Rivalry Week Top 25 and CFP Reaction

CFP Reaction

I ended up agreeing with the committee regarding the top 5.  I’ll be really surprised if two of the current top 4 lose this weekend.  I had said before last week that I thought Ohio St. would be one of the stronger non-champions were they to lose to Michigan.

Neither Tennessee nor Alabama, who each have two losses, had a non-conference game that was worth very much to compensate for the extra loss.  The SEC is better, but it’s not so much better that you don’t need either a very good non-conference game or a ninth conference game. 

I did think that LSU would have deserved consideration if they had finished with 2 losses, but the Tigers did get the ninth conference game when they qualified for the SEC Championship Game.  This would have given LSU a second win over a team who finished with a winning record in conference.

Anyway, as to who #6 should be, I disagree with those who have Tennessee behind Alabama.  Tennessee not only played the #1 team in the country by virtue of playing in the SEC East, but they also beat both of the top teams in the SEC West.  Alabama didn’t beat anyone in the top 6 (there are 7 teams per division) of the SEC East, and they also didn’t beat the only team with a winning conference record (LSU) in the SEC West.  The Tide did lose two games in the last second, but I think beating more good teams should count for more than how close the losses were.  Alabama didn’t have to beat a team like either team who beat Tennessee.  Texas was a better non-conference opponent than Pitt, but that doesn’t make up for Alabama playing Vanderbilt as the extra cross-divisional opponent while Tennessee drew LSU, not to mention Georgia and South Carolina.

Ratings and Other Thoughts

I don’t think this technicality matters as far as Playoff arguments but something else that annoys me is if you lose a tiebreaker for the conference championship game, you’re still considered a divisional co-champion.  Even though LSU lost after clinching the spot in the championship game, Alabama can now claim they’ve won the SEC West 10 of 11 years (the exception being 2019).  I prefer the NFL approach.  If you lose the tiebreaker to the team that advances as the winner of the division, you’re not called a champion or co-champion.  The previous time the Tide lost it outright was also to LSU, in 2011.  Since divisions will cease to exist in about two years, I hope we can get at least one more outright win in the next two years.

Back to my rankings/ratings, you may have noticed the “weighted rank” doesn’t penalize as much for losses anymore.  I’ve compensated for that by making it a smaller component of the overall total, but it still does take record into consideration to some extent.  For instance, Vanderbilt had to play four of the five best teams by conference record in the SEC and is only #39 in the weighted rankings because the Commodores also have 7 losses.  Alabama only played two of those teams and is #15 in the weighted rankings largely because there were no other losses.

So, although when I first introduced the weighted rankings they were meant to stand alone, in no universe did I think LSU was #1 last week or that Oregon St. is #2 this week (after Georgia); but those are the teams (other than Georgia) most deserving of bonus points if you will given a combination of a good record and quality opponents.  I also think it’s right that Clemson lost an extra spot (from what they are in the original unweighted formula) because their weighted rank fell to #24.  Clemson just barely edged out LSU and Oregon St. 

Sometimes you have to hold onto your hat in the last 20 minutes of a Rivalry Week game.

One might come to the conclusion that I don’t give conferences other than the SEC enough of a chance with the weighted component, but there are five Pac-12 teams in the weighted top 10 and only three SEC teams.  All things being equal, LSU and Tennessee having such tough conference slates would have caused them to finish lower than Alabama in the standings, but they both beat the Tide and ended up with the same number of conference losses as the Tide. 

USC was the only one of those five Pac-12 teams to have a better weighted rank than unweighted rank.  This was because the other four all finished with three overall losses.  It also helped that the Trojans played Notre Dame.  This compensated somewhat for USC not having played Washington and Oregon.

The other teams in the top 10 of the weighted rankings are Texas and Michigan.  Michigan is doing well being that they only played two teams in the top 40 in my overall ratings, but of course being undefeated helps.    Texas has the opposite situation: a number of top-40 opponents (4) but also a number of losses (4).  Texas has also played 5 teams that finished between numbers 41 and 65 with only one opponent (ULM) below #85.

There are only a couple of the lower teams I thought needed a little bit of explanation beyond the results of last week.

It really hurt Florida St. that Clemson and LSU lost because those games were largely responsible for the Seminoles’ having an unweighted ranking of 14 and a weighted ranking of 16 last week.  Notre Dame’s loss to USC also had some collateral effect upon the ACC as a whole as well given that the Irish beat both of the ACC title contestants and another team (Syracuse) who went .500 in conference and finished 7-5 going into the bowl game.

The only other team who seems somewhat out of place is Boise St.  The win over Utah St. wasn’t the most impressive (although to be fair, the Aggies had won 5 of 6 going into the game), but the three teams who had beaten the Broncos all had “good” weeks.  The Broncos’ worst loss, UTEP, is still not a good team; but the Miners improved their strength of schedule considerably by playing UTSA.  You probably know what happened with Oregon St. (who beat Boise St. in Week 1) and why their stock improved.  Also, BYU improved its strength of schedule with the win over Stanford (who played in a good conference and somehow beat Notre Dame…. Best wishes to departing head coach David Shaw, by the way. How he made it so long is beyond me).

Boise St. LB Ezekiel Noa sacks Fresno St. QB Logan Fife in the third quarter of what was at the time a close game in Boise on October 8. The Broncos outscored the Bulldogs 20-0 in the last 20 minutes of the game to win 40-20. A rematch will be played for the Mountain West title tomorrow, also in Boise.

I also noticed there were some games that weren’t included the last time or two I had updated the weighted rankings, so that may have played some role in why Florida St. fell after a loss and why Boise St. rose so far after a win over a now-6-loss opponent.  I think that’s also the main reason UCLA fell so much last week and rose so much this week. Without correctly factoring in how good USC was, it made the loss to the Trojans look worse than it should have; and this is now corrected.

Regardless, I like the process I’ve followed this year because it’s been a lot more stable.  I don’t like to say a given team is top 10 one week and not in the top 25 the next or that six or seven teams are in this week’s top 25 but weren’t in last week’s.  We don’t really find out that much about a team in one game, especially not when it’s 1 of 12 games, so I don’t like to see much volatility later in the year even if there are some adjustments in the methodology.

Top 25

Rank	Team	Last
1	Georgia	1
2	Michigan	4
3	Texas Christian	3
4	USC	7
5	Ohio St.	2
6	Tennessee	8
7	Alabama	9
8	Penn St.	10
9	Clemson	5
10	LSU	6
11	Oregon St.	16
12	Texas	18
13	Oregon	11
14	Utah	12
15	Kansas St.	21
16	UCLA	23
17	Tulane	20
18	Florida St.	13
19	Boise St.	—
20	Washington	24
21	Notre Dame	15
22	Troy	14
23	S Carolina	—
24	Mississippi St.	—
25	TX San Antonio	22
—	N Carolina	17
—	Ole Miss	19
—	Coastal Caroliina	25

For the detailed ratings of all 131 teams, see here or follow the link in the heading for “Knights Ratings” at any time while browsing the site.

Why It Wasn’t Wrong for Kelly to Leave Notre Dame

There was no way to encapsulate all of my thoughts about the events of the last 5 or 6 days into a single blog. For now, I’m going to focus on Kelly leaving Notre Dame and how I understand that happened. I’ve decided to start with a collection of often misrepresented or misunderstood facts and then use those facts to come to reasonable conclusions. Some of the facts may seem a little sarcastic, but it’s not my fault how many people fail to acknowledge such obvious facts in their reaction to this situation. I will discuss Kelly’s fit with LSU and other matters in other blogs.

Facts

Kelly had recently said that for him to leave there needed to be a fairy godmother with a check for a quarter billion dollars OR he had to talk to his wife.

• The only confirmed conversation between Woodward and Kelly was some point between the Notre Dame-Stanford game and the news broke on Monday. 

• Kelly stayed on the West Coast after the game for recruiting for Notre Dame.

• Leaked text of contract was dated Sunday.

• There were widespread reports of a conversation in October, but Kelly said he didn’t engage in any and he can’t speak to what conversations his agent did and didn’t have.

• Kelly said after meeting with a recruit’s family he found out news broke.

• There is no known ability that Brian Kelly has to shut down social media or sports reporters nationwide.

• There have been no documented cases of time travel.

• I’m not sure where he was recruiting, but Stanford plays just south of San Francisco and he said he picked up his lawyer and they left from Orange County, which is South of Los Angeles.

• Kelly probably did not check his phone while with a recruit and also was not available by phone while in the air.  This apparently led some to believe he was deliberately ignoring his assistants.

• Kelly and Lincoln Riley share the same agent.

• When LSU fans were largely under the impression the coach would be Riley, there was a report that a press conference was expected Wednesday or Thursday.

• After texting Monday night while preparing to return, Kelly met with Notre Dame players on Tuesday morning.

• On Tuesday evening, Notre Dame was ranked #6 in the College Football Playoff rankings.

• Kelly would not say whether a higher ranking would have affected his decision.

• The early signing period begins two weeks from the introductory press conference that was on Wednesday.

• Unlike many other successful teams this season, Notre Dame is idle until the bowl games.

• The Notre Dame AD did not ask assistant coaches to return since they were also busy recruiting.

• Brian Kelly was at Notre Dame for 12 years and is the all-time winningest coach in Irish history.

• It is very common for coaching changes to take place after regular-season games but before bowl games, and this has been the case going back decades.

• Games that take place after the regular season are called the post-season, not the mid-season, so leaving after those games is not accurately characterized as “leaving in the middle of the season”.

Inferences and Conclusions

Obviously, I don’t think his agent had meaningful conversations without apprising him or that his wife and family were first given the opportunity to think about it late Saturday night.  I think he kept it vague enough that while he might not know of every conversation, he knew of the conversations that he had with the agent.  My guess is the contract in its final form was drafted on Sunday but not finalized and agreed to until Monday.

In an increasingly rare sight, two coaches each with over 10 years of experience as head coach of their respective schools (Stanford’s David Shaw, left, and Brian Kelly, then of Notre Dame, to the right) exchange pleasantries after a Power-5 football game, which in this case had taken place Saturday night in Stanford, Calif. Approximately 48 hours later, it was revealed in no uncertain terms that Kelly would be leaving the Irish with his last stop in South Bend being early Tuesday morning.

Kelly didn’t want to miss any time recruiting in the event he were to stay at Notre Dame. Although it may hurt in the committee, it makes sense for Notre Dame to take advantage of not having a game coming up to get an edge on the many good teams who do have a game coming up this weekend.  The Notre Dame AD said he didn’t ask any of his coaches to come back to South Bend, so it was busy for them too.  Kelly denied and I heard no reports that Kelly had negotiated with any other teams.

I can understand the frustration of an assistant who just had a meeting with a recruit and sees or hears on his phone somehow that the head coach is leaving and then can’t get in touch with the head coach.  Rather than taking a deep breath and thinking about logistical issues that can arise, apparently this assistant assumed the worst and got on the phone with a reporter to vent his frustrations.  That does not mean Kelly screwed anyone over or left anyone high and dry.  That’s just melodrama the media tried to sell.

Since that was about the worst possible ranking the Irish could have realistically had this week, it’s safe to say that waiting a couple of days wouldn’t have mattered even if the news hadn’t come out.  I don’t think waiting until this coming Sunday was an option though. There may have been a revolution in Baton Rouge if people waited that long without further clarity as to the coaching situation there, and anyone who did know would not have been able to keep quiet that long.

Some people say that he should only have even entertained an offer if they were eliminated, but remember that LSU finished #2 in the BCS rankings in 2007 with two losses.  The Tigers had jumped from #7 to #2 on championship weekend. With that in mind, when are you really out of contention for #4? #10 maybe? So everyone can leave but the coaches with the 9 most successful teams of the year after the regular season? In other words, you can have anyone except the coaches you probably want at that moment. After Brian Kelly’s last game in Cincinnati, the Bearcats were ranked #4. After Nick Saban’s last game at Michigan St., the Spartans were ranked #9. Maybe Saban never coaches in the SEC if such a rule were put in place. Certainly, Notre Dame wouldn’t have hired Brian Kelly the year they did in the first place. So don’t listen to these appeals to principle by Notre Dame fans. They’re fine with taking coaches from the best teams, in their case while an undefeated campaign was ongoing. They just never thought the shoe would be on the other foot.

Also, even if he were 40, you don’t get your best offers after an off year.  Saban didn’t say, “We finally have a good bowl game this year, call me back another year if we go back to the Independence Bowl.” No one at Notre Dame had a problem bringing Kelly in after he had an undefeated season at Cincinnati and they were going to the Sugar Bowl.   I know they’re not national championships, but Michigan St. and Cincinnati aren’t Notre Dame.  Notre Dame had some down years in recent memory, but they didn’t go winless like Michigan St. did before Saban took over.  Michigan St. was a big program at some point, but Cincinnati never was.

Brian Kelly celebrates a dramatic comeback win in the final regular-season game against Pittsburgh in 2009. Cincinnati clinched the Big East championship with the win. Two days later, the New York Times reported Kelly would interview with the Irish. Kelly was selected and negotiations were completed by the following Thursday.

If Kelly had ended up staying at Notre Dame, he wouldn’t have wanted to endanger that by not using this opportunity to recruit.  He certainly wouldn’t have wanted to let on that he was talking to other programs about their job.  That could have left him with neither job.  If LSU didn’t work out and Notre Dame had let him stay, that could have strained a lot of relationships and cost him a chance to win at least one playoff game.  If Georgia beats Alabama comfortably, they’ll be a clear #1 and I wouldn’t give Notre Dame a chance; but if Alabama wins, I don’t know who #1 is.  I guess it would be Michigan, but if Michigan St. beat them Notre Dame can.  This might have been the only really good chance Notre Dame had, and time is not on your side at 60.

I also want to mention that it’s very unlikely that Kelly was offered more than a very brief speech.  The Notre Dame administration would not have wanted him to have conversations with players that could have led to transfers to LSU, nor would they want more than a brief distraction even if that were not a risk.

I know it’s unfortunate that his departure could be used against Notre Dame, but NCAA/CFP college football made this mess, not Lincoln Riley and not Brian Kelly.  They shouldn’t penalize any team for their coach making a rational decision based on the recruiting schedule.

Some say if they’re really harsh it will teach schools a lesson not to fire coaches.  How would punishing Notre Dame teach LSU a lesson?  What?

Others who pretend to take the players’ side say coaches shouldn’t be able to actually leave at this time.  So coaches can make plans to leave, but they’re stuck.  How hard are they going to recruit if they know they’re not getting the player?  For the players the school gets despite the coach potentially blowing it, they’re going to be signing up to play for a coach who won’t even be the coach when they arrive on campus.  Whatever university hires that coach will have a whole recruiting class who didn’t sign up to have that coach.  I’m for the escape valve of the transfer portal (although I think there should be certain date ranges), but you could end up with almost as many players in it as out of it.  I don’t think it would stop coaches from moving if all the other rules stay in place.

The only real solution in my opinion is (1) to not have an early signing day, (2) to make rules about tampering during the season (which for all teams would be through the national title game), and (3) allow six weeks between the allowable period to hire another team’s coach and the one and only national signing day.  The teams who lose a coach and opt not hire a current head coach should still have times to find a replacement and get their new staffs organized in time for recruits to make really good decisions knowing the head coach, coordinator, and school.  Only knowing the school isn’t good enough if you really care about players and you’re not just trying to get clicks from angry Notre Dame fans.

Another person who tried to add fuel to the fire was Lou Holtz, who tried to act like leaving Notre Dame was a huge insult to Notre Dame.  If you don’t remember, Lou Holtz was the guy who left Notre Dame at the age of 59 after 11 seasons, a stark contrast from Kelly’s age of 60 and his departure after 12 seasons.  Holtz then decided he wanted a new challenge of coaching in the SEC, which is also completely different because of reasons. He may claim it was OK because he didn’t go to another team immediately. To me, it’s more selfish to leave to have months for yourself than it is to immediately begin to devote your energies to another group of young men.

I could make fun of bad takes all day long, but I don’t want to be mean and I don’t want to promote their stupidity. I’m not worried about Holtz’s media presence going forward. Although I can’t stand the whole Notre Dame football scene, I have some sympathy for how players and fans may feel right now. I know when they go on about how mediocre or morally deficient Kelly is or how great first time head coach Marcus Freeman is (he may be, but no one really knows yet), they’re really overcompensating for a sudden feeling of insecurity.

Anyway, for a more rational analysis, I recommend this Fox Sports clip of Doug Gottleib. I also thought Rich Eisen, Marcellus Wiley, and Stephen A. Smith (of all people) had reactions worth hearing. I intentionally mention people without any loyalties toward LSU.

I’ve even seen some comments from LSU fans saying we were disappointed when Saban left.  After Katrina, the Saints played the Dolphins in Tiger Stadium.  The biggest cheer all day was when Nick Saban was announced. 

On October 30, 2005, Nick Saban walks the sidelines at Tiger Stadium less than 10 months after his last game with the Tigers. Saban would return again just over three years later as the head coach of the Alabama Crimson Tide. Saban won both the game above over the Saints and the 2008 game over the Tigers. 2010 is still the only instance of Saban losing in Tiger Stadium since he left LSU. His next scheduled trip to Baton Rouge is November 5. He also defeated Kelly’s Irish in the 2012 and 2020 seasons.

LSU fans were sad that Christmas 2004 (which I think was the day Saban decided) and New Year’s 2005 (not to mention the way LSU lost the game that day), but it wasn’t this kind of anger.  Saban probably would have had to stay 15 years to become the all-time winningest coach.  I don’t think many would have begrudged him leaving after that.  Even given that he left after 5 years, people only got angry and hateful toward Saban when he went to Alabama.  If Kelly had gone to USC, then I would relate.  I think the real reason we see the anger from Notre Dame fans is it kind of rubs their noses in it that they’re not this great college program that people will sacrifice tens of millions of dollars just for the privilege of being there. 

I will talk about why the common agent might matter in other blogs.

Anyway, this says absolutely nothing negative about Kelly’s character.  Unless it’s proven that he lied about a large number of things or a large number of conclusions about reported facts are not as they appear, I don’t see any legitimate reason for the negative attention.  I think Notre Dame hopes with the favorable media they get, they can unfairly poison recruits against Kelly.  LSU fans might not have cared about Kelly a week ago, but we shouldn’t let them.

Week 6 Rankings and Comments

I didn’t get around to posting a mid-week blog last week, but I may have a couple of them this week. I forgot to link them last week, but I’ve published my computer ratings for the second time this season. Maybe it’s good that I didn’t link them, because I had made a couple of mistakes that I’ve since caught.

It wasn’t the most eventful week.  Thirty-four teams had the week off.  There were a couple of losses by mid-range top-25 teams, but they were conference road games.  None were particularly shocking.  There was also the Auburn-Florida game.  Most people I saw picked Auburn, but I don’t think anyone was too shocked Florida won. 

In the late game, Stanford beat Washington.  I found out that Stanford’s kicker is named Jet Toner, which sounds like printer ink.  Anyone can beat anyone in the Pac-12 it seems, but Oregon is still probably the best bet to compete for a playoff spot since the Ducks have no conference losses.  The Rose Bowl is not a semifinal this year, so the Pac-12 champion is guaranteed at least that.

Anyway, the main tricky team I got in the computer was Auburn, and that was largely because the Florida loss barely damages the Tigers right now.  As an opponent, Florida is overrated in my system at the moment because their two games against FCS opponents don’t damage the strength of schedule.  As a team, they don’t get much credit for those two games though.  That’s why the computer doesn’t put the Gators ahead of Auburn even though they’re one of the “best losses” possible.  It will be fairer if Florida loses because then the Gators will be harmed in winning percentage (4-1 is a lower percentage than 6-1, but 5-0 isn’t a lower percentage than 7-0).

LB Jonathan Greenard and the Gators defense had an easier time than expected keeping Auburn quarterback Bo Nix from doing a lot of damage (in Gainesville, Fla., Saturday). We will see how they do against LSU QB Joe Burrow in Baton Rouge next Saturday night.

I tinkered with a few different ideas of addressing this before deciding that I would just move Auburn down the normal variation I allowed myself for this week, which is four spots.  There were more undefeated teams I wanted to put ahead of Auburn, but I don’t think numbers 7 to 10 would beat Auburn anyway. 

Clemson is still in the top 3 in the computer formula with three wins against the top 60, so I still don’t think it makes sense to make a change.  Ohio St. has more impressive wins so far, but there isn’t the kind of signature win that justifies becoming #1 in my mind. Maybe Wisconsin in a couple of weeks will do it, depending on how the SEC sorts itself out by then.

Although I tried to stay within the four spots, I did make a few exceptions based on losses (or lack thereof).  

I liked that there was a group of undefeated teams followed by a group of one-loss teams (with Oklahoma thrown in… see below), so I didn’t think it made sense to put Oregon ahead of more undefeated teams, especially now that the team they lost to has a loss itself. So I moved the Ducks one extra spot down.

I moved Oklahoma one extra spot up because I think the Sooners should be ahead of Texas since they’re undefeated.  If the Longhorns are better, they don’t have to wait long to prove it on the field.  Switching them before the game doesn’t accomplish anything. 

Third, I excluded Washington from the top 25 despite a computer rank of 20^th.  If you’ve lost 40% of the FBS games you’ve played (to teams with 3 losses combined), that’s not top-25-worthy even with a good schedule.  Again, it’s a problem that can be easily rectified on Saturday. If they beat Arizona (#27 in the computer formula), they’ll be in.  If not, they won’t be.

Stanford K Jet Toner was responsible for 11 of the Cardinal’s 23 points against Washington Saturday night. Stanford dominated in both time of possession total yards largely due to the success of RB Cameron Scarlett (not pictured).

Michigan St. did take the last spot despite two losses, but I think 4-2 vs. FBS (which is what Washington would be with a win on Saturday) is easier to justify than 3-2 with an FCS win.  Also, one of the Spartans’ losses is to the computer #1.  The Huskies’ better loss is to #31.

As for undefeated teams, Memphis, Baylor, and Minnesota all joined the top 25 by virtue of being undefeated.  All the teams who fell out of the top 25 lost on Saturday.  Colorado fell the most spots, but that was partly due to Air Force’s loss to Navy. Michigan and Cincinnati moved back into the top 25 despite earlier losses.  Ohio St. and Wisconsin are two of the top four teams in the computer formula though, so I didn’t see those respective losses as a reason to keep the Wolverines or Bearcats out.  Both had decent wins over the weekend.  Michigan beat Iowa; and Cincinnati beat Central Florida.

A few teams have been seesawing, such as LSU (from 4^th to 14^th and back up to 3^rd) and Notre Dame (from 25^th to 7^th and back down to 16^th), but that’s part of the volatility that takes place in the first weeks of the transition to the computer system.  It’s also partly mistakes on my part in anticipating what the computer formula will do.

LSU gained from beating Utah St., which isn’t a bad team; but Georgia Southern finally won a game, so that gives the Tigers more credit for that win (so it was like two wins in one week).  The Tigers also benefited from the rule changes I made to my top 25.  Georgia and Alabama were too far back in the computer formula, and Auburn lost, so that accounts for all three spots that I moved the Tigers from the computer formula.  This had minimal affect on the ranking, but I also feel like LSU addressed some of its issues in the way it played against Utah St.  I’m less impressed by some of the other undefeateds.  I’ll write more about LSU later in the week.

We will know more about a lot of teams this weekend, not just LSU.  Hopefully that will clarify things and help limit the erratic movements from week to week. 

rank	team	last
1	Clemson	1
2	Ohio St.	5
3	LSU	14
4	Alabama	2
5	Florida	15
6	Auburn	4
7	Wisconsin	9
8	SMU	11
9	Georgia	3
10	Boise St.	6
11	Penn St.	17
12	Wake Forest	8
13	Memphis	—
14	Oregon	18
15	Arizona St.	10
16	Notre Dame	7
17	Oklahoma	21
18	Texas	25
19	Baylor	—
20	Michigan	—
21	Hawaii	24
22	Appalachian	19
23	Minnesota	—
24	Cincinnati	—
25	Michigan St.	13

Out of top 25: (12) Colorado, (16) Washington, (20) UC-Berkeley, (22) Oklahoma St., (23) Iowa

Week 2 Recap and New Top 25

Top 25

rank	team	last
1	Clemson	1
2	Alabama	2
3	Georgia	3
4	LSU	4
5	Ohio St.	5
6	Notre Dame	7
7	Auburn	8
8	Florida	9
9	Wash. St.	10
10	Oklahoma	11
11	Michigan	6
12	Texas A&M	12
13	Utah	13
14	Texas	15
15	C. Florida	16
16	Michigan St.	17
17	Penn St.	19
18	Appalachian	20
19	USC	—
20	Maryland	—
21	Cincinnati	21
22	Boise St.	22
23	Oregon	23
24	Iowa St.	24
25	UC-Berkeley	—

Out of top 25: (14) Washington, (18) Syracuse, (25) Stanford

Comments

LSU/Texas Recap and Significance

I considered making LSU comments a separate blog, but since it was the only big game this weekend worth delving into, I’m doing it here. 

I wasn’t wrong about LSU winning, but I was wrong about a couple of other things.  I would have been right both about LSU not beating the spread and about LSU not getting to 45 points on offense if only the Tigers had failed in the two-point conversion attempt, so I wasn’t far off.

Anyway, I’m happy to be wrong about LSU being able to get the same number of points Oklahoma did in the Texas win in Dallas last season and happy LSU beat the spread.  I did expect one late score to make the difference though, so my reasoning for picking Texas to beat the spread was sound.  The win didn’t feel secure until LSU went up 12 (14 with the conversion) with 2:27 left in the game, and then the game wasn’t really over until the onsides kick failed with 22 seconds left.  The field was just a couple of inches too narrow for Texas to recover.

Despite some problems that will need to be fixed, it’s at least somewhat encouraging that LSU did 10 points better than Oklahoma did on defense last year in the first game against the Horns.  I thought that was the most impressive Texas game last year, so that’s why it was my point of comparison in the preview.  I wasn’t sure if Texas would be equally impressive on offense in this game, but they were in my opinion. 

I don’t think the LSU offense is quite at the level of the Oklahoma offense last season, but the relative inexperience of the Texas defense (which I thought was the main reason the Longhorns would lose) made it look like that.

Anyway, I’ll add some stats I found interesting.  LSU once again looked extremely good against a top 10 team not named Alabama.  The Tigers are 6-0 in such games under Orgeron and have won 4 of the 6 by at least 7 points.  This game was closer than average, but the offense did about 2 touchdowns better than the average number of points in the previous 5 such games. 

One reason the game was close was the fact that it was on the road.  LSU had never won a road game against a top-10 opponent out of conference; although under Les Miles alone, the Tigers did beat #16 West Virginia in Morgantown in 2011 and #15 Arizona St. in Tempe in 2005.  This was the second LSU win in Austin and first since 1938.

QB Joe Burrow throws downfield in Austin on Saturday. Burrow went 31/39 for 471 yards.

This was also the first time in LSU history that the Tigers had three receivers with over 100 yards each (Jefferson, 163; Chase, 147; and Marshall, 123).  Joe Burrow’s 471-yard performance on Saturday is second in the Tiger record books only to that of Rohan Davey, who threw for 528 yards against (unranked) Alabama in 2001.  Davey (with Josh Booty) also contributed to more total passing yards (485) in the win over Western Carolina in 2000, but neither quarterback exceeded 300 yards.  For possible future reference, the individual home record is held by Tommy Hodson, who threw for 438 yards in a loss to Tennessee in 1989.

Other games

Other people are moving LSU up to the top 4, but since I had them there already, I think the top 10 (apart from Michigan, who needed overtime to beat Army and still deserved to lose) is fine how it is.

The only other big game going into the week was Texas A&M at Clemson.  It went about what I’d expect with the #1 team playing at home against the 6^th-best SEC team.  I didn’t make a specific mention of the game; but you can see my preseason top 25 if you don’t believe that was how I viewed the respective teams.

There were two Pac-12 games that were somewhat surprising, especially the endings.  Stanford looked good against USC for about a quarter and a half, but then the Trojans scored the last 35 points of the game to win 45-20.  The Cal (UC-Berkeley) Bears used a lot of ball control late in the game to give themselves a chance against Washington.  It took until about 1:30 a.m. local time (due to a 2-hour lightening delay), but the Bears scored the winning field goal with 8 seconds left after Washington had scored a go-ahead field goal from about 50 yards with just over 2 minutes left.

The only thing else that was surprising was Maryland beating Syracuse by 43 points.  I wouldn’t have been surprised by a closer Maryland win since it was a Terps home game, but the Orange was blown away on defense in both rushing and passing.  It could be a long day when Syracuse faces Clemson next week.

Anthony McFarland, Jr., (no relation to the former LSU player) runs for one of his three touchdowns against Syracuse in College Park, Md., Saturday.

Due to Stanford, Syracuse, and Iowa St. (who was idle after needing 3 OTs to beat FCS foe Northern Iowa), no games within the AP top 25 will be played next weekend.  I left the Cyclones in though, so the battle for the Cy-Hawk trophy is unusually interesting this year.

Week 1 Top 25 and LSU/Texas Series and Preview

TOP 25

rank/team/last

1	Clemson	1
2	Alabama	2
3	Georgia	3
4	LSU	4
5	Ohio St.	6
6	Michigan	5
7	Notre Dame	7
8	Auburn	9
9	Florida	8
10	Wash. St.	10
11	Oklahoma	11
12	Texas A&M	12
13	Utah	13
14	Washington	14
15	Texas	15
16	C. Florida	17
17	Michigan St.	18
18	Syracuse	20
19	Penn St.	21
20	Appy St.	23
21	Cincinnati	24
22	Boise St.	—
23	Oregon	16
24	Iowa St.	19
25	Stanford	—

Out of top 25: (22) Florida St., (25) South Carolina

Top 25 Comments

I know it’s late for many of you, so I only used one picture. I usually try to avoid walls of text, but it couldn’t be helped.

I covered most of what I had to say about the games over the weekend on Sunday. 

I thought Michigan struggled too much to stay ahead of Ohio St., who dominated.

I think Auburn barely beat a much better team than Florida barely beat, so I switched the two.

I dropped Oregon close to the bottom just because they’re 0-1, but they can bounce back pretty quickly. 

Boise St. was a late cut from my list of potentials, so it was easy to put them in.

As for the other new team, I’m not in love with Stanford being that they only scored 17 points and will probably rely on the backup quarterback in the next game, but sometimes that helps teams.

Florida St. and South Carolina deserved to fall out for obvious reasons.  It may be a while before I consider South Carolina again, but Florida St. showed some good things.

If you need three overtimes to beat a FCS team like Iowa St. did (although it’s worth noting Northern Iowa has had a lot of success in recent history), that’s almost like a loss to a top-10 team.  A win is a win for the most-part (giving credit for strength of schedule of course); but with only one game to consider, you have to look at how easily the win came. 

Oklahoma and Notre Dame, who played since my last blog, took care of business.  

Notre Dame probably let Louisville hang around too long, but the Irish don’t typically have an offense that leaves the opposition in the dust right away anyway 

Oklahoma let Houston score a couple of touchdowns to get within two possessions late, but I don’t hold it against them.  I’m still skeptical about how the Sooners will do against Power 5 competition though.  It could be that the Big XII will make them look good even if they aren’t.  Texas looked all right, but nobody looked great. Speaking of the Longhorns…

LSU @ Texas

Texas QB Sam Ehlinger looks to throw against TCU last season. LSU HC Ed Orgeron said preparing for Ehlinger was similar to preparing for Heisman Trophy winner Tim Tebow.

All-time series: Texas leads, 9-8-1 (updated after the game)

The first game of the series was way back in 1896, LSU’s 11^th official game as a program (and 10^th intercollegiate game), but 10 of the 17 games in the series were clustered between 1935 and 1954, the last regular-season matchup (Texas won 20-6 in Austin).

The (January) 2003 Cotton Bowl (Texas 35, LSU 20) was the only matchup since 1963 (also the Cotton Bowl, which LSU won 13-0), so LSU fans shouldn’t despair too much about these facts.  The more-recent Cotton Bowl was the highest-scoring game of the series, beating out the 35-14 Texas win in 1952.  In the 2003 game, Texas entered at 10-2, and LSU entered at 8-4.  LSU would win the BCS national championship in the following January though.

The third-largest point total and largest margin of victory is also owned by Texas, 34-0 in 1941.  Other than the tie in 1936, the closest game was the 5-0 LSU win in San Antonio in 1902.

Texas leads the series in Austin, 7-2-1, the other LSU win coming in 1938. (updated after the game).

The Tigers lead 2-1 at “neutral” sites (two in Dallas, one in San Antonio) and 4-1 at home. 

Added after the game: Both teams scored more in 2019 (45 to 38 final in favor of LSU) than either had in this series before. LSU more than doubled its previous high of 20 (in the loss in Jan. 2003 and in wins in 1938 and 1953).

After Saturday, the next game is scheduled for Tiger Stadium on September 12 of next season with no future plans thereafter; although LSU plans to return to Big XII country (if the Big XII is still a thing) in 2027 to face Oklahoma.

Preview

Speaking of the Longhorns, there was a debate on the College Football Nerds YouTube channel (formerly known as SEC Fans) about whether Texas will beat LSU.

They absolutely can…  I’m not going to suggest for a moment it’s going to be as easy to stop Texas’s mobile quarterback as it was to stop the Georgia Southern quarterbacks.  I’m not a big fan of the Texas defense even before the loss of all but two or three starters, but I’m reasonably sure LSU will go scoreless on more than one drive with the first-team offense in the game. I also don’t discount the degree of difficulty in playing in Austin.  I don’t know if it’s the same as the best SEC stadiums, but we’ve had some of our best teams lose at home (like in the 2003 season) or lose at less-intimidating SEC places like Commonwealth Stadium (the sponsor isn’t paying me) in Lexington (like in the 2007 season).

.. But I don’t think they will.  LSU has a clear advantage in returning starters; but even if they didn’t, I think last year’s LSU team would have beaten last year’s Texas team even in Austin.  Oklahoma played terribly on defense and only lost by a field goal, and that was Texas’s best game.  The Longhorns only won the Sugar because Georgia was going to be the team that blew the lead to Alabama in the SECCG whether they beat Texas or not.  A month of relatively little motivation can make a big difference.  LSU in their worst game wouldn’t have lost to Maryland like Texas did.

Anyway, in the video, I don’t know if the guy arguing for Texas was advancing weak arguments on purpose or he was just trying hard to sell the only arguments he could come up with; but they weren’t very persuasive.  One was “we’ve heard it before that the offense is different.”  There were changes when Cameron was fired, there were changes when Canada came in, and there were changes last year; but there weren’t wholesale changes like this.  Neither Etling in 2015 and 2016 nor Burrow last year were ready for anything crazy anyway. 

Shea Dixon had some good stats on differences from last year.  In all of last season 14 players caught passes, four of them running backs.  On Saturday, 14 players caught passes, 5 of them running backs.  He also included a special teams stat: LSU had 52 yards in punt returns Saturday compared with 99 in all of last season.

Another one is “Texas doesn’t rebuilt, they reload.”  Charlie Strong (who still recruited a lot of the players) would be surprised to know that.  They’re not Alabama or Clemson all of a sudden because of one year with double-digit wins (which with 14 games isn’t what it used to be).  LSU has done a bit of reloading over the years as well.  It’s still an advantage to have more players back, especially from a successful year.  Speaking of Alabama and Clemson, they both had successful years in 2017; but Clemson had a lot more players back in 2018.  I think that helped the Tigers win the championship as easily as they did.  Even if Texas “reloads” an exact replica of last season on defense (though I’m not sure Louisiana Tech gets 340 passing yards last year), that’s probably a good sign for the LSU offense.  To be fair, the La. Tech scoring was all in the fourth quarter, but they had several earlier opportunities.  In short, I’m not convinced.

Another point I’m not buying is that Texas can handle the SEC based on the Georgia game.  If LSU played Georgia and that was LSU’s only SEC game last year, that wouldn’t mean LSU would beat every SEC team this year with.  LSU played a Georgia team that still had a potential national championship run in front of it too.  Also, bowl games are a lot different.  You don’t get the same players.  LSU had a patchwork team in the bowl game last season and looked pretty good, which is part of the reason I rank them so highly now; but I don’t know how different the Texas-Georgia game would have been if it had been a playoff game.

There was another point that might have been good had Texas had its defense back from last year, and that was that LSU’s new offense is more similar to what Big XII teams run.  Being used to scrimmaging against the Texas offense isn’t the same thing as a season of Big XII opponents.  When you’re up 42-3 at the half and take most of your starters out shortly thereafter, you’re not going to show everything anyway.  So we can’t be sure this would be so easy for an experienced Big XII defense anyway.  Also, let’s not forget even in the best team game for the Longhorns they allowed 45 points.  Do I think LSU will score 45?  No.  Do I think they’ll allow 48 like Oklahoma did?  That’s not even a serious question in my mind.

My final thoughts: I don’t want to discount the fact that Texas has a chance to win at home. It just seems less likely.  Maybe 60-40 odds in LSU’s favor.  If you point a gun to my head and make me bet, I’d take Texas and the points (5.5 according to ESPN), but it’s a close call. If someone wins the turnover battle 4-0 (as was the case when LSU beat Georgia last year), that team could win by 20+ though. I don’t think feel like I know enough about either team under pressure to even venture a guess as to over/under.

Last topic, speaking of turnovers, both teams were +2 in turnovers in the first game, but stats from last year indicate LSU might do better.  LSU was tied for 7^th in turnover margin last year (with an advantage of 0.8 per game).  Georgia Southern’s turnover margin was more than twice as much though (1.7, 1^st), so that makes the first game more impressive for the Tigers.  Texas was close behind LSU last year (0.6, tied for 18^th), but Louisiana Tech was barely positive (0.2, tied for 43^rd).

2019 Preseason Rankings Intro

I’ll publish the top 25 in a couple of days, but I’m going to keep you in suspense while I talk about my philosophy and some of the turnover that you may notice from the end of last season.

There are a few things I want to say about my philosophy when it comes to preseason rankings.  Although I do pride myself on a team having a good season after I started them unusually high or a bad season after I start them unusually low, I’m not trying to have the exact top 25 that will be in place at the end of the year. 

I’m also not trying to have the exact top 25 that will be in place before the bowls.  It sounds strange, but a lot of people will make the top 4 the teams they think will be in the playoff.  If there is a close call at #4 and #4 loses to #1 by 40 while #5 wins a big bowl, #4 going into the playoff is not going to stay #4.  There could even be a #6 or #7 that pass them up.  But if I were still on a site with a lot of comments, people would show up and tell me I’m crazy for thinking three SEC teams will be in the Playoff.  I wouldn’t even want that to happen if I honestly believed the best three teams were in the SEC.

Anyway, what I do believe in is a best guess as to who is going into the season with the toughest team.  So with that in mind, I don’t care how easy your schedule is.  Some people seem to think rankings are a list of most likely teams to go undefeated.  For instance, I read something that touted Nebraska as a potential ranked team since they don’t play any of the best teams in the Big Ten.  That tells me nothing about how good Nebraska is, so I don’t care.  Maybe they’ll get fewer injuries that way and will therefore be harder to beat in the bowl than they would have been otherwise.  But that’s one reason this isn’t as much about who’s good later in the year. 

Nebraska didn’t win its first game last year until October 20 (pictured). The Huskers finished the year 4-8 (a couple of plays from 6-6), but I’m still skeptical of a drastic improvement.

However, I do expect some correlation between the best teams going into the season and the best teams at the end of the season.  And by going into, I mean those with the best prospects on paper, not necessarily the teams who will have the most successful first few weeks.

For a while I focused just on returning starters and how good a team was last year, but I’ve been led astray too many times recently and decided to look more in depth.  If Alabama only had 9 returning starters (RS), for instance, I’d still have them in the top 5.  In past years I may have expected a team like that to fall from 14-1 to 10-4, but I don’t know if any number of returning starters no matter how small would cause Alabama or Clemson to lose four games this season.  Last year, the Tide only had 10 RS.

Tua Tagovailoa (pictured during the 2018 national championship) may feel spoiled as Alabama increases to 12 returning starters from 10 last season.

Such programs just get too many great recruits, and their coaches are attentive and hardworking enough to make even recent high-school players elite college players in just a few months. Teams like that seem most vulnerable early in the year (which I maintain is why Alabama has lost to Ole Miss recently but not LSU), so I guess that’s one caveat to what I said about who’s best going in, but Alabama has also lined up against some decent teams in the first game and blown them out.

Conversely, the two teams with the most RS are UCLA and Texas St.  If you put all of their returning starters on the same team, I still wouldn’t put that team in my top 25.  UCLA could be in the top 25 at the end of the year for all I know, but it would take a lot of improvement that I’ve seen no evidence is forthcoming from that particular program.  I had the Bruins 95^th at the end of last season, so even if they improve 65 spots (jumping over half the teams in FBS football), they still wouldn’t be in the top 25.

The worst team last year that I’m ranking here is Florida St. (whom I had #61 in the final ratings), but since their schedule was so tough last year, their record wasn’t very indicative of talent level.  The Seminoles finished the year against five consecutive ranked opponents (beating one). The only loss to an unranked opponent was to Syracuse, which finished ranked #15 in both major polls and which nearly beat Clemson.  I decided that was as low as I was willing to go though.  I had Virginia Tech many spots lower and after some consideration opted to leave the Hokies unranked despite 16 returning starters.

Florida St.’s one-point loss to Miami, in hindsight, resulted in the Noles’ first season without a bowl game since 1982.

There were three other teams I considered moving into the rankings now despite not finishing last year ranked, but I’ll wait and see for now (last year’s final ranking), Mississippi St. (30), Baylor (47), and Wisconsin (48).

The only ranked teams from last season that I ruled out immediately were in the Mountain West. Boise St. has lacked consistency in recent years and only returns 13 starters, which do not include last year’s quarterback.  Fresno St. and Utah St. return only 9 starters apiece.  The “mid-major” teams can have difficulty with continuity even with a large number of returning starters.  I did decide to give Appalachian St., which returns 16 starters, the benefit of the doubt though.  By the way, RS numbers do not include kickers. 

Other ranked teams that fell out between the final ratings of last season and now are Kentucky (#12, 8 RS), Army (#14, 11 RS), Stanford (#24, 9 RS), and Iowa (#25, 10 RS).  Kentucky has improved or maintained its record from the previous season every year since 2014, but all good things must come to an end.  I considered keeping Army as the Black Knights have responded well in the past to personnel turnover, but there were too many talented major programs that have more potential to reach major bowls.

I’ve given you a few hints, but check back for the preseason top 25 in the coming days.

Final Top 25 of 2018 Season

This week is always tough for me to get back on schedule, so having a game on a week night and then trying to write all of this with work the next day caused me to keep pushing this back. I don’t plan to wait until next season for the next blog, but I can’t be sure when I’ll write again.

As demonstrated by the chart I posted along with the last blog, college football is Alabama, Clemson, and everyone else.  I’m happy someone other than Alabama comes out number one about half the time. 

The only thing I ever had against Clemson (other than a fight song that sounds similar to LSU’s) was that when South Carolina lost to them years ago it made the SEC look bad.  But now I don’t think it hurts that Clemson caused 1/4 of the SEC’s inter-conference losses during the season.

I also want to let the Alabama fans who freaked out when I put Clemson #1 earlier in the year to know I’m laughing at them even though I won’t rub it in.

There is no significance to using a Cotton Bowl picture instead of a national championship picture, but this was the best picture I saw of Trevor Lawrence. He snuck by a lot of people who couldn’t stop talking about Tua and Kyler, so I thought he deserved a good picture.

Final SEC Comments

The Alabama loss drops the top six teams of the SEC to 5-2 in postseason.  All three of my computer rankings (weighted, unweighted, and statistical average) have Clemson #1 and Alabama #2 as is appropriate. 

As I talked about in the last blog, the middle of the conference narrowly lost a few games because they were slightly overmatched. I thought I would explain that a little bit more.

Normally the #7 team and 4th in their division doesn’t end up in the Outback Bowl, for instance (last year South Carolina made it with a winning record at fifth place overall and second in the SEC East). If Mississippi St. had played in the Music City Bowl instead (or an even lesser bowl like the St. Petersburg Bowl they played in two years ago), they probably would have won.

Vanderbilt probably would have won had they not been playing a team that tied for fifth in their conference while the Commodores finished sixth of the seven teams in their division. In other years, the last SEC bowl team ended up in the Birmingham Bowl against a non-major opponent (and not a conference champion like LSU played this year and Auburn played last season).

I would honestly say Missouri was ninth in SEC play although they had the same record as a couple of other teams. Mississippi St. only finished 4-4 because they lost to the two best SEC West teams and to two of the three best SEC East teams. Unlike Missouri, they didn’t play the worst team of the other division. South Carolina was in the SEC East along with Missouri, and the Gamecocks beat the Tigers. The Gamecocks lost to Clemson out of conference, but I don’t think anyone would seriously tell me Missouri would have had a meaningful hope of beating Clemson at the end of the year.

Maybe there wouldn’t have been a blowout (and there would have been another SEC win) had Auburn played Oklahoma St. and Missouri played Purdue, but one reason that didn’t happen was Missouri already beat Purdue. Similarly to Auburn, Oklahoma St. seemed to show up best for their major out-of-conference games while being inconsistent in conference. The Cowboys made Boise St. look like Kansas, even though the Cowboys lost six conference games (including an embarrassing home loss to Texas Tech) between that game and the bowl.

I didn’t see the South Carolina game, just the highlights (if you can call them that); but it seemed like they just didn’t show up. I guess when you qualify 11 teams for bowls, chances are that will happen with one of them. Maybe South Carolina vs. Purdue was the pillow fight the bowl season needed.

In sum, I don’t think the top six of any other conference would have won five games (or even four games) against Oklahoma, Texas, Central Florida, Michigan, Penn St., and North Carolina St. I don’t think anyone else’s #11 plays a close game with Baylor like Vandy did or anyone else’s #10 blows out Purdue like Auburn did. Maybe you can quibble with a couple of others; but mid- and low-ranked teams of other conferences aren’t expected to play close games against the same caliber of teams, and with one exception those SEC teams did play close games.

Also, the average SEC team still blows every other conference out of the water. In my conference ratings, 0.07 points separates the #2 conference (the ACC) and the #5 conference (the Pac-12), but 0.19 separates the ACC and the SEC.

Top 10 (Including LSU)

I also think it’s right to have Notre Dame #3.  The Irish’s loss to Clemson doesn’t look as bad now, and–although Michigan lost–two of the better teams the Irish beat, Northwestern and Syracuse, had good bowl results.  Stanford also won; but I don’t know if that really helps Notre Dame’s argument since they beat Pittsburgh, another opponent of theirs.  I don’t factor this in, but there was also some bad luck in their scheduling.  You would have thought at least one team among Navy, USC, and Florida St. would have qualified for a bowl game, but no such luck.

Oklahoma did beat Texas, which added to its value by winning the Sugar Bowl, but there isn’t much else to be excited about in the Big XII results.  Both of the teams who tied for #3 in the regular season, West Virginia and Iowa St., lost.  There were a couple of wins by lower teams over two middling SEC East teams and Cal, but it also hurt Oklahoma that the team who beat them lost in the national championship.  Also, since Alabama played Georgia and Missouri (the second-best team the Big XII beat in bowls), it didn’t help the Sooners as much to have Big XII teams beat them.

Urban Meyer went out a winner in the Rose Bowl. His team was pretty good too, although that Purdue game still defies explanation.

I think it’s right that Ohio St. finishes ahead of the Sooners.  The top of the Big Ten had some losses too, but I don’t think basically a .500 team of any other conference would have beaten Mississippi St. in the Outback Bowl.  I don’t know if (other than the SEC) another conference’s effective #4 team (Northwestern had as good a conference record as Ohio St. but played in a much weaker division and lost three games out of conference) would have beaten Utah.  Maybe Oklahoma would have beaten Washington, but maybe they would have come out flat like Georgia did against what I consider a worse team. More on Texas later.

I have LSU 7^th, but with the objective way my ratings work I can’t give credit to my belief that LSU was the better team when they played Texas A&M.  I think most of the voters probably treated that like a tie at worst.  The polls also frown upon losing your last two games regardless of the opponents, so that also contributed to the Tigers passing up the Bulldogs… not to mention that LSU beat Georgia by 20 points.

Speaking of head-to-head, there is of course an argument Florida should be ahead of Michigan, but the Gators were hurt by being in the SEC East (which went only 2-4 in bowl games) and losing to Missouri.  Florida was the only team outside of my top four who beat Michigan though.

So Michigan finished ninth behind Central Florida, and Washington St. rounds out the top 10. Iowa St. wasn’t a spectacular opponent (although again the bowl selectors did their job in making it entertaining), but 11 wins is a job well-done anyway.

The Rest of the Top 25

Appalachian St. finished higher than I would have liked (simply because I think at least 25 teams would beat them at a neutral site), but I think keeping an 11-2 team outside of the top 15 based on strength of schedule is about the best to be expected, especially when one of the two losses was to a team in the top 20.  Cincinnati also finished 11-2 and barely made the top 25.

Texas finished fairly low considering the two big wins (Oklahoma earlier in the season and Georgia), but let’s not forget they lost to Maryland (who didn’t qualify for a bowl game).  Only one other Longhorn win (over 8-5 Iowa St.) came against a team who finished with fewer than 6 losses, so that hurts them in the weighted ratings.  Texas A&M, which had no bad losses, also had exactly three wins over teams who finished with fewer than 6 losses. 

I’d like to give the Aggies less credit, but I believe in being consistent.  The Aggies’ worst loss was to Auburn; but given that Auburn beat a 5-4 Big Ten team by about 50 points (and didn’t really even try to score in the second half), they probably could have done the same or worse to Maryland, who finished 3-6 in the Big Ten after beating Texas.  So I don’t consider Auburn a bad loss to the same extent.

I finished with three Mountain West teams in the top 25; but I think they were pretty similar, and despite the early losses to major-conference opponents it’s hard to say there were 20+ teams who were more deserving than all of them.  Fresno St. finished higher than I would have liked, but the Bulldogs did beat a fairly decent team in Arizona St. in the bowl game to finish 12-2.  Other than losing to Boise St., for which they redeemed themselves in the conference championship game, Fresno St. won the rest of the conference games.  Utah St. (which finished 11-2) may have been just as good, but they didn’t get the rematch against Boise St. and unfortunately didn’t have a chance at a better team than North Texas in the bowl.  They’ll get a crack at LSU next year though.

Fresno St.’s Ronnie Rivers ran for 212 yards (almost 9 yards per rush) against Arizona St. in the Las Vegas Bowl on December 15. The Bulldogs trailed, 20-17, before Rivers scored the last two touchdowns of the game.

Top 25 List

I did want to note that I’m using the statistical average of the weighted and unweighted ratings (I guess you could call it semi-weighted). I thought including Stanford and Iowa made more sense than the other versions. The top 10 was pretty consistent, so I didn’t worry about that as much as including the right lower teams. Here is the full 130-team list, but the top 25 list below has the recent changes.

Rank	Team	Prev.
1	Clemson	2
2	Alabama	1
3	Notre Dame	3
4	Ohio St.	5
5	Oklahoma	4
6	Georgia	6
7	LSU	9
8	C. Florida	7
9	Michigan	8
10	Wash St.	13
11	Florida	11
12	Kentucky	12
13	Fresno St.	15
14	Army	17
15	Syracuse	19
16	App. St.	16
17	Texas A&M	18
18	Washington	10
19	Texas	—
20	Penn St.	14
21	Boise St.	22
22	Utah St.	21
23	Cincinnati	23
24	Stanford	—
25	Iowa	—

Out of Top 25: (20) Missouri, (24) Miss. St., (25) Utah

Top 25 after Week 5

Before I begin, I know I missed the midweek blog. I had a baseball fantasy team (I won the championship of 10-team league), but that’s obviously over. I had a couple of other obligations last week as well.

I also should mention that I was sad to hear the news about LSU basketball player Wayde Sims. It’s going to hurt the team, but that’s a small consideration compared to a life cut short like that. I’ve lost a couple of other people prematurely who were important in different ways to my sports fandom in other Septembers, so I’m always glad for September for the cooler weather to commence.

Speaking of cooler weather, that’s usually when the Ole Miss game is played, but it was early this year. Here is the updated information about the LSU/Ole Miss series. I don’t have a whole lot to say about the game though. It was sloppy on both sides, but LSU just has a lot more talent. There were a couple of fumbles, but Ole Miss had a lot more penalties than LSU did (one of which negated a fumble), so it balanced out. It was nice for Burrow to do well statistically, although I’m not sure how well the land plankton compare to other SEC defenses. I plan to talk about the upcoming Florida game later this week. I heard an interesting discussion about it today that I’ll talk about as well.

LSU QB Joe Burrow accounted for 388 total yards against Ole Miss.

If you didn’t notice, I did complete my first official computer rankings of the year. I’m obviously not following them exactly in this list, but there were only two teams below whom I moved more than 4 spots. The first was Auburn, which I thought belonged one spot ahead of Washington, which it beat. The Plains Tigers just have low-value wins like Alabama St., Southern Miss, and Arkansas that makes their computer numbers look relatively bad. The second was Central Florida, who has a 17-game winning streak and lost out on potential points due to the hurricane. I will not move either team as much next week or in future weeks though.

There will probably be only a handful of deviations overall from the computer order next week. Some people have been confused about why I change the approach from week to week, but I just think people don’t realize the transition in other mediums. You start with preseason, which is only about how good you think teams will be, maybe with a little bit of consideration for how good they were in prior years. Then when it comes to bowls and the playoff, you want to exclusively base it on how well a team did this season.

You can’t make that transition and approach each week the exact same, but the polls tend to have this arrested development where they try to do that. I imagine them thinking, “I moved team A up 5 spots because they beat team B last week, and team B was in the top 10.” They’ll do that just as much in November as in September. They don’t think back and wonder if team B was only in the top 10 because of what they did this season or not, and then if team B loses to several other teams they don’t take away the extra credit they gave team A. They only reevaluate when it gets right to the end. I don’t understand what they’re waiting for.

I won’t have as much to say about my decision-making process going forward. Where I do make decisions I’m mostly just trying to provide a smooth transition from subjective to objective. It’s going to be more about why the computer formula reacts to input the way it does.

I will talk about the top teams a bit. I didn’t want to move LSU up another spot until they do something more impressive than beating Ole Miss at home. Ohio St. had a better win than Clemson did Saturday, but I’m no longer holding the closeness of the win over Texas A&M against them. The computer had the orange Tigers a good bit higher, so I followed that. Notre Dame is playing well just in time (and I believe Stanford is also better than Syracuse), so I’m now willing to look past the close final scores early on. Those are two examples of how margin of victory won’t really factor in going forward.

I’ve talked about Army and Duke in the last couple of weeks. Duke beat Army, so even though the Blue Devils lost and the Cadets won in big games last week, I decided they were close enough to put the winning team (especially with one fewer loss) ahead.

I’ll just briefly address the other new teams on this list. West Virginia held on in Lubbock to remain undefeated, which I considered in giving them an extra boost here. Florida had a good win in Starkville. I’m still skeptical of North Carolina St. and Indiana, but as I explained objective numbers are taking more of a role now. Indiana doesn’t get much credit for beating Rutgers, but it has moved up as other teams have lost or are no longer receiving extra subjective credit and did too well in the computer ratings to put lower. North Carolina St. got a numerically helpful win against Virginia and is undefeated. The Wolfpack and the Hoosiers are the only two teams to beat the Cavaliers, but we will see if that means anything soon (when Virginia plays U. Miami and Duke in the next two weeks).

Apart from Michigan, all the teams who fell out lost. The Wolverines are getting a lot of credit in other places for beating winless Nebraska (partly due to margin of victory). That doesn’t count for much here. Northwestern, the team they barely beat on Saturday, is 1-3 and lost to Akron. By the way, that’s an example of margin of victory the other direction. One reason I’m not that far away from many rankings who consider margin of victory is it tends to balance out. Anyway, I just didn’t see the logic in putting Michigan ahead of any team on this list, but they’re still close to the top 25.

rank/team/prev.
1 Alabama 1
2 Notre Dame 8
3 Clemson 7
4 LSU 4
5 Georgia 2
6 Ohio St. 3
7 Oklahoma 6
8 Kentucky 12
9 Stanford 5
10 NC State —
11 W. Virginia —
12 Auburn 10
13 Washington 21
14 Penn St. 9
15 Duke 11
16 Texas 22
17 Indiana —
18 Army —
19 S Florida —
20 Okie St. 24
21 Wisconsin 15
22 Florida —
23 U. Miami 20
24 Maryland 25
25 C. Florida 16

Out of Top 25: (13) UC-Berkeley, (14) BYU, (17) Michigan, (18) Miss. St., (19) S Carolina, (23) Texas Tech

Top 25 after Week 4

LSU had a good first 22 minutes and a good fourth quarter against Louisiana Tech, but it’s concerning to give up 21 consecutive points to two opponents in a row.

Apart from the touchdown drive at the end of the first half against Southeastern (SLU), LSU has not played well around halftime and the third quarter in any of its first four games.

The Tigers were way out in front of U. Miami and SLU; but in the case of U. Miami, ending a game with no touchdowns in your last 8 drives (not counting the kneel-down at the end) isn’t desirable in my opinion no matter what the score is. LSU may have been shut out in the second half against SLU if they had not recovered a fumble at the SLU 18 late in the fourth quarter.

The troubles started against Auburn after about a quarter and a half instead of two quarters, and that’s the same thing that happened against the Bulldogs on Saturday. We were up 24 against the Bulldogs instead of the 10-point lead at Auburn, but the play from that point until the fourth quarter was similar with identical results (outscored 21-0 in both instances). So there is a wide range of teams that could blow out LSU if the Tigers were to play like that for a full game. To look on the bright side, LSU could probably beat anyone if they eliminate that mid-game lag.

If the Tigers don’t play better, they may well lose the next game against Ole Miss. See here for more about that rivalry.

That said, I don’t see anyone other than LSU I want to put #4. Clemson’s game against Texas A&M and Oklahoma’s game against Army were more concerning, and no one has the pair of top-10 wins the Tigers have.

I thought about dropping Ohio St. due to not having played anyone except a team that just got beaten soundly by Texas, but I may have gotten some flak if the first three teams were all in the SEC. The Buckeyes’ strength of schedule should improve significantly in the next two weeks though, so I’ll leave them where they are for now.

Army’s ground game and ball control were almost enough to beat Oklahoma in Norman on Saturday.

I know I ranked Army #25 last week, but that’s not really a good excuse for Oklahoma to go into overtime against the Knights/Cadets at home. After an uninspired win at Iowa St. the week before, I’m not really feeling the Sooners right now. I’m phasing out the feeling element of this as I always do in late September, but going solely by the numbers wouldn’t even put OU in the top 10. I haven’t been impressed with other Big XII teams either, but the toughest games may be away from home: TCU, Texas Tech, West Virginia, and Texas (in Dallas). The remaining home schedule is Baylor, Kansas St., Oklahoma St., and Kansas.

Auburn didn’t do anything wrong; but even assuming they win next week, 3 of their four wins will be Alabama St. (who has lost by at least 34 to every Division I opponent), Arkansas (who probably still won’t have any FBS wins), and Southern Mississippi (whose only FBS win is over Rice). It’s just time to start factoring in strength of schedule more. Auburn has Georgia and Alabama later of course, but they won’t get credit until they play one of them.

Central Florida, the (AU) Tigers’ opponents in the Peach Bowl, and Michigan were even further from a ranking in my formula, so they dropped more.

Mississippi St. lost to a team I already had ranked, so I thought a 10-spot drop was enough even though the Bulldogs are also not on my computer list.

After that, I knew which teams I wanted to rank (they were all selected from the top 25 of my computer), but when I couldn’t decide the order, I just ranked them by how good the teams who beat them are. For instance, Texas Tech and Maryland (which beat Texas before the Longhorns’ big wins of the past two weeks) had lost to unranked teams. Ole Miss (which beat Texas Tech) has only lost to Alabama, and Temple (which beat Maryland) lost two games, one of which was to Villanova—and it wasn’t in basketball—so that was pretty easy to sort out. I think Oklahoma St. lost to a better team than Texas Tech did, but I couldn’t put the Cowboys ahead of a team who just beat them 41-17 in Stillwater.

The five teams that are in the computer top 25 but not in this one are (in order): Buffalo (beat Temple; see above for discussion about Maryland and Texas), Indiana (lost to Michigan St. but is the only team to beat Virginia), Michigan St. (beat Indiana, although the Spartans lost to Arizona St.), San Diego St. (beat Arizona St., only loss is to Stanford), and North Carolina St. (nothing too special, but they are the only team to have beaten James Madison or Marshall; they play Virginia next).

San Diego St. has a bye week, so they will be staying out; but any of the others could make it in by winning. I know it sounds silly, but this is especially true of Buffalo, which plays Army. Who knew New York could field decent college football teams, not to mention (possibly) three of them? The third is undefeated Syracuse, who fell just a few spots outside of the top 25 and will attempt to beat Clemson for the second year in a row on Saturday.

rank/team/prev.
1 Alabama 1
2 Georgia 2
3 Ohio St. 3
4 LSU 5
5 Stanford 6
6 Oklahoma 4
7 Clemson 7
8 Notre Dame 12
9 Penn St. 11
10 Auburn 9
11 Duke 15
12 Kentucky 24
13 UC-Berkeley 18
14 BYU 19
15 Wisconsin 20
16 UCF 13
17 Michigan 14
18 Miss. St. 8
19 S Carolina —
20 U. Miami —
21 Washington —
22 Texas —
23 Texas Tech —
24 Okie St. 10
25 Maryland —

Out of Top 25:
(16) Minnesota, (17) Iowa, (21) Boise St., (22) TCU, (23) Indiana, (25) Army

Top 25 after Week 3

Later this week I may write a little more about the LSU-Auburn game. You can read this for now. And this was an article I liked from the Alabama media. Also, I’ve updated my Rival Series entry about the LSU-Auburn series.

While his job seems safe for now, Auburn head coach Gus Malzahn (pictured addressing the media after the game) has faced criticism for losing to LSU in consecutive seasons after his team scored 20 or more consecutive points in each game.

I’m still not exactly sold on the long-term success of this LSU team. I think an Alabama or a Georgia (the Tigers will have to play both) would have put LSU to bed had they been up 21-10 instead of Auburn. That said, after three weeks, I think you need to give teams credit for what they’ve done so far; and no team has come close. Two wins away from home over teams who were in the top 10 at the time (and who would probably be in the top 5 without the loss) is something to be proud of if it takes you 13 games to do it, not to mention 3.

It will still take at least a couple more weeks before I will rely just on the results so far, but I’m starting to move in that direction. Since every team has now played at least one FBS opponent, I was able to do a trial run of my computer rankings. Indiana and Army were both in the top 10 through that method, so I felt it necessary to at least put them in the top 25 below. I didn’t want to drop Wisconsin all the way out, but I thought they at least needed to be below the team that beat them. Since BYU has a loss, they should also be behind the team who beat them given that that team is undefeated, so that’s why Cal (UC-Berkeley) is there. Both were in the top 25 of my computer formula as well.

Kentucky was 18th in the trial run—and they did beat a team in my preseason top 25—so I added them as well. There are seven teams who are in that top 25 and not in the top 25 below, but that number will be smaller next week and may be completely eliminated the following week.

For now, I’m still looking at each schedule to make sure a ranking is justified. I’ll use the example of the team that came up #25 in the trial run, Louisiana Tech (which just happens to play LSU next). Although they’ve only played two games, they beat an FBS opponent (South Alabama) who beat another FBS opponent (Texas St.). South Alabama has a really strong strength of schedule for the moment because their only other loss is to Oklahoma St., but obviously beating South Alabama and an FCS team isn’t enough reason for Louisiana Tech to be ranked right now. That’s why it’s too soon to only look at results this season without any context.

I don’t think I did anything too weird in the rest of the rankings. LSU and Oklahoma St. moved up for obvious reasons.

Pitt beat Georgia Tech, which was in some preseason top 25s; so I think they gave some legitimacy to Penn St., which beat Pitt easily. Notre Dame struggled again; and the previous team they struggled against (Ball St.) lost badly to Indiana, so that’s why the Irish are behind Penn St. I’m giving less consideration to margin of victory though. Otherwise Notre Dame would have fallen more. To be fair, Vanderbilt is probably a good bit better than Ball St., so at least the quality of play in Week 3 was better than that in Week 2.

In Waco on Saturday, Duke quarterback Quentin Harris threw for three touchdowns in his first start.

Also, I moved Duke up a bit because they’re one of the best teams on my computer list, and I already thought they deserved the ranking last week. I don’t see a strong argument for anyone lower to be in that spot. I don’t know how good Baylor is, but Duke has now beaten Army (one of the best non-power-conference teams) and went on the road to beat two FBS Power Five opponents (Baylor and Northwestern). Not only that, but (if you care about this sort of thing) they led by at least 14 points at the half in each game and were never ahead by fewer than 10 in the second half.

rank/team/prev.
1 Alabama 1
2 Georgia 2
3 Ohio St. 4
4 Oklahoma 5
5 LSU 13
6 Stanford 6
7 Clemson 7
8 Miss. St. 9
9 Auburn 8
10 Okie St. 17
11 Penn St. 15
12 Notre Dame 11
13 UCF 12
14 Michigan 14
15 Duke 23
16 Minnesota 19
17 Iowa 20
18 UC-Berkeley
19 BYU
20 Wisconsin 3
21 Boise St. 10
22 TCU 16
23 Indiana
24 Kentucky
25 Army

Out of Top 25:
(18) USC, (21) Maryland, (22) Arizona St., (24) Va. Tech, (25) W. Virginia