Is it really almost August? Wow, time surely does fly. It
seems like just yesterday I was hanging out with a few thousand green-and-white
clad folks in beautiful southern California watching my alma matar complete it
best football campaign of my lifetime. That was pretty cool, wasn't it? A week
later in the same stadium, a certain state school down south dethroned the SEC
and claimed the national title. It wasn't much as an improvement over the SEC's
reign of terror, but I will take it. Now, the fall it just around the corner
and all 128 FBS football teams are undefeated and full of hope. Who will rise?
Who will fall? Who knows? But once again it is time to unleash the football
spreadsheet on college football nation to see how things might pan out.
I believe this is now the 4th summer that I have presented
the results of my spreadsheet simulation. For the uninitiated, here is the
background. I starting putting the
spreadsheet together in grad school and I have been making steady improvements
to it over the years. I used to just
track scores and standings, but over time I have refined the algorithms to
predict game outcome / point spreads and generate power rankings. As the 2014 season approaches, I have once
again inputted the schedule information into the latest version of the
spreadsheet and am taking an early look at what to expect. If I take the pre-season rankings for each
team, convert that to an estimated power ranking, and simulate the season by correcting
for a team's performance at home or on the road (roughly a 3-point advantage
for the home team), I can to predict the final record of all 128 FBS
teams. As with last year, I have
expanded the set of data used to generate the pre-season rankings by taking the
average of several preseason publications (including Athlon’s, Lindy’s, Phil
Steele, ESPN, and USA Today). Keep in
mind that these results are purely based on math once the pre-season rankings
are inputted.
As always, let's kick things off with the B-one-G. A thirst
for more cable subscriptions but not better football programs resulted in the
Big Ten officially adding Maryland and Rutgers to the fold this summer. As a
results, the old Legends and Leaders Divisions are history and the league is
now divided into the more geographically appropriate East and West Division. Based on the preseason rankings, the East
division appears to be the stronger of the two, as it contains Ohio State (with
an agglomerating ranking of #6), Michigan State (12), and Michigan
(optimistically as always, ranked 23). Based on my spreadsheet's results, good
fortune is projected to shine on the Spartans once again, as I have the green
and white finishing with a perfect 8-0 record in conference play and making it
to Indianapolis once again for the Big Ten Championship game. The key, as it is every year with this
analysis, lies in the schedule. MSU faces both OSU and Michigan at home, and
their toughest road games are at Maryland (ranked 45) and Penn State (42). That
is by far the most manageable schedule in the East. On the other side of the coin is Michigan,
who must travel to both East Lansing and Columbus this year, and is projected
to lose both. The key match-up of the
Division is clearly the November 8th match-up in East Lansing between Michigan
State and Ohio State. Now, the dark
horse spoiler in all this could be Penn State. There does not seem to be a lot
of consensus in how good the Nittany Lions are this year. Some prognosticators have them in the Top 25 while
others do not have them in the Top 50.
PSU gets both MSU and PSU at home and if they could somehow win both,
they could wind up in Indy. But, for now, MSU seems to have the clearest path.
Unfortunately the Spartans also have to travel to Eugene, OR to play the Ducks (ranked #3 overall). I don't
project us to win that game (note that project and expect are not the same
thing), but that could be the only thing standing between MSU and a perfect
12-0 record.
As for the West, parity seems to be the theme as Wisconsin
(16), Nebraska (26), and Iowa (29) are all predicted to have solid teams. In this case, Iowa is the team with the clear
scheduling advantage, as they get both the Badgers and Huskers at home. Their toughest roads games are at Maryland
(45) and Minnesota (56), and even if they drop one of those games (like I
predict they will at Maryland), the Hawkeyes are still picked to finish 7-1 and
win the West Division with a 10-2 record overall (including another loss at
Pitt). The real loser in the scheduling sweepstakes is Nebraska, who with road
games at MSU (12), Wisconsin (16), Iowa (29), and Northwestern (50) is only
expected to finish at 5-3 in B1G play. In this scenario, MSU would face and beat Iowa
in the Big Ten Title Game and earn a slot in one of the new BCS-like Bowl
games. Will it be the Rose Bowl in the new National Semifinal? Stay tuned.
Just for completeness, here are my projected Big Ten
standings:
East
Michigan State 8-0 (11-1)
Ohio State 7-1 (11-1)
Michigan 6-2 (9-3 including a loss at Notre Dame)
Penn State 4-4 (7-5)
Indiana 3-5 (5-7)
Maryland 2-6 (5-7)
Rutgers 1-7 (3-9)
West
Iowa 7-1 (10-2)
Wisconsin 7-1 (10-2)
Nebraska 5-3 (9-3)
Illinois 2-6 (5-7)
Minnesota 2-6 (5-7)
Northwestern 2-6 (5-7)
Purdue 0-8 (3-9)
alas... poor Purdue
Moving on the ACC, Maryland is out and Louisville is in and
Florida State is the reigning National Champs and almost consensus #1 team for
2014. Well, the spreadsheet sees no reason why the Seminoles will not repeat
the success that they had last year. The
Noles draw Clemson (ranked #18) at home, and don't face cross division foe UNC
(27) in the regular season. FSU's toughest road games at Miami (30), at
Louisville (33), and a semi-road game in Dallas against Oklahoma State (31) on
opening weekend, all of which are manageable. The home schedule is not without
peril as FSU welcomes Notre Dame (17) and Florida (22), but if they really are
the best team in the country, they should be able to handle each of these games
and finish the season at 12-0.
FSU is in the "Atlantic" division of the ACC. As
for the "Coastal" division, the situation is much more murky. The problem is that the ACC has a large
number mediocre teams ranked 25-50, and in general the home teams are expected
to win most match-ups between any of those teams. As a result, the spreadsheet projects a 4-way
tie for the Coastal division in which UNC (27), Duke (36), Virginia Tech (37),
and Pitt (48) all finish at 5-3. Fortunately, the complex set of tie breakers
result in the top rated team, North Carolina, representing the division in the
ACC title game. FSU is expected to beat
them easily on a neutral field.
Next is the Big 12, where the cream of the crop appears to
be Oklahoma , which after last year's late season success, is ranked #4 in the
preseason. Baylor (8), Texas (19), and Kansas State (24) are all expected to be
Top 25 caliber, but the Sooners play all of those team at home or at a neutral
location. Their toughest road game seems to be at TCU (35). The most daunting game on the schedule is
likely the semi-neutral game against Texas in Dallas. Based on this schedule, Oklahoma is projected
to go undefeated and finish the season at 12-0.
As you might expect, Baylor (8) is their most likely biggest challenge,
and a home loss to the Bears would likely knock them out of the throne, but if
they are as good as predicted, the Sooners look to be in great shape to be one
of the four teams making the national semifinals. On the flip side, Texas (19) seems to have
drawn the short straw schedule-wise with road games at Kansas State (24),
Oklahoma State (31), and Texas Tech (39) and thus are projected to finish at
5-4 in conference play.
How about the Pac-12? In general, the Pac-12 looks strong
this year with four teams in the Top 15 (Oregon at 3, UCLA (7), Stanford (9),
and USC (14)) and an additional two teams in the Top 25 (Arizona State (21) and
Washington (25)). In the North Division, Oregon has the benefit of drawing both
Stanford and Washington at home (as well as MSU in the preseason). Even though
the Ducks are projected to lose at UCLA, they are projected to win the
remaining game and finish 8-1 in conference play (atop the North Division) and
11-1 overall. Stanford seems to have the toughest draw, as they are projected
to lose road games at Washington (25), Oregon (3), Arizona State (21), UCLA (7), and Notre Dame (17) in the
non-conference. They could be a legit Top 10 team and finish 7-5. Down South in the Pac-12, both UCLA (7) and
USC (14) are projected to finish 7-2 in league play, but UCLA gets USC at home
where they are expected to win, thus clinching the tie-breaker. UCLA's losses are projected to occur at
Arizona State (21) and Washington (25) (along with a nonconference loss at a
semi-neutral field against Texas (19)). USC's other loss is projected to occur
early in the season at Stanford. In the
Pac-12 Title game, Oregon is projected to beat UCLA (giving them a problematic
4th loss) to earn the Pac-12's bid in the postseason.
Last and perhaps least when it comes to humility, integrity,
and actual education, is the beloved SEC. Now, the SEC only has 14 teams, but
somehow 16 of them are ranked in the Top 25. OK, that may be a bit of a
stretch, but they do have six teams in the Top 15 (Alabama at 2, Auburn (5),
Georgia (10), South Carolina (11), LSU (13), and Mississippi (15)) and four
more teams in the top 35 (Texas A&M (20), Florida (22), Mississippi State
(28), and Missouri (34)). Unfortunately,
all of these highly ranked teams wreak havoc on my simulation, and I
historically have a hard time sorting out what will actually happen. What it does project is that no team will
finish conference play with fewer than 2 losses, which will create a 3-way tie
in the SEC East (among Georgia (10), Florida (22), and South Carolina (11)) and
a 2-way tie in the West (between Alabama (2) and Mississippi (15)) all with 6-2
records. If this were to come to pass,
the tie breakers would go to Florida and Mississippi, where Mississippi would
be projected to win and gain the SEC's official berth in the post-season.
How would this all go down? In the East, the top 3 teams
(UGA, USC, and FLA) are each expected to split with the other two teams as USC
hosts UGA, FLA hosts USC, and UGA projects to beat FLA on the neutral field in
Jacksonville where they play annually.
The key game to decide the tiebreaker is Georgia's road game at Missouri
(34), where the Tigers are projected to be just good enough at home to get the
W. This gives UGA a worse division record and thus knocks them out of the
running. In contrast, Florida (22) is projected to lose their other contest at
Alabama (2), while USC (11) is projected to drop one at Auburn (5). In the SEC West, it all comes down to the
tough road games. Auburn (5), LSU (13),
and Texas A&M (20) all are projected to have good teams, but their
conference road games are all tough.
Auburn and A&M are not projected to win a conference road game, and
LSU is only picked to beat Arkansas (53) on the road. Meanwhile Alabama has very winnable road games
against Tennessee (49) and Arkansas (53), while Mississippi draws Vanderbilt
(64) and Arkansas (53) on the road.
Thus, even though Alabama is picked to lose at LSU, and Ole Miss is
picked to lose at A&M and at LSU, both teams are project to win their other
games. The kicker is that Mississippi
also hosts and is projected to beat Alabama, which would ultimately give them
the upper hand in the division. This may
all sound a little crazy (and maybe it is) but nobody had Auburn and Missouri
winning their respective divisions last year, now did they?
The other interesting observation I that have made is that
the SEC seems to have several
interesting match-up against other "BCS" conference foes. They include:
Alabama vs. West Virginia
Clemson at Georgia
LSU vs. Wisconsin
Indiana at Missouri
Georgia Tech at Georgia
Which all look like wins.
However, they also include:
Arkansas at Texas Tech
Auburn at Kansas State
Kentucky at Louisville
Florida at Florida State
South Carolina at Clemson
Tennessee at Oklahoma
which the spreadsheet projects to all be loses. The SEC did
not win a BCS bowl last year and failed to win the National Title. If they wind
up sending a relatively weak Mississippi team to the Final Four this year (who
would project to lose in the 1st game), and the SEC has a losing record against
other BCS teams in the preseason... does this mark an end to the SEC's reign of
terror? Something to ponder.
What about the rest of the country? In the new play-off
system the winners of the 5 major conferences (ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12,
and SEC) all get automatic bids to the new (yet oddly familiar) set of 6 Bowl
games (add the Cotton and Peach Bowls to the Rose, Sugar, Orange, and Fiesta
Bowls) that make up the new Football Playoff rotation. However, similar to the
BCS days, the next best team in the country from the other five Mid-Major "Group
of 5" conferences (American, Conference USA, MAC, Mountain West, and Sun
Belt) also gets a bid. So, let's take a
quick look at those conferences.
First is the Big East version 0.0, otherwise known as the
American Athletic Conference. With the
departure and Rutgers and Louisville this year, there are not really too many
teams left in this conference that most non-hardcore football fans will
remember. U. of Central Florida made a minor splash last year by upsetting
Baylor in the Fiesta Bowl, and this year they are projected to be the best team
in the conference with a ranking of 38. However, Cincinnati (46) has the great
fortune of avoiding UCF this year and drawing the next 2 best conference teams,
Houston (51) and East Carolina (60), at home. Thus, the Bearcats are projected
to run the table in the AAC. However, they also must travel to Ohio State (6)
and Miami (30) and so they are not likely to figure on the national stage at
10-2. In contrast UCF has tough
non-conference games vs. Penn State (42) and Missouri (34)and road games at
Houston (51) and East Carolina (60), so they are unlikely to repeat the success
of last year.
Next is Conference USA, with could provide a bit of intrigue
on the national landscape. The
Thundering Herd of Marshall are ranked at #40 which is not bad, but they have
very possibly the easiest schedule that I have ever seen in the history of college
football. I am actually not joking. Now, C-USA is not exactly stuffed with
quality opponents, but even if there were any, Marshall would seem to be
avoiding them, especially on the road. In a league of 13 teams, Marshall does
not play a single conference road game against any team projected to be in the
top 8 of the conference and no team with a preseason ranking above 108.
Of the other projected top 4 in the conference they skip Texas San
Antonio (ranked 80) and North Texas (91), and play Rice (89) at home. Their non-conference schedule is equally
"daunting" with games against Rhode Island and three bad MAC teams
(at Miami(OH) (120), Ohio (100), and at Akron (95)). I would actually be
surprised if they do not go undefeated at 12-0 and then beat UTSA to win the
C-USA title. But, will they make a "BCS" bowl?
Last year, the MAC had college football fans watching and
wondering if Northern Illinois was going to create BCS chaos. This year, the MAC looks a bit more calm. The
two best teams are predicted to be Bowling Green (61) and Northern Illinois
(71), and both teams are projected to win their divisions with 7-1 records. BG
is most likely to lose at Toledo (79) and NIU is projected to stubble at Ball
State (82), but beat Toledo (79). Both
teams play a couple of BCS opponents in the preseason (BG gets Indiana and
Wisconsin and NIU gets Northwestern and Arkansas), so neither team is likely to
make much trouble this year.
Instead, I believe that the team that makes the "BCS"
bowl will actually come from the Mountain West.
Boise State (44), Utah State (58), Fresno State (62), and San Diego
State (74) are projected to be the top 4 teams in the conference, but Boise
State seems to have the clear schedule advantage as it draws all three of those
other teams at home. Boise even gets potentially tough independent BYU (32) at
home. Thus, except for a projected lone loss to Mississippi on the opening
weekend, Boise is projected to run the table and finish at 11-1. The schedule suggests that Fresno and Nevada will
tie for the lead in the West Division at 6-2, meaning that Nevada gets the
right to lose to Boise in the league Championship game. With Boise's 11-1 record against much tougher
opponents than Marshall, I think that it is quite to very likely that the
Broncos will be the highest ranked Group of 5 team when the dust settles. If
nothing else, the new selection committee is not going to want to reward
Marshall for such a weak schedule, even though they may actually be a better
team with a better record.
I guess I should mention the Sun Belt as well. The Sun Belt
is pretty terrible, with only 3 teams out of 11 ranked higher than 110 in the nation. Louisiana Lafayette is projected as the best
team at 70. They have the schedule to go 8-0 in the Sunbelt and 10-2 overall
with loses to Ole Miss and Boise. No one will notice.
As for the Independents, there are only four left and Notre
Dame (17), BYU (32), and even Navy (63) are projected to have solid seasons. Navy is picked to go 10-2, mostly by only
playing three teams in the nation's Top 70 (Ohio State (6), Notre Dame (17),
and Rutgers (68)), and BYU is picked to finish 9-3 with a slightly tougher
schedule. The Fighting Irish look to have the toughest schedule in the land and
are also picked to go 9-3 with tough road losses at Florida State (1), USC
(14), and Arizona State (21), but with solid wins against Michigan (23),
Stanford (9), and Louisville (33). That
will be pretty solid against that schedule, but likely not quite good enough
for a BCS-type bid.
So, what does all this mean for the inaugural college
football playoff system? For those that may not have been obsessing over this
change for the past 1-2 years, the new system works as follows. The infamous
BCS computer has been replaced by a committee of people (including Barry
Alvarez, Archie Manning, Tom Osborne, Tyrone Willingham, and Candoleezza
Rice... not kidding), similar to the Basketball selection committee. This
committee's job is create a ranking of the college football teams and to seed
the teams into the 2 Bowl Games that will be a part of the 4-team National
Playoff and also an additional 8 teams into the other 4 top tier Bowls. All 6
Top Tier bowls will be played on December 31st and January 1st, with the two
winners of the national semifinals meeting in the National Title game to be
held at another location a week or so later.
This year, the two host bowls for the national semifinal are the Rose
Bowl and Sugar Bowl, and the National Title game will be played on January 12th
in Dallas.
Based on my simulated results, the following schools would
all have automatic bids to the Top Tier Bowl Games: Florida State (13-0),
Oklahoma (12-0), Oregon (12-1), Michigan State (12-1), Mississippi (11-2), and
I am projecting Boise State (12-1) to be the top ranked Group of 5 team.
Several other teams would also most likely be pretty highly ranked such as Ohio
State (11-1), Baylor (10-2). Alabama (10-2), Georgia (10-2), USC (10-2),
Clemson (10-2), Wisconsin (10-2), South Carolina (9-3), LSU (9-3), and Notre
Dame (9-3) (and several other 9-3 teams that I doubt would be in the mix.) So,
in this scenario, how would the bowls shake out?
The first step, obviously, would be to pick your Top 4 for
the actual playoff part. FSU and
Oklahoma with their undefeated records would be an almost be shoe-ins for the
Top 2 spots. But, spots 3 and 4 would
be a but harder to select. There is
essentially no chance that an SEC team would not be allowed into the playoff.
But, which team to go with? In reality, Mississippi might be the 6th best team
in the SEC on a neutral field. But in this scenario, they are the SEC Champs. I
cannot see how the committee could place a 2-loss Alabama or Georgia team ahead
of the official champion. So, I suspect Mississippi would get the bid. If there were not that many other teams with 0
or 1 loss, I could easily see Alabama getting the benefit of the doubt and
getting the 4th bid. But, with Oregon,
MSU, and Ohio State all sitting with 11-1 records or better, I don't see any
way these teams don't get selected over the Tide. Very fortunately for the
committee, Oregon beat MSU in the regular season, and MSU beat OSU. So, Oregon
would seem to be the team that would get the last (or actually the #3, I
believe) slot.
In this scenario, FSU would get the #1 seed and would play
the 4-seed Mississippi, while 2-seed Oklahoma would draw 3-seed Oregon. From a geographic point of view, it would
seem to make more sense to have FSU play Ole Miss in the Sugar Bowl and
Oklahoma play Oregon in the Rose Bowl.
That might be the way this would play out. However, the committee is
also supposed to not put the higher seeded team at a geographic disadvantage.
The Rose Bowl is Pac-12 territory and the Sugar Bowl is SEC territory, so I
have a feeling that locations will actually be reversed with Florida State-Mississippi
playing in Pasadena and Oregon-Oklahoma playing in New Orleans. In any event, I would have FSU beating the
SEC champs and Oregon upsetting Oklahoma.
So, the following week at Cowboys Stadium in Dallas, I project a FSU-Oregon
battle in which the Seminoles would ultimately be victorious to claim
back-to-back titles.
So what would happen with the other four bowl games? Well, my understanding is that the committee
will first decide on the 8 other teams that will play in the remaining bowl
based solely on their rankings and then they would match them up based on
creating "compelling match-us."
So, which 8 teams would make the cut? MSU and Boise State would qualify
automatically, and a 11-1 Ohio State squad would also be an obvious choice. Alabama and Georgia at 10-2 would also almost
certainly be in, as there is now no limit to the number of teams from a
conference that can be selected. That
leaves 3 teams yet to be determined. Clemson would also be sitting at 10-2 and
would only have losses to Florida State and Georgia (both early in the season).
So, I am guessing they would get a spot. The last two could get interesting with UCLA,
USC, Notre Dame, Wisconsin, Baylor, Iowa, LSU, and South Carolina all having a
claim. The Pac-12 looks like a fairly strong conference and would seem to
deserve 2 bids. UCLA is projected to win the South and beat USC head to head,
but after losing to Oregon in the Pac-12 Title game, they would have 4 losses.
Add to that the fact that USC is projected to beat Notre Dame on the last day
of the regular season, and ultimately I think USC would get one of the
bids. It is hard to see the Big Ten
getting 3 bids, especially with Iowa beating Wisconsin head-to-head but having
two fairly ugly losses. I could see the SEC getting a forth bid for either LSU
or South Carolina, but both of these teams would be projected to be coming off
loses (to Texas A&M and Clemson, respectively), so I will go with Baylor,
which would also give the bids a fair amount of balance between the five major
conferences.
As for the bowl match-making, the Rose Bowl and Sugar Bowl now
have contracts to get the Pac-12, Big Ten, SEC, and Big 12 champs when they are
not hosting the national semifinals, which they are this year. So, there are actually not that many rules
this year when it comes to team placement. The one odd rule that is in place is
the MSU, as the Big Ten Champ cannot play in the Orange Bowl. Ok. Whatever. If
I do understand the strategy of the selection of the next few bowl games, I
would expect the committee to try to pair up #5 vs. #6, #7 vs. #8 and so
on. In this scenario, it looks like MSU
and Alabama would be the next two teams on the board, and I think the Cotton
Bowl would be the most likely destination. Another match-up of Saban vs. his
old team would qualify as "compelling" right? Sadly, MSU would not
project to win this game, but hopefully it would be closer than last time. Next on the board I would have Ohio State and
Georgia, another compelling SEC-Big Ten match-up which would be a good one to
have at the Peach Bowl in Atlanta. On a
neutral field, I would have OSU winning that game, but in the semi-road
environment of Atlanta, this game projects as a loss for the Buckeyes. USC and
Clemson would then meet in the Orange Bowl (thus keeping the ACC tie to the
bowl) where USC would be favored, and finally Baylor would meet Boise State in
the Fiesta Bowl, where Baylor would be expected to win.
So, in summary, I project the major bowls to be:
National Title: Florida State (1) over Oregon (3)
Rose Bowl: Florida State (1) over Mississippi (15)
Sugar Bowl: Oregon (3) over Oklahoma (4)
Orange Bowl: USC (14) over Clemson (18)
Fiesta Bowl: Baylor (8) over Boise State (44)
Cotton Bowl: Alabama (2) over MSU (12)
Peach Bowl: Georgia (10) over Ohio State (6)
Well, that about does it for this year. With the games just
about a month away, it won't be long until we can once again see how very wrong
Paul's spreadsheet can be! In the mean time, here are the games that I feel
with be the most impactful on the national scene:
8/30: Clemson at Georgia
8/30: Florida State vs. Oklahoma State
8/30: Wisconsin vs. LSU
8/30: Mississippi vs. Boise State
9/6: Michigan State at Oregon
9/13: UCLA vs. Texas
9/13: Georgia at South Carolina
9/20: Clemson at Florida State
11/1: Georgia vs. Florida
10/4: Alabama at Mississippi
10/4: Baylor at Texas
10/11: Oklahoma vs. Texas
10/11: Georgia at Missouri
10/18: Washington at Oregon
10/18: Notre Dame at Florida State
11/8: Ohio State at Michigan State
11/8: Baylor at Oklahoma
11/15: South Carolina at Florida
11/22: Wisconsin at Iowa
11/29: Notre Dame at USC
11/29: Florida at Florida State
Short Version for Spartan Mag
I have posted here from time to time about the spreadsheet
and algorithm that I have developed over the years to project college football
point spreads and power rankings. As I
have done for the last few seasons, I have taken the consensus rakings for all
128 teams and used the data to simulate the full season correcting for home
field advantage. I find this to be an
entertaining exercise to prepare myself for the upcoming season and a way to
take an unbiased look at the role of the schedule on some key conference races.
I thought I would post my main
observations for the 2014 season, based on my simulation.
1) MSU has the best chance to win the East and repeat as Big
Ten Champs. The preseason magazines on average have MSU ranked 12th in the
country. With home games against Ohio State (ranked 6th), Michigan (23), and
Nebraska (26) and the toughest road test at Maryland (45), MSU is the team to
beat. The dark horse spoiler in all this could be Penn State, who is ranked
anywhere from 22 to 54. PSU gets both MSU and PSU at home and if they could
somehow win both, they could wind up in Indy. But, for now, MSU seems to have
the clearest path. Obviously the game at Oregon (3) is probably a loss, but I
think MSU could be favored in the 11 other games.
2) As many have pointed out, Iowa (29) has a clear edge in
the Big Ten West. They get both the
Badgers (16) and Huskers (26) at home and their toughest roads games are at
Maryland (45) and Minnesota (56). My algorithm projects a loss at Maryland and
also in the non-conference at Pitt (48), but 10-2 overall and 7-1 in the B1G is
quite realistic. The real loser in the
scheduling sweepstakes is Nebraska, who with road games at MSU (12), Wisconsin
(16), Iowa (29), and Northwestern (50) is projected to finish at 5-3 in B1G
play. So, MSU-OSU and Wisconsin-Iowa are
the key games in the Big Ten this year.
3) Florida State has a tough but manageable schedule that I
project to lead to a repeat national Title. The Noles are the preseason #1 team
and draw Clemson (ranked #18) at home, and don't face cross division foe UNC
(27) in the regular season. FSU's toughest road games at Miami (30), at
Louisville (33), and a semi-road game in Dallas against Oklahoma State (31) on
opening weekend, all of which are manageable. The home schedule is not without
peril as FSU welcomes Notre Dame (17) and Florida (22), but if they really are
the best team in the country, they should be able to handle each of these games
and finish the season at 12-0. I project
them to beat UNC in the ACC title game.
4) Oklahoma (4) is also well positioned to run the table and
finish 12-0. Baylor (8), Texas (19), and Kansas State (24) are all expected to
be Top 25 caliber, but the Sooners play all of those team at home or at a
neutral location. Their toughest road game seems to be at TCU (35). The most daunting game on the schedule is
likely the semi-neutral game against Texas in Dallas. On the flip side, Texas (19) seems to have
drawn the short straw schedule-wise with road games at Kansas State (24),
Oklahoma State (31), and Texas Tech (39) and thus are projected to finish at
5-4 in conference play.
5) The Pac-12 looks to be strong, but ultimately Oregon
seems to have the edge this year. The
conference has four teams in the Top 15 (Oregon at 3, UCLA (7), Stanford (9),
and USC (14)) and an additional two teams in the Top 25 (Arizona State (21) and
Washington (25)). Oregon (3) has the benefit of drawing both Stanford (9) and
Washington (25) at home. Even though the Ducks are projected to lose at UCLA
(7), they are projected to win the remaining game and finish 8-1 in conference
play and 11-1 overall. Stanford seems to have the toughest draw, as they are
projected to lose road games at Washington (25), Oregon (3), Arizona State
(21), UCLA (7), and Notre Dame (17) in the non-conference. They could be a
legit Top 10 team and finish 7-5. I have
UCLA (7) and USC (14) tying for the Pac 12 South at 7-2. I project that UCLA
would win the head to head tie breaker, but that Oregon would get revenge for
their lone loss in the Pac 12 title game.
6) The SEC could get messy. Could Ole Miss wind up on top?
The SEC is supposed to have 10 teams that in the in top 35 of the country. This
means that a lot of teams are going to have brutal road schedules. In the West, Auburn (5) has road games at
Alabama (2), Georgia (10), Mississippi (15), Mississippi State (28), and Kansas
State (24) in the non-conference. They could lose all 5. LSU (13) is not in
much better shape with road games at Auburn (5), Florida (22), and Texas
A&M (20). A&M goes on the road to South Carolina (11), Alabama (2), and
Auburn (5). Meanwhile both Alabama and
Mississippi seem to have a little lighter load with road contests against
Arkansas (53), Tennessee (49) and (in Ole Miss's case) Vanderbilt (64). The
kicker is that Mississippi play Alabama at home, and if they can win that game,
they project to win the West with a 10-2 (6-2) record (with losses at A&M
and LSU)
In the SEC East, the projected three best teams Georgia
(10), South Carolina (11), and Florida (22) all play each other and no team get
the other two both at home. Florida (22) will likely lose at Alabama (2), and
South Carolina (11) is projected to lose at Auburn (5). The key game here is
when Georgia (10) travels to Missouri (34) where I project a close loss that
would knock the Dogs out of contention and give Florida the tie breaker over
South Carolina (as Florida has that game at home). In this scenario,
Mississippi (15) would project to beat Florida (22) in the SEC title game. This
may all sound a little crazy (and maybe it is) but nobody had Auburn and
Missouri winning their respective divisions last year, now did they?
7) In the Group of 5 Mid-Major Conference, Marshall (C-USA)
will likely go undefeated, but Boise State at 11-1 will get the automatic bid
to the 6 major bowls. Marshall (40)
appears to have very possibly the easiest schedule that I have ever seen in the
history of college football. In a league of 13 teams, Marshall does not play a
single conference road game against any team projected to be in the top 8 of
the conference and no team with a preseason ranking above 108.
Their non-conference schedule is equally "daunting" with games
against Rhode Island and three bad MAC teams.
I would actually be surprised if they do not go undefeated at 13-0.
In the Mountain West, Boise State (44), is projected to be
good, but also has a clear schedule advantage as it draws all three of the next
best conference teams, Utah State (58), Fresno State (62), and San Diego State
(74), at home. Boise even gets potentially tough independent BYU (32) at home.
Thus, except for a projected lone loss to Mississippi (future SEC champs?) on
the opening weekend, Boise is projected to run the table and finish at 11-1,
which should be enough in the committee's eyes to put them ahead of
Marshall. No other team from the
American, MAC, or Sun Belt conference is predicted to finish with fewer than 2
loses.
8) If this scenario plays out, I project the major bowls (all
of which are now set by committee) to shake out as follows
National Title: Florida State (1) over Oregon (3)
Rose Bowl: Florida State (1) over Mississippi (15)
Sugar Bowl: Oregon (3) over Oklahoma (4)
Orange Bowl: USC (14) over Clemson (18)
Fiesta Bowl: Baylor (8) over Boise State (44)
Cotton Bowl: Alabama (2) over MSU (12)
Peach Bowl: Georgia (10) over Ohio State (6)
FSU and Oklahoma would be undefeated and would therefore be
#1 and #2 seed. Oregon would be 12-1 and
would have beaten an 11-1 MSU team early in the season and just gotten revenge
for their only loss to UCLA in the Pac-12 title game. I see no way that they are not the #3 seed
with that resume. For the 4th seed, the
committee will take Mississippi as the SEC champ over teams like MSU, OSU,
Alabama, and Georgia. I would then see
the committee wanting to match up the remaining Big Ten and SEC teams in the
Cotton and Peach Bowls (for geographic reasons), as they would likely be ranked
#5-#8 by the committee. The other two match-ups (USC-Clemson and Baylor-Boise
State) would be #9 vs. #10 and #11 vs. automatic bid where the games will be
held in places that make geographic sense.
How will this pan out in reality? Who knows. My simulations
are entirely based on preseason rankings, which are highly suspect. But it is
clear that some teams (such as FSU, Oklahoma, MSU, Mississippi, and Marshall)
got a fairly good schedule draw while some other teams (Auburn, Stanford,
perhaps Texas) drew the short straw. While we all wait for kickoff on that last
weekend in August, here are my predictions for the key games that will impact
the overall football landscape this year:
8/30: Clemson at Georgia
8/30: Florida State vs. Oklahoma State
8/30: Wisconsin vs. LSU
8/30: Mississippi vs. Boise State
9/6: Michigan State at Oregon
9/13: UCLA vs. Texas
9/13: Georgia at South Carolina
9/20: Clemson at Florida State
11/1: Georgia vs. Florida
10/4: Alabama at Mississippi
10/4: Baylor at Texas
10/11: Oklahoma vs. Texas
10/11: Georgia at Missouri
10/18: Washington at Oregon
10/18: Notre Dame at Florida State
11/8: Ohio State at Michigan State
11/8: Baylor at Oklahoma
11/15: South Carolina at Florida
11/22: Wisconsin at Iowa
11/29: Notre Dame at USC
11/29: Florida at Florida State
Enjoy!
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