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Mississippi State 38, Auburn 23
Confused? Visit the Advanced Stats glossary here.
| Basics | Auburn | Mississippi State | Nat'l Avg |
|---|---|---|---|
| Total Plays | 78 | 79 | |
| Close Rate (non-garbage time) | 94.3% | ||
| Avg Starting FP | 32.7 | 31.5 | 29.8 |
| Possessions | 15 | 16 | |
| Scoring Opportunities* |
7 | 7 | |
| Points Per Opportunity | 3.29 | 5.43 | 4.70 |
| Leverage Rate** | 61.5% | 76.0% | 68.3% |
| Close S&P*** | 0.500 | 0.549 | 0.507 |
|
* A scoring opportunity occurs when an offense gets a first down inside the opponent's 40 (or scores from outside the 40). ** Leverage Rate = Standard Downs / (Standard Downs + Passing Downs) *** When using IsoPPP, the S&P formula is (0.8*Success Rate) + (0.2*IsoPPP) |
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| EqPts (what's this?) | Auburn | Mississippi State | |
| Total | 24.9 | 31.1 | |
| Rushing | 11.3 | 15.9 | |
| Passing | 13.7 | 15.2 | |
| Success Rate (what's this?) | Auburn | Mississippi State | Nat'l Avg |
| All (close) | 43.5% | 48.1% | 42.0% |
| Rushing (close) | 44.4% | 48.8% | 43.4% |
| Passing (close) | 42.4% | 47.2% | 40.6% |
| Standard Downs | 50.0% | 50.0% | 47.3% |
| Passing Downs | 28.6% | 42.1% | 30.6% |
| IsoPPP (what's this?) | Auburn | Mississippi State | Nat'l Avg |
| All (close) | 0.76 | 0.82 | 0.85 |
| Rushing (close) | 0.66 | 0.76 | 0.73 |
| Passing (close) | 0.87 | 0.90 | 0.99 |
| Standard Downs | 0.60 | 0.71 | 0.77 |
| Passing Downs | 1.41 | 1.25 | 1.14 |
| Line Stats | Auburn | Mississippi State | Nat'l Avg |
| Line Yards/Carry (what's this?) | 3.89 | 3.03 | 2.92 |
| Std. Downs Sack Rt. | 11.1% | 0.0% | 4.7% |
| Pass. Downs Sack Rt. | 6.7% | 7.1% | 7.3% |
| Turnovers | Auburn | Mississippi State |
|---|---|---|
| Turnovers | 4 | 4 |
| Turnover Points (what's this?) | 18.5 | 16.3 |
| Turnover Margin | +0 | |
| Exp. TO Margin | Auburn +2.19 | |
| TO Luck (Margin vs. Exp. Margin) | Mississippi State +2.19 | |
| TO Points Margin | Mississippi State +2.2 points | |
| Situational | Auburn | Mississippi State |
| Q1 S&P | 0.472 | 0.628 |
| Q2 S&P | 0.516 | 0.655 |
| Q3 S&P | 0.511 | 0.342 |
| Q4 S&P | 0.512 | 0.492 |
| 1st Down S&P | 0.500 | 0.606 |
| 2nd Down S&P | 0.448 | 0.389 |
| 3rd Down S&P | 0.616 | 0.651 |
| Projected Scoring Margin: Mississippi State by 8.4 | ||
| Actual Scoring Margin: Mississippi State by 15 | ||
What a hot, wet, delicious mess of a football game. Six first-half turnovers, stalled drives, punts ... and a hell of a defensive effort by Mississippi State.
Two specific things won this game for MSU: luck and finishing. The turnovers lucked skewed pretty hard in the Bulldogs' favor here; if the average turnover is worth about five points of field position, MSU benefited by about 11 points by, among other things, recovering six of the game's seven fumbles. Still, they won by 15 because, as I mentioned in the Numerical, they finished drives and Auburn didn't.
MSU turned the tables on Saturday and won the game because of it. Each team had seven scoring opportunities; with five touchdowns, a field goal, and a turnover, MSU averaged 5.4 points on its opportunities. With two touchdowns, four field goal attempts (one missed), and an interception, Auburn averaged just 3.3 points per trip. I'm not sure if "Turn your opponent's strength into your strength" comes directly from Sun Tzu or not, but it worked for Dan Mullen.
When you're the luckier AND better team, good things tend to happen to you.