So far in this year's math-driven college football preview, we have explored the historical accuracy of the preseason rankings, taken a look back at last year, and conducted a thorough analysis of the potential paths for the Michigan State Spartans' season.
In today's installment, the focus shifts to the new, supersized, coast-to-coast Big Ten conference.
Strengths of Schedule
The first thing to cover today is the relative strength of schedule of each team. Figure 1 below summarizes my calculations for an 18 teams in the new Big Ten.
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There are several different ways to calculate strength of schedule. I use my preseason estimations of power rankings and calculate the number of expected wins that a reference, borderline top 25 team would have if that reference team were to play the schedule in question.
For example, if the reference team were to play Michigan State's schedule, that reference team would have an expected win total of 7.87 games. That grades out to middle of the pack in the Big Ten and No. 29 toughest nationally (as indicated by the label on the bar in Figure 1).
Note that Indiana has the easiest overall schedule (No. 60) in the Big Ten, while Los Angeles-based newcomers USC and UCLA both have schedules that rank in the top 15 nationally. The difference between the easiest and hardest schedule is close to two full games, 1.78 wins out of 12 total.
Also note that potential contenders Iowa, Ohio State, and Penn State have slightly easier schedules than either Oregon or Michigan.
Figure 2 below gives the same calculation considering only the nine conference games.
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| Figure 2: 2024 Big Ten football conference strengths of schedule. The horizontal line represents the conference's average difficulty. |
Rutgers has a significant advantage over the field with a schedule that is close to half a game (0.39) easier than Iowa's second easiest conference schedule. Note also that contenders Penn State, Oregon, and Michigan all have schedules among the six easiest in the league.
The other two main contenders, Ohio State and USC have schedules in the middle of the pack, difficulty wise. Michigan State's schedule difficulty (5.20 wins) is just below the conference average of 5.39 wins.
Defending national runners up Washington draw the truly brutal "welcome the big stage" schedule which grades out almost a game-and-a-half (1.45) harder than Rutgers' schedule.
Win Distributions
In the first two installments of this series, I introduced my methodology to simulate the full college football season by assigning power rankings to each team which allows me to assign a victory probably for each game. The results of this simulation allow me to calculate the probability that each team will win any number of the games on their schedule.
Table 1 below gives the full regular season win probability matrix for all 18 Big Ten teams.
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The data in this table allows us to answer all sorts of hypothetical questions about odds for any Big Ten to win any total number of games. The most practical application is the odds for each team to win at least six games and qualify for a bowl game. This value for each team is highlighted on the right side of the table.
Based on these bowl odds, roughly 12 of the 18 teams are expected to win at least six games with only Minnesota (49%), UCLA (46.4%), Illinois (44.3%), Michigan State (41.5%), and Purdue (26.5%) having bowl odds under .500.
The teams are sorted based on total expected number of wins, ranging from Ohio State (9.84 win) down to Purdue (4.27). Michigan State's value of 5.13 wins is only good enough for second to last.
For reference, Table 2 below also shows the win distribution for just conference games.
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| Table 2: Big Ten conference win probability matrix derived from the results of the 100,000 cycle Monte Carlo simulation, including the known uncertainty in the preseason ranking. |
Interestingly, the four teams at the top of the conference all have expected conference win totals that round to seven (i.e a record of 7-2), while the bottom six teams (including the Spartans) all have expected win totals that round to three (i.e. a record of 3-6). The ability to win or lose close games is what is likely to separate the teams at both ends of the standings.
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| Table 3: Summary of the preseason projections for the Big Ten conference, based on the consensus preseason rankings and a 150,000 cycle Monte Carlo simulation of the full college football season. |
The bird's eye view of the Big Ten race is that there are four primary competitors (Ohio State, Oregon, Penn State, and Michigan) which are all preseason top 10 teams. My data suggests that there is an 81% chance that one of those four teams ultimately wins the Big Ten Championship.
Then there is USC and Iowa, who are both considered top-25 level teams this year. There is about a 10% chance that one of those two programs wins the Big Ten. The set of projected records shown in Table 3 suggest that this group of six teams are most likely to finish conference play with a record between 9-0 and 7-2.
There is less than a 10% chance that any of the remaining 12 conference teams claim the championship and only a 30% chance that one of those 12 teams even makes it to Indianapolis.
Two other tidbits from Table 3 are that the expected number of Big Ten teams to earn a playoff bid is 2.85 teams and the odds for a Big Ten team to win the National Title is 31%.
Who will win the Big Ten?
In order to understand the most likely set of scenarios for the six contenders to play for the Big Ten Championship in Indianapolis in early December, it is best to start with the seven total games where those six teams will face each other. They are as follows, with my project spread listed after each home team:
- 9/21: USC at Michigan (-10.5)
- 10/5: Iowa at Ohio State (-7.5)
- 10/12: Ohio State at Oregon (-3)
- 10/12: Penn State at USC (+4.5)
- 11/2: Oregon at Michigan (-0.5)
- 11/2: Ohio State at Penn State (-1)
- 11/30: Michigan at Ohio State (-7.5)
The Buckeyes have the misfortune of playing each of the other three primary contenders in addition to hosting Iowa. Michigan and Oregon each play two of the other primary contenders, while Penn State only faces Ohio State.
Michigan and Penn State both face dark horse contender USC, while Iowa only faces Ohio State.
Of these seven games, the Trojans are projected to be double digit underdogs in Ann Arbor and it is very difficult to imagine Iowa beating Ohio State in Columbus. This leaves the final five games on the list as the ones most likely to decide the two teams who will qualify for the Big Ten Championship Game.
As Figure 2 shows, the primary contender with easiest conference schedule and therefor the most straightforward path to Indianapolis is Penn State. The Nittany Lions avoid the Ducks and the Wolverines, and Penn State will have the opportunity to host Ohio State.
If Penn State can edge the Buckeyes, the Nittany Lions next most difficult games are at USC (+4.5) and at Wisconsin (+8.5). Penn State is the only Big Ten team that I project to be favored in all 12 games. For this reason, I am picking Penn State to make the Big Ten Championship game, even if they drop a game at USC or at Wisconsin.
As for the team that I pick to join Penn State, the numbers tell me to pick Oregon. The Ducks also have the benefit of hosting Ohio State. Even if they drop the game to the Wolverines in Ann Arbor, Oregon's next toughest game is also at Wisconsin (+10) where they project to be a double digit favorite.
Also note that Table 2 shows that Oregon and Penn State lead the Big Ten in expected conference wins. In a theoretical neutral field match-up, the Ducks (-2) would be a slight favorite over the Nittany Lions. Therefore, the Oregon Ducks are my official pick to win the Big Ten in 2024.
Other Paths to Indianapolis
Ohio State has the best overall odds to win the Big Ten due to a conference-best No. 2 national preseason ranking. But the fact that the Buckeyes have by far the toughest conference schedule of four primary contenders could be an issue. As Figure 1 shows, Penn State has a build-in schedule advantage of almost half of a game.
If Ohio State can win two of the three marquee match-ups at Oregon (-3), at Penn State (-1), and versus Michigan (+7.5), the Buckeyes will likely finish with a record of at least 8-1 and in solid shape to return to the Big Ten Championship Game.
But Ohio State projects to be the underdog in the two road games, which is is why I am picking against the Buckeyes. That said, with no many tough games, Ohio State has more potential paths to Indianapolis as well as a potential tiebreaker advantage due to strength of schedule.
Of the four primary contenders, the odds for Michigan to return to Indianapolis are slightly lower than the other three teams. Michigan is projected to be a solid underdog at Ohio State this year. By contrast, the toughest games on the schedule for Penn State, Oregon, and Ohio State are all project as toss-ups.
If the Wolverines can beat either Ohio State or Oregon and get to 8-1, there are several scenarios where Michigan returns to the Big Ten Championship game. However, many of the scenarios include complex tiebreakers that will not always favor the Wolverines.
Speaking of tiebreakers, one of the challenges in making predictions about the Big Ten Championship is that the conference has yet to announce the official tiebreaker procedure. Most experts expect the tiebreakers to resemble the procedure adopted by the ACC, which dropped divisions last year.
In my analysis, I assumed that the Big Ten adopts something similar to the ACC, which prioritizes head-to-head results, results against common opponents, and strength of conference schedule.
Practically, scenarios involving a two-team tie will likely be straightforward. But there are other scenarios where three, four, or even five teams could finish with a record of 8-1. In these scenarios, Ohio State is often the only common opponent of note, which could create problems for Michigan if the Wolverines lose in Columbus.
For example, both the most likely and disruptive scenarios shown in Table 3 involve a three-way tie with teams 8-1 records. In the disruptive scenario, Penn State finishes at 9-0 and three teams are 8-1: Oregon (with a loss to Michigan, but a win over Ohio State), Michigan (with a loss to Ohio State but a win over Oregon), and Iowa (also with a loss to Ohio State).
If Iowa were to pick up a second loss, Michigan would win the head-to-head tiebreaker with Oregon. With Iowa in mix however, the tiebreaker rules would (most likely) revert to the record against common opponents. All three teams played Ohio State, which gives the tiebreaker to Oregon as the only team in the trio to beat the Buckeyes.
The disruptive scenario is the same for Michigan and Oregon, but Iowa does pick up a second loss at UCLA and Penn State also loses at USC. This forcing a three-way tie between the Nittany Lions, Oregon, and Michigan. Once again, all three teams faced Ohio State with only Michigan falling to the Buckeyes. The Wolverines would miss out on the Big Ten Championship Game in this scenario as well.
In the cases where there are no common opponents, strength of schedule may become important. Based on Figure 1, we can see that this tiebreaker is likely to favor Ohio State and hurt Penn State with Oregon and Michigan somewhere in the middle.
The tiebreakers may also play a crucial role if one or both of the two secondary contenders (Iowa and USC) comes into play for the top two spots in the conference.
From this point of view, Iowa's weak conference schedule could come back to haunt them. The Hawkeye's most likely best case scenario is to go 8-1 with a sole loss at Ohio State. But the weak schedule containing no other contender makes it very unlikely that Iowa would win any tiebreaker. Iowa would need four of the other five contenders to finish no better than 7-2.
On the other hand, USC is in the opposite position. The Trojans are likely to lose at Michigan, but if they can handle Penn State at home, they are likely to be favored in the seven other conference games and could reach a record of 8-1. USC has a schedule that falls into a sweet spot where they almost exclusively play teams in the middle of the conference. This allows the Trojans potentially to rack up wins while still having a strong strength of schedule.
The fact that USC avoids Oregon, Ohio State and Iowa also means that if they wind up in a complex tie near the top of the standings, it is unlikely to involve any relevant common opponents. In these scenarios, the Trojans are in a strong position based on strength of schedule. For this reason, USC is my pick for the dark horse participant in the Big Ten Championship game.
That all said, the analysis above assumes that the six top contenders all can survive the rest of their collective conference slates. History tells us that many of the top six contenders will stumble at some point during conference play. Here are some of the potential pitfalls that could trip up each of them.
- Iowa at UCLA (+3.5)
- Iowa at Maryland (+4)
- Michigan at Washington (+9.5)
- Ohio State at Northwestern (+19)
- Oregon at Wisconsin (+10)
- Penn State at Wisconsin (+8.5)
- USC at Washington (+3)
- USC at UCLA (+5)
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