So, sometimes football is weird. On the night that MSU went to Ann Arbor as a 12-point dog, I felt pretty good about our chances. But, this past weekend when MSU went on the road as a 3-point favorite in Minneapolis, I just had a bad feeling about it. I don’t know if it was the weather, or the timing, or the fact that the Gophers badly needed a win, but I was just plain nervous. The beginning of the game was a bit dicey, then MSU really seemed to dominate for a large stretch of time. But, much like in Ann Arbor the week before, a few opportunities were squandered, and all of a sudden MSU was staring down the barrel of another potential on-side kick / Hail Mary nightmare. Fortunately, MSU’s cushion and their hands team was just good enough to carry the day. By the time Lewerke took that final knee, MSU got the “W,” but they could not have felt that good about it. Honestly, this might be exactly what this young Spartan team needed. They learned a very important lesson over the past two weeks: letting inferior teams hang around is Risky Business. John L.’s and Bobby’s teams learned that lesson the hard way, as did some of Dantonio’s teams in his first few years. If you can learn that lesson without taking an “L?” Well, that is just as good as cleaning up the house, getting the Porsche repaired, and getting the glass egg back on the mantle, just before Mom and Dad get home, even if the egg gets a little crack in it. Just like Joel Goodson, this MSU team has some real potential, the future might be brighter than even the most optimistic MSU fan could have imagined. The running game may have had a break-through this weekend. Will the passing game finally click fully into place next week? I think we know at this point that the defense is pretty good, but they also got a bit of a humility check in the 4th quarter. That’s a good thing. They will be hungry to keep improving. While the Spartans have no plans to go off to Princeton (although Rutgers is not far away from there), if things break just right, a return trip to Indy isn’t out of the question.
National Overview
As usual, the chart above shows the comparison of the results of Week 7 to the opening spread. On paper, this weekend looked like it might be one of the more quiet ones of the year, but come early Sunday morning, it looked more like a blood bath. I count a total of 19 upsets, which according to upset simulation, was up in the 95th percentile of the bell curve. But, there were a handful of favorites that did cover easily, including OK State, Ohio State, Stanford, TCU, Ole Miss, and Iowa State, while notably USC failed to cover, and Wisconsin didn’t do so great either. Getting back to the upsets, in a typical weekend, there might be one or maybe two major upsets that shake the foundation of what we think we know about the season. This week it feels like there were at least 5 in that category, namely Syracuse over Clemson, Arizona State over Washington, Cal over Wazzou, LSU over Auburn, and Boise State over San Diego State. If it were just a normal weekend, we might be talking about Tulsa’s big win over Houston, Louisville’s loss to B.C., South Carolina’s upset of Tennessee, A&M’s defeat of Florida, and the fact that Rutgers actually won a conference game. (Sorry, Rutgers… No Press For You!) So, what the heck is going on? Well, I am just going to go ahead and blame myself, as on Friday I posted about many of these teams having high probabilities to win out and make the playoffs… Sorry guys.
As for the performance of the spreadsheet, it did quite well, hitting 5 of 8 upsets (bringing the season tally to 24-26 (48%) and going 7-4 on highlighted covers (now at 57% for the year). Against the spread (ATS) it did just OK at 30-29 (now at 53% for the year). Somehow, for what I think is 3-4 weeks in a row, ESPN’s FPI matched my spreadsheet’s performance at 30-29 (54%) and maintained its 4-game lead in the standings. But, the FPI did only hit on 3 of 6 of it upsets, bringing its tally to 13-18 (42%) for the year. Finally, Rand()y had an up week, going 7-6 for upsets, which does improve its performance to 33% for the year. With that, let’s now take our weekly spin around the country
Big Ten
Let’s face it, it was a real jungle out there this weekend, but somehow most the Big Ten survived unscathed. Sure, Rutgers did score an upset at Illinois to claim just their 3rd Big Ten road win in history. But, the key word in that previous sentence is “Illinois,” which I believe is an ancient Native America term meaning, “sucks at football.” Other than that, all the favorites won, including Ohio State’s huge win in Lincoln, Wisconsin’s closer than expected clash with Purdue, and Michigan’s Dangerous Liaison at Indiana. Talk about Risky Business… someday Wolverines, the Hoosiers are going to break that 30-year win streak. I mean seriously, IU, you couldn’t even beat Rick Rod or Hoke even once? Sad. Finally, so apparently, Northwestern went to Maryland and won by 16. Since MSU still has to play both, I don’t know how to feel about that one, but the road trip to Evanston in two weeks may have just gotten slightly tougher. Not sure.
ACC
While the Big Ten schools were at home over the weekend doing their homework, (wink, wink, schools from the state of Michigan), a couple of schools in the ACC decided that it was time to party. Clemson decided, “Playoffs, be dammed! They can’t tell us what to do!” So, they broke into the liquor cabinet and danced around the living room in their underwear to (I can only assume) some Bob Seager. In the process, they got pants by Syracuse. Sorry Tigers, but there simple is no ‘Cuse for that. Meanwhile, a buddy of Louisville’s decided to call them a hooker, but they wound up getting chased by a killer pimp (most likely nicknamed, “B.C.”) I am also going to guess the buddy’s name was either “Rick” or “Rickie.” Not sure. The rest of the boys more or less behaved themselves. Florida State managed to beat… somebody (actually, Duke), Miami survived a scare from Georgia Tech, UVA dismissed UNC, and NC State easily handled Pitt. As a result, the Wolfpack now get to roll into their bye week in first place by themselves in the Atlantic Division, with a suddenly bigger game looming in Rayleigh against Clemson in a few weeks. By then, they might just have sobered up and found their pants.
Pac 12
And then, there’s the Pac 12. In my preview, it looked like such a sleepy week that I advised everyone to just go to bed early. Well, I think the kids waited until mom and dad went to bed, and then they snuck downstairs, saw the party taking place at the ACC house next door and thought, “you think that’s a party? HOLD MY ZIMA.” Wazzou went out on Friday night to Berkeley and wound up with the Porsche rolling into the Bay. Washington and his pal UCLA both went down to the desert and got all the furniture in the house stolen. It wasn’t pretty. Somehow, their pal USC survived a scare from Utah on a failed 2-point conversion. Colorado went out and got high, but since that is pretty much a normal weekend for them, they still managed to beat Oregon State. But, goodie two-shoes Stanford just stayed home, finished their trig homework, and enjoyed some roasted Duck. You always were such a good boy, Stanford! As a reward, the Cardinal now have a half-game lead in the North, with the Washington schools rapidly approaching on the schedule. Down South, USC is tied in the loss column with both Arizona schools, but they will get a shot at both in a few weeks as well.
SEC
When the SEC got wind of what was happening up the street in the ACC and Pac-12, they half-heartedly tried to compete. Tennessee skipped school tried to sneak his best friend and girlfriend into a fancy French restaurant, but I think would up with some bad Chicken. Florida just went out to an art museum, a baseball game, and a parade and failed to finish against Texas A&M. But, the only school that really got into trouble was Auburn, who wound up crashing dad’s Ferrari into the woods after Ed Oregeron took it for joy ride on the streets of Baton Rouge. Meanwhile, Alabama, Georgia, and even the Mississippi schools just went straight to business and took their opponents to school. “Wrong movie, morons,” mumbled Saban. As it stands now, Alabama and Georgia remain undefeated, with Kentucky (Kentucky?!?!?) remaining as the lone 1-loss team in the conference. Only 2 NY6 bids seems all but inevitable now.
Big 12
With everything going on up and down Power Five Street this week, I think the Big 12’s parents got word that something was going on, and they decided to just stay at home to keep an eye on things. As a result, there were no upsets on the Plains this weekend. Oklahoma tried pretty hard to choke against Texas, and Texas Tech led WVU until the 4th quarter but they both eventually fell in line. In contrast, OK State and TCU seemed have little trouble with Baylor and K-State. So, TCU remains the lone undefeated team in the conference, which two very winnable games up next in Kansas and at Iowa State. That is, unless mom and dad decide to go out again… PARTY FROG!!!!
Independents / Group of Five
If you thought that all the chaos was confined to Power Five Street, well, think again. On AAC Street, as if Houston didn’t hate Hurricanes enough right now, the Cougars were a 13-point favorite to Tulsa, yet wound up losing… by 4 TDs. As a result, their possible NY6 hopes are pretty much wrecked. Also in the South, Memphis edged Navy by 3 to move to the head of the field. But, considering UCF already lanced the Tigers 3 weeks ago, and once again crushed their opponent (ECU) this week, the conference looks more and more like a two team race between the Knights and their neighbors to the west, the USF Bulls, who beat Cincinnati by 8 more points that Michigan did. But, the parties did not stop there. Mountain West Blvd saw two upsets, with one of them being fairly destructive. San Diego State looked to be on cruise control with a bright future, but they partied a little too hard with Boise State and now their future is quite uncertain. They still might be the conference’s best chance for a NY6 bid, but they would likely need an upset in the AAC Title game to have any shot at all now. Farther down the street, the party continued. C-USA, the MAC, and the Sun Belt all had multiple upsets.
And finally, How Good is… Ohio State?
I must admit, once the Buckeye’s went down to Oklahoma, I kind of wrote them off. I have never been a huge fan of Urban Meyer, and no matter how much talent he can assemble, I just am not convinced that he knows how to develop his own players. He is just really good at utilizing someone else’s players. But, it is pretty hard to ignore the fact that they have now won their last 5 games by an average of over 40 points, and the last three games by an average of almost 50. Now, with a bye week to prepare for the Nittany Lions, at home, no less, I am starting to wonder if maybe I was right all along when I picked OSU to win the conference and make the playoffs this summer. Has TJ Barrett finally returned to form from his Freshman year? For the rest of the conference’s sake… I hope not.
How Bad is… BYU?
In the preseason rankings, the Cougars were being picked to be anywhere from #33 to #49 in the country. Now, that isn’t exactly something to write home about, or even tell your hooker girlfriend about, but it was good enough for the 2nd best ranking among non-Power 5 team not named Notre Dame. This week, BYU got crushed by Mississippi State to drop to 1-6, with the one win coming at the expense of FCS team Portland State during “Week Zero” in late August. Granted, the back-half of their schedule is significantly easier, with no teams left that were ranked in the Top 100 in the preseason. Yet, my spreadsheet only has the Cougar’s favored in 2 of those contests. I would say I feel bad for them, but I am still a little bit mad at them for last year. They know why.
That’s all for right now, and as always, Go State, Beat the Hoosiers!
National Overview
As usual, the chart above shows the comparison of the results of Week 7 to the opening spread. On paper, this weekend looked like it might be one of the more quiet ones of the year, but come early Sunday morning, it looked more like a blood bath. I count a total of 19 upsets, which according to upset simulation, was up in the 95th percentile of the bell curve. But, there were a handful of favorites that did cover easily, including OK State, Ohio State, Stanford, TCU, Ole Miss, and Iowa State, while notably USC failed to cover, and Wisconsin didn’t do so great either. Getting back to the upsets, in a typical weekend, there might be one or maybe two major upsets that shake the foundation of what we think we know about the season. This week it feels like there were at least 5 in that category, namely Syracuse over Clemson, Arizona State over Washington, Cal over Wazzou, LSU over Auburn, and Boise State over San Diego State. If it were just a normal weekend, we might be talking about Tulsa’s big win over Houston, Louisville’s loss to B.C., South Carolina’s upset of Tennessee, A&M’s defeat of Florida, and the fact that Rutgers actually won a conference game. (Sorry, Rutgers… No Press For You!) So, what the heck is going on? Well, I am just going to go ahead and blame myself, as on Friday I posted about many of these teams having high probabilities to win out and make the playoffs… Sorry guys.
As for the performance of the spreadsheet, it did quite well, hitting 5 of 8 upsets (bringing the season tally to 24-26 (48%) and going 7-4 on highlighted covers (now at 57% for the year). Against the spread (ATS) it did just OK at 30-29 (now at 53% for the year). Somehow, for what I think is 3-4 weeks in a row, ESPN’s FPI matched my spreadsheet’s performance at 30-29 (54%) and maintained its 4-game lead in the standings. But, the FPI did only hit on 3 of 6 of it upsets, bringing its tally to 13-18 (42%) for the year. Finally, Rand()y had an up week, going 7-6 for upsets, which does improve its performance to 33% for the year. With that, let’s now take our weekly spin around the country
Big Ten
Let’s face it, it was a real jungle out there this weekend, but somehow most the Big Ten survived unscathed. Sure, Rutgers did score an upset at Illinois to claim just their 3rd Big Ten road win in history. But, the key word in that previous sentence is “Illinois,” which I believe is an ancient Native America term meaning, “sucks at football.” Other than that, all the favorites won, including Ohio State’s huge win in Lincoln, Wisconsin’s closer than expected clash with Purdue, and Michigan’s Dangerous Liaison at Indiana. Talk about Risky Business… someday Wolverines, the Hoosiers are going to break that 30-year win streak. I mean seriously, IU, you couldn’t even beat Rick Rod or Hoke even once? Sad. Finally, so apparently, Northwestern went to Maryland and won by 16. Since MSU still has to play both, I don’t know how to feel about that one, but the road trip to Evanston in two weeks may have just gotten slightly tougher. Not sure.
ACC
While the Big Ten schools were at home over the weekend doing their homework, (wink, wink, schools from the state of Michigan), a couple of schools in the ACC decided that it was time to party. Clemson decided, “Playoffs, be dammed! They can’t tell us what to do!” So, they broke into the liquor cabinet and danced around the living room in their underwear to (I can only assume) some Bob Seager. In the process, they got pants by Syracuse. Sorry Tigers, but there simple is no ‘Cuse for that. Meanwhile, a buddy of Louisville’s decided to call them a hooker, but they wound up getting chased by a killer pimp (most likely nicknamed, “B.C.”) I am also going to guess the buddy’s name was either “Rick” or “Rickie.” Not sure. The rest of the boys more or less behaved themselves. Florida State managed to beat… somebody (actually, Duke), Miami survived a scare from Georgia Tech, UVA dismissed UNC, and NC State easily handled Pitt. As a result, the Wolfpack now get to roll into their bye week in first place by themselves in the Atlantic Division, with a suddenly bigger game looming in Rayleigh against Clemson in a few weeks. By then, they might just have sobered up and found their pants.
Pac 12
And then, there’s the Pac 12. In my preview, it looked like such a sleepy week that I advised everyone to just go to bed early. Well, I think the kids waited until mom and dad went to bed, and then they snuck downstairs, saw the party taking place at the ACC house next door and thought, “you think that’s a party? HOLD MY ZIMA.” Wazzou went out on Friday night to Berkeley and wound up with the Porsche rolling into the Bay. Washington and his pal UCLA both went down to the desert and got all the furniture in the house stolen. It wasn’t pretty. Somehow, their pal USC survived a scare from Utah on a failed 2-point conversion. Colorado went out and got high, but since that is pretty much a normal weekend for them, they still managed to beat Oregon State. But, goodie two-shoes Stanford just stayed home, finished their trig homework, and enjoyed some roasted Duck. You always were such a good boy, Stanford! As a reward, the Cardinal now have a half-game lead in the North, with the Washington schools rapidly approaching on the schedule. Down South, USC is tied in the loss column with both Arizona schools, but they will get a shot at both in a few weeks as well.
SEC
When the SEC got wind of what was happening up the street in the ACC and Pac-12, they half-heartedly tried to compete. Tennessee skipped school tried to sneak his best friend and girlfriend into a fancy French restaurant, but I think would up with some bad Chicken. Florida just went out to an art museum, a baseball game, and a parade and failed to finish against Texas A&M. But, the only school that really got into trouble was Auburn, who wound up crashing dad’s Ferrari into the woods after Ed Oregeron took it for joy ride on the streets of Baton Rouge. Meanwhile, Alabama, Georgia, and even the Mississippi schools just went straight to business and took their opponents to school. “Wrong movie, morons,” mumbled Saban. As it stands now, Alabama and Georgia remain undefeated, with Kentucky (Kentucky?!?!?) remaining as the lone 1-loss team in the conference. Only 2 NY6 bids seems all but inevitable now.
Big 12
With everything going on up and down Power Five Street this week, I think the Big 12’s parents got word that something was going on, and they decided to just stay at home to keep an eye on things. As a result, there were no upsets on the Plains this weekend. Oklahoma tried pretty hard to choke against Texas, and Texas Tech led WVU until the 4th quarter but they both eventually fell in line. In contrast, OK State and TCU seemed have little trouble with Baylor and K-State. So, TCU remains the lone undefeated team in the conference, which two very winnable games up next in Kansas and at Iowa State. That is, unless mom and dad decide to go out again… PARTY FROG!!!!
Independents / Group of Five
If you thought that all the chaos was confined to Power Five Street, well, think again. On AAC Street, as if Houston didn’t hate Hurricanes enough right now, the Cougars were a 13-point favorite to Tulsa, yet wound up losing… by 4 TDs. As a result, their possible NY6 hopes are pretty much wrecked. Also in the South, Memphis edged Navy by 3 to move to the head of the field. But, considering UCF already lanced the Tigers 3 weeks ago, and once again crushed their opponent (ECU) this week, the conference looks more and more like a two team race between the Knights and their neighbors to the west, the USF Bulls, who beat Cincinnati by 8 more points that Michigan did. But, the parties did not stop there. Mountain West Blvd saw two upsets, with one of them being fairly destructive. San Diego State looked to be on cruise control with a bright future, but they partied a little too hard with Boise State and now their future is quite uncertain. They still might be the conference’s best chance for a NY6 bid, but they would likely need an upset in the AAC Title game to have any shot at all now. Farther down the street, the party continued. C-USA, the MAC, and the Sun Belt all had multiple upsets.
And finally, How Good is… Ohio State?
I must admit, once the Buckeye’s went down to Oklahoma, I kind of wrote them off. I have never been a huge fan of Urban Meyer, and no matter how much talent he can assemble, I just am not convinced that he knows how to develop his own players. He is just really good at utilizing someone else’s players. But, it is pretty hard to ignore the fact that they have now won their last 5 games by an average of over 40 points, and the last three games by an average of almost 50. Now, with a bye week to prepare for the Nittany Lions, at home, no less, I am starting to wonder if maybe I was right all along when I picked OSU to win the conference and make the playoffs this summer. Has TJ Barrett finally returned to form from his Freshman year? For the rest of the conference’s sake… I hope not.
How Bad is… BYU?
In the preseason rankings, the Cougars were being picked to be anywhere from #33 to #49 in the country. Now, that isn’t exactly something to write home about, or even tell your hooker girlfriend about, but it was good enough for the 2nd best ranking among non-Power 5 team not named Notre Dame. This week, BYU got crushed by Mississippi State to drop to 1-6, with the one win coming at the expense of FCS team Portland State during “Week Zero” in late August. Granted, the back-half of their schedule is significantly easier, with no teams left that were ranked in the Top 100 in the preseason. Yet, my spreadsheet only has the Cougar’s favored in 2 of those contests. I would say I feel bad for them, but I am still a little bit mad at them for last year. They know why.
That’s all for right now, and as always, Go State, Beat the Hoosiers!
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