Championship Week Preview

Football season might be over for the Michigan State Spartans, but the college football season is far from over. This weekend 20 teams will compete for a conference championship and the results of those games will determine the match-ups in the College Football Playoffs and the New Year's Six Bowls. 

How are those game likely to shake out and what are the possible bowl game scenarios? Let's use a little math to see how things might play out.

Championship Week Betting Preview

Every week of the college football season, I compared the initial Las Vegas point spreads to the predictions for each game made by both my algorithm and ESPN's Football Power Index (FPI) computer. The analysis will often lead to betting recommendations, which historically have done well (other than this year... sorry). Figures 1 and 2 below summarize this comparison for Championship Week, 2022.

Figure 1: Comparison of the projected final margins of victory based on my algorithm to the opening Vegas lines for Championship Week.

Figure 2: Comparison of the projected final margins of victory based on ESPN's FPI to the opening Vegas lines for Championship Week.

Typically, any game that falls outside of the dotted lines in the figures above trigger a potentially favorable wager against the spread. But, no such data point exists this week. So, the only potential wagers on the board are three potential upset picks, as summarized below in Table 1.

Table 1: Summary of upset picks for Championship Week.

My computer is predicting an upset in the Big 12, Pac-12, and MAC championship games which would certainly impact both the Playoff and New Year's Six landscape. ESPN's FPI concurs with sounding the upset alert for the Pac-12 Championship Game.

This year I have also been generating a series of recommended bets for game point totals (otherwise known as "over/under" bets). This week my computer only has one suggestion: take the over on 54.4 points in the MAC Championship Game (Ohio versus Toledo).

The complete set of predictions for this weekend's action are shown below in Table 2.

Table 5: Summary of the Championship Week action, including my algorithm's projected scores. The teams shaded in green are projected to cover by my algorithm. The teams shaded red are projected to cover by the FPI.

Interestingly, my computer projects the favored team to cover in every game this week except for the three games that are flagged above as potential upsets. This includes my computer's suggestion that Michigan will beat Purdue by 19 points. As for ESPN's FPI, it picks LSU and Coastal Carolina to cover the spread.

College Football and New Year's Six Scenarios

Out of the 10 total conference championship games that will be played this weekend, only four will actually impact the eventual participants in the College Football Playoffs. Those games are:

• Big Ten Championship: Michigan (-15.5) versus Purdue
• SEC Championship: Georgia (-14.5) versus LSU
• Big 12 Championship: TCU (-2.5) versus Kansas State
• Pac-12 Championship: USC (-1) versus Utah

The winner of the ACC Championship game (Clemson versus North Carolina) and the American Athletic Conference Championship (AAC) game (Tulane versus Central Florida) will both also impact the New Year's Six participants in a trivial way. Due to the various bowl contracts, the ACC Champion will play in the Orange Bowl and the AAC Champion will play in the Cotton Bowl.

Different potential outcomes in the four games listed above translates to 16 unique final scenarios. The point spreads for each game are known, so it is also possible to calculate a probability for each scenario. Furthermore, if one makes a series of assumptions, it is possible to predict and assign a probability to the bowl match-ups in all 16 cases.

Here are the assumptions that I am using:

1. No. 1 Georgia (12-0) and No. 2 Michigan (12-0) will make the playoffs no matter what happens this weekend
2. No. 3 TCU (12-0) would slip below No. 5 Ohio State (11-1) with a loss to Kansas State but would stay ahead of No. 6 Alabama (10-2)
3. No. 4 USC (11-1) will only make the playoffs with a win over Uth. No. 5 Ohio State (11-1) will jump USC if the Trojans lose.
4. If both No. 3 TCU and No. 4 USC lose, they maintain their relative position, but both teams would slip below No. 5 Ohio State.
5. There is no scenario where No. 6 Alabama (10-2) makes the playoffs.
6. All teams not in action this week will maintain there current rankings relative to each other.
7. If Ohio State makes the playoff, the committee will "modify" the final rankings to avoid an all-Big Ten semifinal rematch.

The final point is perhaps more wishful thinking on my part. That said, as a college football fan, an Ohio State/Michigan rematch in the National Semifinals would be malpractice on the part of the Selection Committee.

If we accept the above assumptions as true, Table 3 below gives the odds and match-ups for 16 possible scenarios

Table 3: Odds and projected match-ups for the College Football Playoffs and other New Year's Six Bowl Games 

This table is a bit of an eye chart. Table 4 below gives the odds for each team to play in each of the New Year's Six Bowls.

Table 4: Odds for each team to play in each of hte New Year's Six Bowls, based on the data in Table 3.

Scenario No. 1 above, where the favored team in all four contest wins, is the most likely single outcome with odds of 22 percent. This would very likely result in a Peach Bowl match-up of No. 1 Georgia versus No. 4 USC and a Fiesta Bowl match-up of No. 2 Michigan versus No. 3 TCU. 

The chances for Ohio State to make the Playoffs are perhaps better than most people would expect. In fact, I give Ohio State better odds than USC. The reason is that USC needs to win this weekend in order to make it in. By contract, Ohio State only needs either TCU or USC to lose. In other words, Ohio State has multiple paths to the Playoffs, while USC has just one.

When all 16 scenarios are considered, the most likely match-ups are for Michigan to face TCU (66% odds) and Georgia to face Ohio State (62% odds) although not necessarily at the same time. There is a 43% chance these both of these match-ups come to pass which corresponds to six of the eight scenarios where Utah beats USC.

Here are some other general New Year's Six observations. 

For the Rose Bowl, Utah will automatically earn a return trip to Pasadena with a win over USC. If the Trojans win and go to the Playoffs, Washington seems like the most likely Pac-12 replacement. On the Big Ten side, Purdue would automatically qualify for the Rose Bowl with an upset win over Michigan. Otherwise, Penn State (60% odds) or Ohio State (26% odds) will make the trip.

The Sugar Bowl scenarios are very simple. Kansas State is the Big 12 representative in all 16 scenarios. If LSU upsets Georgia, the Tigers will face the Wildcats. Otherwise, Alabama will represent the SEC.

The Orange Bowl will contractually feature the ACC Champion (either Clemson (70%) or North Carolina (30%)) against most likely Tennessee (81% odds). Alabama (15%) and Ohio State (4%) are also in play.

Finally, the Cotton Bowl will feature either Tulane (57%) or Central Florida (43%) against most likely either USC (47% odds), TCU (22%), Penn State (22%). Tennessee (7%) and Alabama (less than 1%) are also candidates.

Enjoy the games.