Saturday night was a good night. I wrote a lot of words late last week about the importance in my mind of MSU’s Big Ten opener, but if anything, the depth of the situation was understated. Make no mistake; beating Iowa was a huge, program win, and leaving the stadium, it felt really, really good. Before the Iowa game, my math said MSU’s chance to make a bowl game was around 33%, and I could not necessarily disagree with it. We all knew that Lewerke needed to play well; we just didn’t know if he could quite execute at that high of a level… yet. We all knew that the defense would need to stop the run; we just didn’t know if they could do it for 60 minutes against a Big Ten level team… yet. We all knew that MSU needed to avoid turnovers, penalties and other stupid stuff; we just didn’t know if that was going to happen. And, we all knew that if some or all of the above did not pan out, MSU would most likely lose, and the whole season might just snowball… again. But, Brian did play well, the defense did stop the run, and instead of getting turned over, MSU turned Iowa over, twice. As a result, the 17-10 win now looks like the turning point in what might be the turnaround season for MSU. My algorithm now says MSU is projected to be favored in 4 of the remaining 8 games (Indiana, @NW, Maryland, and @ Rutgers). MSU’s expected value of wins is 6.5, but more importantly, it says MSU now has an 80% chance to make a bowl game. That is quite a turnaround from last week. For the first time since MSU beat Iowa to clinch that playoff berth in 2015, MSU feels like MSU again. Now, the Spartans can head to Ann Arbor with a little bit of house money in their pockets to face an equally youthful team burdened with sky-high expectations. But we’ll talk about that more on that later in the week.
National Overview
As usual, the chart above shows the comparison of the results of Week 5 to the opening spread. Clearly, Alabama and Ohio State had good weekends, as did Georgia, Auburn, Penn State, Miami, UCF, and oddly, Nebraska. Also, it should not go unnoticed that Western Michigan and Notre Dame also both covered comfortably. As for upsets, there were only 8 total, which is well below the 11-14 that I predicted, but they were noteworthy, as USC, LSU, and Minnesota all went down. It also should be noted that both Cincinnati and Air Force got upset. I feel those two team have something important in common this year, but I just can’t put my finger on it… Speaking of losers, the table below shows that nobody did a great job picking upsets this week. My model only got 2 of 7, but that was good compared to FPI’s 1 for 4, and way better than poor Rand()y, who (somehow) went 0-fer. Ouch! My model went 29-24 against the spread (52.4% for the year), which was matched by the FPI (currently at 53.8% for the year), and 6 of the 8 teams highlighted in the preview covered, bring that yearly tally to 29-21 (58%). Now, let’s take a quick look around the conference
Big Ten
As we somewhat suspected, it wound up being a pretty quiet week in the B1G as OSU, PSU, and Wisconsin all won as expected. So, outside of Nebraska’s surprisingly competent 60 minutes of tackle football, the only notable result was Maryland’s upset on the road over Minnesota, 31-24. (Hot tip P.J.: you may want to row your boat to shore already; the honeymoon is officially over). From the MSU perspective, it is hard to know how to feel about this one since we play both teams, but I think the signals are good. MSU still gets to host Maryland, and Maryland still did lose badly to UCF, so I am comfortable with that (although the Golden Knights just might be a little better than we thought). But, Maryland showed that you can still go on the road to Minneapolis and get a “W.” If anything it made me more confident MSU could beat both teams later in the year.
ACC
I thought this weekend had the potential to be wild and crazy in the Atlantic Region, but it wound up being a rather lazy weekend. There were literally no upsets at all. NC State and Florida State both eked out victories over Syracuse and Wake. Tobacco stock went down, however, as both Duke and UNC got hammered by Miami and GA Tech, respectively. The only story, really, is that Clemson once again went on the road and beat a solid Virginia Tech team by 14 points. The Tigers look to me to be on cruise control and next up they face Wake and SoRrY exCUSE followed with a bye. It’s still early, but I am going to go ahead and pencil them into the playoffs.
SEC
Like the Big Ten this week, there was not a lot of big surprises, with of course one pretty major exception, and that was LSU’s upset at the hands of Troy, a school that is so bad I am not even sure if I should call them Troy or Troy State (no really, I have heard both and I don’t care know which one is correct). As for the Tigers, we can tell you from firsthand experience that hiring the assistant that is local and popular with the players might work well for a little while, but long term? Not so much. The good news is that John L Smith is likely still willing to take an SEC job (SMILE!) and he at least cleans up messes pretty well. Other than that, the state of Alabama outscored the state of Mississippi this week 115 to 13 and the University of Georgia outscored the University of Tennessee 41 to 0. Even though Florida somehow won again, the SEC looks like a 3-team race between Alabama, Auburn, and Georgia.
Pac 12
I tried briefly to watch a little Pac 12 football this weekend, but then I realized that it was 1 AM and the game was still in the 3rd quarter, so I basically gave up. But when I awoke on Saturday morning I discovered that the riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside a discrete square package known as the USC Trojans finally did was I having been (incorrectly) picking for weeks, and that is lose, in this case to Washington State. This doesn’t really hurt the Trojans chance to win the South and eventually redeem themselves, and it certainly signals that WSU is a team to watch, but I think this does hurt the conference’s overall chances to secure a playoff spot. With a lackluster non-conference performance, I think the boys out west really needed USC and Washington to sweep through the South and North unscathed, setting up a winner-take-all conference title game. Now, I just don’t see the conference getting a bid, but it is still early. Elsewhere, Oregon easily beat Cal, 45-24, and UCLA edged out Colorado, 27-23, to drop both the Bears and Buffs to 0-2. Hopefully my spreadsheet will get the memo to stop picking these teams in upsets.
Big 12
Nothing interesting happened. Oh wait, Baylor lost again, this time to K-State. Ha! Actually, I was hoping to write that the state of Texas went 0-3 this week, but the Longhorns managed to beat Iowa State. Better luck next week…
Independents / Group of Five
Notre Dame managed to crush Miami (OH) this weekend, which is good for MSU’s strength of schedule, so… good job, I guess (but I STILL WANT MY MEGAPHONE BACK). In the Mountain West, San Diego State beat Northern Illinois to stay undefeated in the NY6 race, but as expected, the key action was in the AAC. USF cruised past the Pirates of East Carolina, and Navy rode out the Hurricanes of Tulsa to stay undefeated overall. But, in the Group of Five game of the week, Central Florida just destroyed Memphis, 40-13. UCF has only played 3 games total, but they are winning by an average of 33 points/game. It looks like the late November UCF-USF game, in Orlando, will likely decide the AAC East crown and possibly the NY6 bid. It also looks Maryland’s loss to the Knights last week might not quite been as bad as we all thought.
And finally, How Good is… Georgia?
I caught about a quarter of the Georgia - Notre Dame game in Week 2 and came away feeling like neither team was that good, but after a Week 3 tune-up against Samford, the Bulldogs have mauled Mississippi State and Tennessee by a combined score of 72 to 3. Damn. I am not convinced MSU could pull that off against Haslett and Dewitt high schools in back-to-back weeks. With Vandy, Missouri, and a bye coming up, I don’t expect a loss any time soon, and let’s be honest, I don’t see Florida beating them either. So, the next real test for UGA appears to be a mid-November trip to face Auburn, which by then I would expect to be a battle of Top 5 teams. Either way, Alabama will likely need to go through both teams in order to win the conference and claim a playoff berth. Is Georgia good enough to take Bama’s slot in the playoffs? Good question. Right now my algorithm likes Georgia by a single point on a neutral field.
How Bad is… LSU?
I thought I would keep things in the SEC this week. LSU looked pretty good in Week 1, beating BYU 27-0, but a Week 3 loss to Mississippi State brought the Tigers back to reality. They struggled to beat Syracuse in Week 4, and in Week 5 they seem to have hit rock bottom with a loss to Troy (State). The next two weeks don’t look any better as they require a road trip to Florida and hosting Auburn, and even a road trip to Oxford to play Ole Miss is likely not a gimme three weeks from now. My algorithm still likes LSU to make a Bowl game, but I am guessing 6-6 is not going to cut it with the fan-base. I don’t see Orgeron making it to January. Somewhere, I hope Les Miles is looking at himself in the mirror and lip syncing to the song “How You Like Me Now?”
That’s all for right now, and remember, it Michigan Week, folks!
National Overview
As usual, the chart above shows the comparison of the results of Week 5 to the opening spread. Clearly, Alabama and Ohio State had good weekends, as did Georgia, Auburn, Penn State, Miami, UCF, and oddly, Nebraska. Also, it should not go unnoticed that Western Michigan and Notre Dame also both covered comfortably. As for upsets, there were only 8 total, which is well below the 11-14 that I predicted, but they were noteworthy, as USC, LSU, and Minnesota all went down. It also should be noted that both Cincinnati and Air Force got upset. I feel those two team have something important in common this year, but I just can’t put my finger on it… Speaking of losers, the table below shows that nobody did a great job picking upsets this week. My model only got 2 of 7, but that was good compared to FPI’s 1 for 4, and way better than poor Rand()y, who (somehow) went 0-fer. Ouch! My model went 29-24 against the spread (52.4% for the year), which was matched by the FPI (currently at 53.8% for the year), and 6 of the 8 teams highlighted in the preview covered, bring that yearly tally to 29-21 (58%). Now, let’s take a quick look around the conference
Big Ten
As we somewhat suspected, it wound up being a pretty quiet week in the B1G as OSU, PSU, and Wisconsin all won as expected. So, outside of Nebraska’s surprisingly competent 60 minutes of tackle football, the only notable result was Maryland’s upset on the road over Minnesota, 31-24. (Hot tip P.J.: you may want to row your boat to shore already; the honeymoon is officially over). From the MSU perspective, it is hard to know how to feel about this one since we play both teams, but I think the signals are good. MSU still gets to host Maryland, and Maryland still did lose badly to UCF, so I am comfortable with that (although the Golden Knights just might be a little better than we thought). But, Maryland showed that you can still go on the road to Minneapolis and get a “W.” If anything it made me more confident MSU could beat both teams later in the year.
ACC
I thought this weekend had the potential to be wild and crazy in the Atlantic Region, but it wound up being a rather lazy weekend. There were literally no upsets at all. NC State and Florida State both eked out victories over Syracuse and Wake. Tobacco stock went down, however, as both Duke and UNC got hammered by Miami and GA Tech, respectively. The only story, really, is that Clemson once again went on the road and beat a solid Virginia Tech team by 14 points. The Tigers look to me to be on cruise control and next up they face Wake and SoRrY exCUSE followed with a bye. It’s still early, but I am going to go ahead and pencil them into the playoffs.
SEC
Pac 12
I tried briefly to watch a little Pac 12 football this weekend, but then I realized that it was 1 AM and the game was still in the 3rd quarter, so I basically gave up. But when I awoke on Saturday morning I discovered that the riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside a discrete square package known as the USC Trojans finally did was I having been (incorrectly) picking for weeks, and that is lose, in this case to Washington State. This doesn’t really hurt the Trojans chance to win the South and eventually redeem themselves, and it certainly signals that WSU is a team to watch, but I think this does hurt the conference’s overall chances to secure a playoff spot. With a lackluster non-conference performance, I think the boys out west really needed USC and Washington to sweep through the South and North unscathed, setting up a winner-take-all conference title game. Now, I just don’t see the conference getting a bid, but it is still early. Elsewhere, Oregon easily beat Cal, 45-24, and UCLA edged out Colorado, 27-23, to drop both the Bears and Buffs to 0-2. Hopefully my spreadsheet will get the memo to stop picking these teams in upsets.
Big 12
Nothing interesting happened. Oh wait, Baylor lost again, this time to K-State. Ha! Actually, I was hoping to write that the state of Texas went 0-3 this week, but the Longhorns managed to beat Iowa State. Better luck next week…
Independents / Group of Five
Notre Dame managed to crush Miami (OH) this weekend, which is good for MSU’s strength of schedule, so… good job, I guess (but I STILL WANT MY MEGAPHONE BACK). In the Mountain West, San Diego State beat Northern Illinois to stay undefeated in the NY6 race, but as expected, the key action was in the AAC. USF cruised past the Pirates of East Carolina, and Navy rode out the Hurricanes of Tulsa to stay undefeated overall. But, in the Group of Five game of the week, Central Florida just destroyed Memphis, 40-13. UCF has only played 3 games total, but they are winning by an average of 33 points/game. It looks like the late November UCF-USF game, in Orlando, will likely decide the AAC East crown and possibly the NY6 bid. It also looks Maryland’s loss to the Knights last week might not quite been as bad as we all thought.
And finally, How Good is… Georgia?
I caught about a quarter of the Georgia - Notre Dame game in Week 2 and came away feeling like neither team was that good, but after a Week 3 tune-up against Samford, the Bulldogs have mauled Mississippi State and Tennessee by a combined score of 72 to 3. Damn. I am not convinced MSU could pull that off against Haslett and Dewitt high schools in back-to-back weeks. With Vandy, Missouri, and a bye coming up, I don’t expect a loss any time soon, and let’s be honest, I don’t see Florida beating them either. So, the next real test for UGA appears to be a mid-November trip to face Auburn, which by then I would expect to be a battle of Top 5 teams. Either way, Alabama will likely need to go through both teams in order to win the conference and claim a playoff berth. Is Georgia good enough to take Bama’s slot in the playoffs? Good question. Right now my algorithm likes Georgia by a single point on a neutral field.
How Bad is… LSU?
I thought I would keep things in the SEC this week. LSU looked pretty good in Week 1, beating BYU 27-0, but a Week 3 loss to Mississippi State brought the Tigers back to reality. They struggled to beat Syracuse in Week 4, and in Week 5 they seem to have hit rock bottom with a loss to Troy (State). The next two weeks don’t look any better as they require a road trip to Florida and hosting Auburn, and even a road trip to Oxford to play Ole Miss is likely not a gimme three weeks from now. My algorithm still likes LSU to make a Bowl game, but I am guessing 6-6 is not going to cut it with the fan-base. I don’t see Orgeron making it to January. Somewhere, I hope Les Miles is looking at himself in the mirror and lip syncing to the song “How You Like Me Now?”
That’s all for right now, and remember, it Michigan Week, folks!
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