/Neutral Splits | OOC vs Top 5 | OOC vs 6-15 | OOC vs 16-35 | OOC vs 36-62 | OOC vs 63-89 | OOC vs 90-109 | OOC vs 110-119 | OOC vs Bottom 5 |
SEC | 0.37 | -0.08 | 28 / 10 / 3 | 0 - 0 | 2 - 1 | 2 - 1 | 8 - 5 | 8 - 1 | 6 - 0 | 3 - 0 | 4 - 0 |
Big 12 | 0.34 | -0.10 | 13 / 8 / 0 | 0 - 0 | 0 - 1 | 1 - 1 | 3 - 1 | 5 - 1 | 8 - 0 | 0 - 0 | 0 - 0 |
Pac-12 | 0.25 | 0.11 | 15 / 11 / 1 | 0 - 0 | 1 - 3 | 6 - 4 | 4 - 1 | 2 - 1 | 1 - 1 | 3 - 0 | 0 - 0 |
Indep | 0.10 | -0.06 | 21 / 18 / 0 | 0 - 0 | 2 - 1 | 3 - 3 | 4 - 6 | 6 - 2 | 6 - 2 | 1 - 1 | 2 - 0 |
Big Ten | 0.06 | -0.13 | 27 / 12 / 1 | 0 - 1 | 0 - 4 | 3 - 2 | 5 - 2 | 3 - 3 | 7 - 2 | 5 - 0 | 3 - 0 |
Big East | -0.01 | -0.13 | 13 / 17 / 0 | 0 - 0 | 0 - 2 | 0 - 1 | 2 - 5 | 5 - 4 | 4 - 1 | 4 - 0 | 2 - 0 |
ACC | -0.02 | 0.05 | 19 / 14 / 2 | 0 - 2 | 0 - 6 | 0 - 3 | 1 - 8 | 7 - 1 | 3 - 0 | 2 - 1 | 1 - 0 |
Sun Belt | -0.09 | 0.05 | 8 / 22 / 0 | 0 - 5 | 0 - 3 | 0 - 4 | 1 - 3 | 2 - 3 | 3 - 1 | 3 - 0 | 2 - 0 |
WAC | -0.15 | -0.09 | 10 / 16 / 0 | 0 - 1 | 0 - 2 | 1 - 4 | 2 - 1 | 2 - 3 | 4 - 3 | 3 - 0 | 0 - 0 |
Mountain West | -0.18 | -0.04 | 12 / 19 / 1 | 0 - 1 | 0 - 0 | 1 - 10 | 0 - 4 | 1 - 5 | 2 - 0 | 4 - 1 | 3 - 0 |
MAC | -0.26 | -0.07 | 12 / 25 / 0 | 0 - 1 | 0 - 2 | 0 - 3 | 3 - 6 | 5 - 6 | 2 - 2 | 4 - 1 | 2 - 0 |
C-USA | -0.33 | 0.06 | 21 / 21 / 0 | 0 - 1 | 0 - 3 | 1 - 11 | 0 - 12 | 1 - 7 | 3 - 1 | 0 - 0 | 2 - 0 |
League | Rating | Bowl Record | OOC vs AQ's | OOC vs Non-AQ's | OOC vs Big 12 / SEC | OOC vs Pac-12 | OOC vs ACC / Big East / Big Ten | OOC vs Sun Belt / MWC / WAC | OOC vs CUSA / MAC | ||
SEC | 0.37 | 0 - 0 | 8 - 6 | 25 - 2 | 0 - 1 | 2 - 0 | 6 - 5 | 13 - 2 | 12 - 0 | ||
Big 12 | 0.34 | 0 - 0 | 5 - 2 | 12 - 2 | 1 - 0 | 0 - 1 | 4 - 0 | 7 - 0 | 5 - 2 | ||
Pac-12 | 0.25 | 0 - 0 | 6 - 5 | 11 - 5 | 1 - 2 | 0 - 0 | 5 - 1 | 6 - 4 | 3 - 0 | ||
Indep | 0.10 | 0 - 0 | 14 - 6 | 10 - 9 | 1 - 0 | 3 - 2 | 10 - 4 | 8 - 5 | 2 - 4 | ||
Big Ten | 0.06 | 0 - 0 | 6 - 9 | 20 - 5 | 1 - 2 | 1 - 3 | 4 - 1 | 5 - 1 | 14 - 3 | ||
Big East | -0.01 | 0 - 0 | 7 - 9 | 10 - 4 | 3 - 0 | 0 - 1 | 4 - 7 | 2 - 0 | 6 - 4 | ||
ACC | -0.02 | 0 - 0 | 6 - 17 | 8 - 4 | 1 - 8 | 0 - 1 | 5 - 5 | 3 - 2 | 4 - 0 | ||
Sun Belt | -0.09 | 0 - 0 | 3 - 16 | 8 - 3 | 2 - 12 | 0 - 1 | 1 - 3 | 0 - 0 | 7 - 2 | ||
WAC | -0.15 | 0 - 0 | 3 - 6 | 9 - 8 | 0 - 3 | 1 - 1 | 2 - 2 | 5 - 2 | 2 - 3 | ||
Mountain West | -0.18 | 0 - 0 | 3 - 11 | 8 - 10 | 0 - 3 | 3 - 4 | 0 - 4 | 4 - 5 | 2 - 2 | ||
MAC | -0.26 | 0 - 0 | 8 - 17 | 8 - 4 | 1 - 4 | 0 - 1 | 7 - 12 | 3 - 2 | 1 - 1 | ||
C-USA | -0.33 | 0 - 0 | 1 - 23 | 6 - 12 | 1 - 12 | 0 - 2 | 0 - 9 | 5 - 10 | 1 - 1 |
In fact, this list even has a loss on it (a very close loss to a very good team, of course). This is, I think, telling. At least until bowl season has happened, there aren't a full 30 OOC wins that rate better than Louisiana Tech's very close defeat to Texas A&M. And while it's true that this was a pretty solid performance, I think the fact that it made the top 30 list is really more telling about the quality of non-conference schedules these days than anything else. Quite simply, there weren't enough good non-conference games for teams to rack up really strong non-conference performances, and that's true even though Notre Dame and BYU are Independents.
Rank | Team | Conference | Opp Name | Loc | Score |
1 | Notre Dame | Indep | Oklahoma | AWAY | 30 - 13 |
2 | Texas | Big 12 | Mississippi | AWAY | 66 - 31 |
3 | Louisiana State | SEC | Washington | HOME | 41 - 3 |
4 | Alabama | SEC | Western Kentucky | HOME | 35 - 0 |
5 | Alabama | SEC | Michigan | NEUTRAL | 41 - 14 |
6 | Florida | SEC | Florida State | AWAY | 37 - 26 |
7 | Notre Dame | Indep | Southern California | AWAY | 22 - 13 |
8 | Arizona | Pac-12 | Oklahoma State | HOME | 59 - 38 |
9 | Oregon State | Pac-12 | Brigham Young | AWAY | 42 - 24 |
10 | Texas A&M | SEC | Southern Methodist | AWAY | 48 - 3 |
11 | Oregon | Pac-12 | Fresno State | HOME | 42 - 25 |
12 | Notre Dame | Indep | Miami (Florida) | HOME | 41 - 3 |
13 | Mississippi State | SEC | Middle Tennessee State | HOME | 45 - 3 |
14 | South Carolina | SEC | Clemson | AWAY | 27 - 17 |
15 | Brigham Young | Indep | Georgia Tech | AWAY | 41 - 17 |
16 | Notre Dame | Indep | Michigan State | AWAY | 20 - 3 |
17 | Oklahoma State | Big 12 | Louisiana-Lafayette | HOME | 65 - 24 |
18 | Kansas State | Big 12 | Miami (Florida) | HOME | 52 - 13 |
19 | Oregon | Pac-12 | Arkansas State | HOME | 57 - 34 |
20 | Nebraska | Big Ten | Arkansas State | HOME | 42 - 13 |
21 | Georgia | SEC | Georgia Tech | HOME | 42 - 10 |
22 | Kentucky | SEC | Kent | HOME | 47 - 14 |
23 | Notre Dame | Indep | Stanford | HOME | 20 - 13 (OT) |
24 | Alabama | SEC | Florida Atlantic | HOME | 40 - 7 |
25 | Texas | Big 12 | New Mexico | HOME | 45 - 0 |
26 | San Jose State | WAC | Navy | AWAY | 12 - 0 |
27 | Ohio | MAC | Penn State | AWAY | 24 - 14 |
28 | Kent | MAC | Rutgers | AWAY | 35 - 23 |
29 | Louisiana Tech | WAC | Texas A&M | HOME | 57 - 59 |
30 | Notre Dame | Indep | Wake Forest | HOME | 38 - 0 |
Another interesting way to look at league strength (since for this calculation every team counts equally) is to focus not on the best performances, but on the worst. This year, there have so far been 204 non-conference games by AQ teams against 1-A opponents. Below is the 30 worst-rated of these (and in the reverse of the top 30 performances list, this actually has a couple of really close wins against really bad teams):
175 | Illinois | Big Ten | Arizona State | AWAY | 14 - 45 |
176 | Minnesota | Big Ten | Nevada-Las Vegas | AWAY | 30 - 27 (OT) |
177 | Virginia | ACC | Texas Christian | AWAY | 7 - 27 |
178 | Penn State | Big Ten | Virginia | AWAY | 16 - 17 |
179 | Minnesota | Big Ten | Western Michigan | HOME | 28 - 23 |
180 | Washington State | Pac-12 | Brigham Young | AWAY | 6 - 30 |
181 | Louisville | Big East | Southern Mississippi | AWAY | 21 - 17 |
182 | Connecticut | Big East | North Carolina State | HOME | 7 - 10 |
183 | Wake Forest | ACC | Notre Dame | AWAY | 0 - 38 |
184 | Rutgers | Big East | Kent | HOME | 23 - 35 |
185 | North Carolina State | ACC | Tennessee | NEUTRAL | 21 - 35 |
186 | Syracuse | Big East | Minnesota | AWAY | 10 - 17 |
187 | Mississippi | SEC | Texas | HOME | 31 - 66 |
188 | California | Pac-12 | Nevada | HOME | 24 - 31 |
189 | Kansas | Big 12 | Rice | HOME | 24 - 25 |
190 | Kentucky | SEC | Louisville | AWAY | 14 - 32 |
191 | Virginia Tech | ACC | Pittsburgh | AWAY | 17 - 35 |
192 | Colorado | Pac-12 | Fresno State | AWAY | 14 - 69 |
193 | Maryland | ACC | Connecticut | HOME | 21 - 24 |
194 | Georgia Tech | ACC | Middle Tennessee State | HOME | 28 - 49 |
195 | Georgia Tech | ACC | Brigham Young | HOME | 17 - 41 |
196 | Boston College | ACC | Army | AWAY | 31 - 34 |
197 | Iowa | Big Ten | Central Michigan | HOME | 31 - 32 |
198 | Connecticut | Big East | Western Michigan | AWAY | 24 - 30 |
199 | Wake Forest | ACC | Vanderbilt | HOME | 21 - 55 |
200 | Colorado | Pac-12 | Colorado State | NEUTRAL | 17 - 22 |
201 | Temple | Big East | Maryland | HOME | 27 - 36 |
202 | Illinois | Big Ten | Louisiana Tech | HOME | 24 - 52 |
203 | South Florida | Big East | Miami (Florida) | AWAY | 9 - 40 |
204 | Penn State | Big Ten | Ohio | HOME | 14 - 24 |
And finally, in an effort to focus a bit on some of the non-AQ leagues (and answer the somewhat obvious question of why CUSA rates as the worst league even though the numbers don't look THAT much worse than a couple other leagues), I'm listing the top 30 OOC performances by non-AQ teams. And since CUSA has only one game among that list, and #25 at that, I think it becomes fairly clear why CUSA rates lower. At the lower end, they don't have all that much more dragging them down compared to other non-AQ leagues, but they also really don't have the sort of OOC showings that help push a league up in the ratings either.
1 | Brigham Young | Indep | Georgia Tech | AWAY | 41 - 17 |
2 | San Jose State | WAC | Navy | AWAY | 12 - 0 |
3 | Ohio | MAC | Penn State | AWAY | 24 - 14 |
4 | Kent | MAC | Rutgers | AWAY | 35 - 23 |
5 | Louisiana Tech | WAC | Texas A&M | HOME | 57 - 59 |
6 | Middle Tennessee State | Sun Belt | Georgia Tech | AWAY | 49 - 28 |
7 | San Jose State | WAC | Brigham Young | HOME | 20 - 14 |
8 | Louisiana-Monroe | Sun Belt | Tulane | AWAY | 63 - 10 |
9 | Navy | Indep | East Carolina | AWAY | 56 - 28 |
10 | Brigham Young | Indep | Utah State | HOME | 6 - 3 |
11 | Toledo | MAC | Cincinnati | HOME | 29 - 23 |
12 | San Jose State | WAC | Stanford | AWAY | 17 - 20 |
13 | San Jose State | WAC | San Diego State | AWAY | 38 - 34 |
14 | Brigham Young | Indep | Washington State | HOME | 30 - 6 |
15 | Louisiana-Lafayette | Sun Belt | Florida | AWAY | 20 - 27 |
16 | Fresno State | Mountain West | Colorado | HOME | 69 - 14 |
17 | Brigham Young | Indep | Hawaii | HOME | 47 - 0 |
18 | Brigham Young | Indep | New Mexico State | AWAY | 50 - 14 |
19 | Toledo | MAC | Arizona | AWAY | 17 - 24 (OT) |
20 | Nevada | Mountain West | California | AWAY | 31 - 24 |
21 | Brigham Young | Indep | Idaho | HOME | 52 - 13 |
22 | Brigham Young | Indep | Boise State | AWAY | 6 - 7 |
23 | Boise State | Mountain West | Brigham Young | HOME | 7 - 6 |
24 | San Diego State | Mountain West | Army | HOME | 42 - 7 |
25 | Tulsa | C-USA | Fresno State | HOME | 27 - 26 |
26 | Louisiana Tech | WAC | Illinois | AWAY | 52 - 24 |
27 | Fresno State | Mountain West | Oregon | AWAY | 25 - 42 |
28 | Bowling Green State | MAC | Florida | AWAY | 14 - 27 |
29 | Louisiana Tech | WAC | Rice | HOME | 56 - 37 |
30 | Utah State | WAC | Wisconsin | AWAY | 14 - 16 |
Technical notes about the lists:
1) Conference ratings are straight averages of all of the teams in the league. There is no "central averaging" (like Sagarin does), or over-weighting the top teams, or anything like that. Such approaches would yield different numbers, and could potentially change the order of some of the leagues.
2) Games against AA teams are not counted. There are many good arguments both for and against counting such games (see this link for an interesting analysis of the issue). I have elected not to count these results in the Compu-Picks model. As is the case almost every year, this means that one or two especially surprising AA upsets don't make it into the numbers, skewing the results to a fair degree for a couple of teams. I believe that this is a more than acceptable tradeoff given the substantial issues that counting AA games would create, but you are certainly welcome to disagree with my decision on this matter.
3) As mentioned here, the purpose of this system is to make picks, not to create a list used for rankings. As such, I evaluate the system solely on the basis of how good a job it does making picks. I do not evaluate the system on the basis of whether or not it agreed with AP polls, BCS rankings, the BCS computers, or any other such list out there. In fact, the system has a long and established history of being substantially different than those sources. I am fine with these differences. To be honest, I publish these lists because I find them interesting and thought-provoking, and because I believe it is a good thing to introduce an approach that doesn't simply regurgitate the same avenues of thinking as you can find in most places.
4) The system is noisy, especially earlier in the year. This is why I start with only the top and bottom few, and slowly expand the list. While I believe that the numbers are reasonable, I certainly accept that they're not perfect. If you believe that a specific team is over- or under-ranked, you may well be right. I bring this up because if you're going to criticize the system for being wrong about a team, I'd appreciate it if you explain why you think the system is substantially wrong, rather than just marginally so (if it's just one or two slots off, especially well before the end of the year, I'd consider that well within a reasonable error range).
There are a few important notes and caveats I need to make about this model:
1) Compu-Picks does not endorse implicitly or explicitly any form of illegal gambling. Compu-Picks is intended to be used for entertainment purposes only.
2) No guarantee or warranty is offered or implied by Compu-Picks for any information provided and/or predictions made.
Questions, comments or suggestions? Email me at cfn_ms@hotmail.com