Bowl season Five Factors box scores

This week’s Five Factors box scores are up! This encompasses both bowl season and the Army-Navy game. Check out all the results here. Superior performances in each category are below.

Top 5 success rate margins (vs. FBS)

1. FAU (+27% vs. Akron)
2. Appalachian State (+24% vs. Toledo)
3. Duke (+18% vs. NIU)
4. Florida State (+18% vs. Southern Miss)
5. Army (+16% vs. Navy)

FAU’s destruction of Akron was even worse than we expected, and we expected something pretty bad.

Top 5 yards per play margins (vs. FBS)

1. FAU (+4.3 vs. Akron)
2. SDSU (+4.1 vs. Army)
3. Appalachian State (+3.6 vs. Toledo)
4. Ohio (+3.5 vs. UAB)
5. Marshall (+3.0 vs. Colorado State)

That SDSU managed to lose to Army was ... unique.

Top 5 field position margins (vs. FBS)

1. Louisiana Tech (+25.5 vs. SMU)
2. Texas (+24.2 vs. Mizzou)
3. Wyoming (+22.2 vs. CMU)
4. Florida State (+21.3 vs. Southern Miss)
5. Appalachian State (+16.7 vs. Toledo)

Can’t believe that Texas-Mizzou wasn’t the most ridiculous field position game of bowl season. Congrats, Louisiana Tech.

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

1. Navy (+6.1 vs. Virginia)
2. Temple (+5.0 vs. FIU)
3. Ohio (+4.8 vs. UAB)
4. Ohio State (+4.7 vs. USC)
5. Appalachian State (+3.8 vs. Toledo)

I also can’t believe that there multiple games with a bigger skew than USC-Ohio State in this regard.

Top 5 turnovers luck margins (vs. FBS)

1. Wyoming (+4.3 vs. CMU)
2. Appalachian State (+3.3 vs. Toledo)
3. UCF (+3.0 vs. Auburn)
4. Arkansas State (+2.9 vs. MTSU)
5. Louisiana Tech (+2.5 vs. SMU)

Translation: UCF had a turnover margin that was +3.0 ahead of where national averages suggest it should have been. As each turnover is worth approximately five points, that means Auburn suffered about 15 points’ worth of bad turnovers luck in a one-touchdown loss. Small consolation, I’m guessing.