Week 10 Five Factors box scores

This week’s Five Factors box scores are up! Check out all the results here. Week 9’s superior performances in each category are below.

Top 5 success rate margins (vs. FBS)

1. Auburn (+23% vs. Texas A&M)
2. Washington State (+22% vs. Stanford)
3. Purdue (+20% vs. Illinois)
4. Boise State (+17% vs. Nevada)
5. Mississippi State (+17% vs. UMass)

Auburn’s offense basically took the first quarter off, and the Tigers still completely dominated Texas A&M, play for play.

Top 5 yards per play margins (vs. FBS)

1. Michigan (+5.6 vs. Minnesota)
2. Houston (+4.7 vs. East Carolina)
3. Washington (+3.7 vs. Oregon)
4. SDSU (+3.7 vs. SJSU)
5. Middle Tennessee (+3.6 vs. UTEP)

Not that he was asked to do just a ton on the slop against Minnesota, but now that Brandon Peters is getting some playing time as Michigan QB, I’m becoming even more curious as to why he wasn’t seeing the field a lot earlier.

Top 5 field position margins (vs. FBS)

1. Wisconsin (+20.7 vs. Indiana)
2. Bowling Green (+17.5 vs. Kent State)
3. UL-Lafayette (+17.5 vs. South Alabama)
4. New Mexico (+16.3 vs. Utah State)
5. Washington (+16.0 vs. Oregon)

An extremely Wisconsin win over Indiana: run the ball, tilt the field, and wait.

Top 5 points per scoring opportunity margins (vs. FBS)

1. Eastern Michigan (+4.7 vs. Ball State)
2. Army (+4.2 vs. Air Force)
3. SDSU (+4.0 vs. SJSU)
4. TCU (+3.4 vs. Texas)
5. FIU (+3.3 vs. UTSA)

FIU’s defense is up to 64th in Def. S&P+, and the Panthers themselves are up to 77th overall, after a nice win over a UTSA team that is beginning to flail a bit. The Roadrunners are still in the S&P+ top 50 because of how good they were earlier in the year. But they’re just 2-3 after a 3-0 start.

Top 5 turnovers luck margins (vs. FBS)

1. UMass (+3.5 vs. Mississippi State)
2. Boise State (+3.4 vs. Nevada)
3. FAU (+3.0 vs. Marshall)
4. CMU (+2.7 vs. WMU)
5. Idaho (+2.7 vs. Troy)

Translation: UMass had a turnover margin that was +3.5 ahead of where national averages suggest it should have been. As each turnover is worth approximately five points, that means Mississippi State suffered about 17 to 18 points’ worth of bad turnovers luck. That somewhat explains why this game was so close for so long (MSU eventually won by 11).