Total Div IA Teams:.....................119 Total Div IA Teams playing this week:....82
Total Games involving Div IA Teams:......41
Div IA Teams playing non-IA teams:........0 (One game played at Div IA home)
Div IA Teams losing to non-Div IA team....0
Average Points per game:.................57 Highest Total:..........................108 (Central Michigan at Eastern Michigan[w]) Lowest Total:............................15 (UAB[w] at UCF)
Average spread of victory:...............18 Highest Spread:..........................51 (Fresno State at Boise State[w])
Lowest Spread:............................1 (LSU at Arkansas[w])
Visiting Teams that won:.................15 Visiting Teams that won - Non-Div IA:.....0
Interesting Facts:
Eight of the BCS Top 25 did not play in Week 14
Number of Teams Undefeated Teams left after 14 weeks: 4
BCS Top 5 - FBS Opponents Cumulative Win/Loss Records Alabama....64-66...49% Oklahoma...78-52...60% Texas......85-58...59% Florida....75-56...57% USC........67-73...48%
It didn't help USC to have played any of the Washington teams as far as SoS goes.
Next Week, Week 15...The Last Week of Regular Season.
Total Div IA Teams:.....................119 Total Div IA Teams playing this week:....96
Total Games involving Div IA Teams:......49
Div IA Teams playing non-IA teams:........2 (One game played at Div IA home)
Div IA Teams losing to non-Div IA team....0
Average Points per game:.................55 Highest Total:..........................107 (Eastern Michigan at Temple[w]) Lowest Total:............................16 (Clemson[w] at Virginia)
Average spread of victory:...............19 Highest Spread:..........................55 (Iowa[w] at Minnesota)
Lowest Spread:............................1 (two games) (Syracuse[w] at Notre Dame & Cal Poly at Wisconsin[w]
Visiting Teams that won:.................20 Visiting Teams that won - Non-Div IA:.....0
Interesting Facts:
Seven of the BCS Top 25 did not play in Week 12
Number of Teams Undefeated Teams left after 13 weeks: 4
The Cal Poly Mustangs Number 3 in FCS Coaches Poll Record: 8-3, 1-1 against FBS Teams
Washinton Leads the Nation... ...in Return Defense. Lowest Total Return Yardage - Kickoffs and Punt Returns.
Next Week, Week 14...Two Weeks of Regular Season Left.
Total Div IA Teams:.....................119 Total Div IA Teams playing this week:....99
Total Games involving Div IA Teams:......50
Div IA Teams playing non-IA teams:........1 (One game played at Div IA home)
Div IA Teams losing to non-Div IA team....0
Average Points per game:.................54 Highest Total:..........................100 (two games) (Tulsa at Houston[w] & Arizona at Oregon[w]) Lowest Total:............................24 (East Carolina at Southern Miss[w])
Average spread of victory:...............17 Highest Spread:..........................59 (Louisiana-Monroe at Mississippi[w])
Lowest Spread:............................2 (two games) (Virginia Tech at Miami[w] & North Carolina at Maryland[w]
Visiting Teams that won:.................24 Visiting Teams that won - Non-Div IA:.....0
Interesting Facts:
Five of the BCS Top 25 did not play in Week 12
Number of Teams Undefeated Teams left after 12 weeks: 5
Big game this week: Texas Tech at Oklahoma Both Teams coming off a bye week.
Total Div IA Teams:.....................119 Total Div IA Teams playing this week:...106
Total Games involving Div IA Teams:......54
Div IA Teams playing non-IA teams:........2 (One game played at Div IA home)
Div IA Teams losing to non-Div IA team....0
Average Points per game:.................52 Highest Total:...........................94 (Oklahoma[w] at Texas A&M) Lowest Total:............................17 (Notre Dame at Boston College[w])
Average spread of victory:...............17 Highest Spread:..........................38 (Oklahoma[w] at Texas A&M)
Lowest Spread:............................1(two games) (Arkansas State at Florida International[w] & Penn State at Iowa[w]
Visiting Teams that won:.................20 Visiting Teams that won - Non-Div IA:.....0
Interesting Facts:
All of the BCS Top 25 played in Week 11
Number of Teams Undefeated Teams left after 11 weeks: 5
Total Games Played by Week 11:..........614 Games Against non-IA teams:..............92 Div IA in-Conference Games:.............328 Div IA Games vs Non-Div IA teams:.......194 Visiting Teams that won - Non-Div IA:.....0
Conference vs. Conference
The key to reading the table is that the conference win/loss flips below the X. As an example, the ACC has 3 wins as visitor to the Big 12 and has 1 win versus the Big 12 as host. Overall, the ACC is 4 and 0 versus the Big 12 this season.
Next Week, Week 12. The eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month...Armistice Day...WWI...Veteran's Day since 1954.
Total Div IA Teams:.....................119 Total Div IA Teams playing this week:...100
Total Games involving Div IA Teams:......50
Div IA Teams playing non-IA teams:........1 (One game played at Div IA home)
Div IA Teams losing to non-Div IA team....0
Average Points per game:.................55 Highest Total:...........................93 (Rice[w] at UTEP) Lowest Total:............................23 (three games) (Air Force[w] at Army & Utah[w] at New Mexico & East Carolina[w] at UCF)
Average spread of victory:...............16 Highest Spread:..........................58 (Stanford[w] at Washington State)
Lowest Spread:............................1(three games) (Wisconsin at Michigan State[w] & Troy at Louisiana-Monroe[w] & Kentucky[w] at Mississippi State)
Visiting Teams that won:.................19 Visiting Teams that won - Non-Div IA:.....0
Interesting Facts:
Four of the AP Top 25 did not play in Week 10
Number of Teams Undefeated Teams left after 10 weeks: 6
Undefeated teams Away (11) ---- Air Force Alabama Ball State Boise State Florida Georgia Oklahoma Penn State Pittsburgh Texas Tech Utah
At Home (26) ---- Alabama Ball State Boise State BYU California Central Michigan Cincinnati Louisiana Tech Louisiana-Lafayette Maryland Northern Illinois Oklahoma State Oregon State Penn State Rice Stanford TCU Texas Texas Tech Troy Tulsa USC Utah Virginia Tech West Virginia Western Michigan
Next Week, Week 11. Yeah, not much time to do much with all the numbers I've been accumulating, but I'll be better prepared next year. That's right, don't forget to vote. If not, the curse of the Fatman will follow you...
Total Div IA Teams:.....................119 Total Div IA Teams playing this week:...100
Total Games involving Div IA Teams:......50
Div IA Teams playing non-IA teams:........0 (One game played at Div IA home)
Div IA Teams losing to non-Div IA team....0
Average Points per game:.................53 Highest Total:...........................93 (Oklahoma[w] at Kansas State) Lowest Total:............................17 (Duke[w] at Vanderbilt)
Average spread of victory:...............16 Highest Spread:..........................58 (Two games) (Colorado at Missouri[w] & Kentucky atFlorida[w])
Lowest Spread:............................1 (Two games) (Florida Atlantic[w] at Louisiana-Monroe & Central Michigan[w] atToledo)
Visiting Teams that won:.................23 Visiting Teams that won - Non-Div IA:.....0
Interesting Facts:
Two of the AP Top 25 did not play in Week 9
Number of Teams Undefeated Teams left after 9 weeks: 8
BCS 1 thru 5 in Ranked Stats Rnk.Team......W/L..TYds..RYds..Pyds..TPt s..TDef 1. Texas......8-0...5th..30th..11th...6th..28th 2. Alabama....8-0..35th..16th..98th..27th..10th 3. Penn State.9-0...8th...8th..18th...5th...3rd 4. Oklahoma...7-1...2nd..33rd...2nd...2nd..51st 5. USC........6-1..14th..41st..37th..22nd...1st
So, Penn State best balance between offense and defense. Does defense win championships?
Next week, Week 10.
DF
Ps. Vista sucks. Took all morning to run updates on my new computer...
While this article from the NY Times talks about boosters and how the current financial problems may change their ability to give, it also talks about the amount money tied up by the six members of the BCS bowl series and related institutions.
Total Div IA Teams:.....................119 Total Div IA Teams playing this week:...103
Total Games involving Div IA Teams:......52
Div IA Teams playing non-IA teams:........1 (One game played at Div IA home)
Div IA Teams losing to non-Div IA team....0
Average Points per game:.................55 Highest Total:..........................112 (UTEP at Tulsa[w]) Lowest Total:............................22 (Connecticut at Rutgers[w])
Average spread of victory:...............18 Highest Spread:..........................69 (USC[w] at Washington State)
Lowest Spread:............................1(three games) (Kansas State at Colorado[w] & Arkansas at Kentucky[w] & Air Force[w] at UNLV)
Visiting Teams that won:.................16 Visiting Teams that won - Non-Div IA:.....0
Total Yards:..........4373 (1st) Total Rush Yards:.....1869 (9th) Total Passing Yards:..2504 (6th) Total Points:..........396 (1st) Rushing Touchdowns:.....20 (tied 8th) Receiving Touchdowns:...31 (1st)
Explanation of title: Last week was my first week back at work. Stopped taking anti-inflammatories and got the gout in every joint below the waist. It's like being a child. I hate being punished for something do (you gouty people know what I'm talking about!). By the time the weekend came, I was exhausted. I got up Saturday, got a cup of coffee, turned on the tube, and slept straight through to the third quarter of the Cal game. Whew!
Next week, Week 9. May rework the prediction formula adding defensive stats.
Total Div IA Teams:.....................119 Total Div IA Teams playing this week:...102
Total Games involving Div IA Teams:......52
Div IA Teams playing non-IA teams:........2 (One game played at Div IA home)
Div IA Teams losing to non-Div IA team....0
Average Points per game:.................48 Highest Total:...........................93 (New Mexico State[w] at Nevada Lowest Total:............................17 (Gardner-Webb at Georgia Tech[w])
Average spread of victory:...............13 Highest Spread:..........................53 (Washington State at Oregon State[w]
Lowest Spread:............................1 (Arizona at Stanford[w]
Visiting Teams that won:.................23 Visiting Teams that won - Non-Div IA:.....0
Conf......W.....L ACC......45....23 Big 12...49....22 Big East.28....18 Big Ten..46....25 C-USA....32....43 MAC......38....47 MWC......35....23 Pac-10...29....31 SEC......48....24 Sun Belt.17....30 WAC......26....26 Ind......10.....8
Interesting Facts:
Four of the AP Top 25 did not play in Week 7
Number of Teams Undefeated Teams left after 7 weeks: 10
Home Field Advantage? Total Number of Home Games Played: 267 Total Number of Home Wins:.........137 ................................... 66%
Teams unbeaten at home: ACC......Georgia Tech.....MAC......Ball State ACC......Maryland.........MAC......Central Michigan ACC......Virginia Tech....MAC......Northern Illinois Big 12...Kansas...........MAC......Western Michigan Big 12...Oklahoma State...MWC......BYU Big 12...Texas............MWC......TCU Big 12...Texas Tech.......MWC......Utah Big East.Cincinnati.......Pac-10...Arizona Big East.Connecticut......Pac-10...California Big East.West Virginia....Pac-10...Oregon State Big Ten..Michigan State...Pac-10...Stanford Big Ten..Minnesota........Pac-10...USC Big Ten..Ohio State.......SEC......Alabama Big Ten..Penn State.......SEC......LSU C-USA....Rice.............SEC......Vanderbilt C-USA....Tulsa............Sun Belt.Louisiana-Lafayette Ind......Navy.............Sun Belt.Troy Ind......Notre Dame.......WAC......Boise State ..........................WAC......Louisiana Tech ..........................WAC......San José State
Teams without a home win: MAC......Akron MAC......Bowling Green MAC......Temple MAC......Toledo Pac-10...Washington Sun Belt.North Texas
Total Div IA Teams:.....................119 Total Div IA Teams playing this week:...104
Total Games involving Div IA Teams:......53
Div IA Teams playing non-IA teams:........2 (All games played at Div IA home) (One game a replacement for a cancelled Week 2 game)
Div IA Teams losing to non-Div IA team....0
Average Points per game:.................51 Highest Total:...........................91 (Rice at Tulsa[w]) Lowest Total:............................22 (Northern Illinois at Tennessee[w])
Average spread of victory:...............17 Highest Spread:..........................35 (2 games) (Alcorn State at New Mexico State[w] & Rice at Tulsa[w])
Lowest Spread:............................1 (2 games) (Florida Atlantic at Middle Tennessee[w] & Auburn at Vanderbilt[w])
Visiting Teams that won:.................27 Visiting Teams that won - Non-Div IA:.....0
Conf......W.....L ACC......40....22 Big 12...43....16 Big East.25....16 Big Ten..41....19 C-USA....29....36 MAC......31....41 MWC......31....19 Pac-10...25....27 SEC......43....19 Sun Belt.13....26 WAC......21....22 Ind.......9.....7
Interesting Facts:
Three of the AP Top 25 did not play in Week 5
Mr. Obvious: Ball State undefeated and now ranked!
Number of Teams Undefeated Teams left after 6 weeks: 15
To explain the title, it took up to Week 6 for data on the Independent teams, Army, Navy, and Notre Dame, to show up in Fox's stats and the stats were ready Sunday night instead of Wednesday. Will use the actual scores to try and add corrections to the predictions. Next Week, Week 7.
Part Three – The BCS Computer Component and BCS Problems and Fixes
The BCS Computer Component
The 2008 BCS computer component consists of six ranking; Fox has the list of the participants and links to their sites here.
How the rankings in each "poll" are calculated is too complex for this blog. If you are truly interested, you can follow the links on the page listed above to the participant home page and look for the detail there. Here is how the BCS component is calculated:
For each team, their rank in each poll is added together, the final score for each team being that sum divided by six (the average);
The scores can be sorted to rank the computer component.
The final score for each team is the sum of individual scores given by each component of the BCS, the Harris Poll, the Coaches Poll, and the computer-ranked component, divided by three (the average). The scores are sorted to give the BCS ranking for that week. The first BCS rankings come out two Sundays from now (October 19th)
Flaws in the Human Polls
If you've been following along, you probably noticed that the mathematics of the three components tend to feed on itself. Tell me if this statement makes sense: The average of the sums of the averages of the sum of the ranks creates a meaningful relationship between the true strength of teams. Nonsense, right? If you remember my first blog on this topic, performance on the field is the only true determinant of strength.
What makes the human polls mostly useless are, of course, the humans. Believe it or not, I am not talking about a human failing like corruptibility, but the more positive aspects of preference and differentiation.
Fixes for the Human Polls
In the human polls, how many points are there between each ranked team? One. Only one. So the difference in strength between the first place team and second place team on any one ballot is one point. The difference between first and third is two points. And, so on.
Imagine if we gave each voter a thousand (1,000) points to distribute along with the ranking on their ballot. This would show a difference between each of the ranks and create a preference differential that can be included in a larger calculations.
Flaws in the Computer Polls
I don't have any simple fixes for the problems that the computer polls have, though I'm willing to list them:
Strength of Schedule - is based on last's years win/loss of teams your team will play against this year
Margin of win and quality of opposition - supposed to remove the 'cupcake' factor
Calculations to remove Home field advantage
Calculations and recalculations to give higher weight to a team's performance in their more recent game
Unknown portions of systems
Well, I had to know for myself And, of course, you know how I feel about it all: performance on the field...
And, you see how much is involved in creating promoting the system...it feeds upon itself. That's why there won't be playoff system...for a long time.
Total Div IA Teams:.....................119 Total Div IA Teams playing this week:....98
Total Games involving Div IA Teams:......52
Div IA Teams playing non-IA teams:........6 (All games played at Div IA home)
Div IA Teams losing to non-Div IA team....0
Average Points per game:.................55 Highest Total:...........................97 (North Texas at Rice[w] Lowest Total:............................10 (Western Michigan[w] at Temple)
Average spread of victory:...............17 Highest Spread:..........................57 (North Texas at Rice[w]
Lowest Spread:............................1 (Mississippi[w] at Florida
Visiting Teams that won:.................16 Visiting Teams that won - Non-Div IA:.....0
Conf......W.....L ACC......34....18 Big 12...37....10 Big East.22....13 Big Ten..36....14 C-USA....25....30 MAC......26....35 MWC......26....15 Pac-10...21....21 SEC......38....15 Sun Belt.10....23 WAC......10....23 Ind.......6.....7
Interesting Facts:
Seven of the AP Top 25 did not play in Week 5
Mr. Obvious: Intra-conference play has started for ALL conferences. Only conferences with an odd number of teams need to play an out of conference game.
Number of Teams Undefeated Teams left after 5 weeks: 18
Big 12........5 Missouri Oklahoma Oklahoma State Texas Texas Tech
Big East......2 Connecticut South Florida
Big Ten.......2 Northwestern Penn State
C-USA.........1 Tulsa
MAC...........1 Ball State
MWC...........2 BYU Utah
SEC...........4 Alabama Kentucky LSU Vanderbilt
WAC...........1 Boise State
Next Week, Week 6...and maybe back to work...where I have access to the supercomputer...and decent coffee...
The BCS computation comes in three parts, two of which are the human polls, the Harris Interactive and the Coaches Poll, and one part that is made of an amalgam of computer-generated rankings.
The Harris Poll is composed of former players, coaches, and persons associated with various communications media. The 2008 pool consists of 114 voters. The poll is managed by Harris Interactive.
The coaches poll is composed of Division I-A coaches, all members of the American Football Coaches Association. The 2008 pool consists of 61 coaches. The poll is now managed by USA Today.
For these human polls, each member in the pool picks his top 25 teams and ranks them from 1 (top) to 25 (bottom). The key is that each coach doesn't necessarily start out with the same 25 teams or ranks them in the same order. In the case of the Coaches Poll, there have been questions of bias as the general public does not know what was on the individual ballots as they are kept secret.
In the published list of both polls, there is a points column on which the list is sorted. Where do the points come from? The formula is simple: Each team on each ballot is given points in inverse of their position on the ballot. That is, the first place team on a ballot receives 25 points and the last place team receives 1 point. The points are accumulated for each team across all ballots in that poll.
Lets look at an example: In week three of the Coaches Poll, where USC is ranked number one with 56 first place votes and a total 1517 points. 1517 minus 1400 (56 first place votes times 25 points) leaves 117 points and five voters. 117 points in five parts is 4 second place votes and a fifth place vote at best or two second and three thirds at worst.
As a component of the BCS calculation, these points and divided by the total number of possible point if everyone voted a particular team. In the case of the Coaches Poll, the divisor is (61 coaches times 25 first place points = ) 1525. So, if the BCS were to come out this week, USC would have a component value of .995 (1517/1525).
Enough math, lets look at how the members of the Coaches poll are distributed:
Distribution of Coaches by Conference
CONF......................COUNT Atlantic Coast Conference....6 Big 12 Conference............7 Big East Conference..........4 Big Ten Conference...........7 Conference USA...............6 FBS Independents.............1 Mid-American Conference......6 Mountain West Conference.....4 Pacific-10 Conference........5 Southeastern Conference......7 Sun Belt Conference..........4 Western Athletic Conference..4
South East 22 AL.....2 FL.....6 GA.....1 KY.....1 LA.....2 MS.....1 NC.....3 SC.....2 TN.....2 VA.....1 WV.....2
South West 9 OK.....1 NM.....2 TX.....6
West 11 CA.....4 CO.....1 ID.....1 OR.....2 UT.....1 WA.....1
The names of the 114 members of the 2008 Harris Interactive Poll can be found here. Someone before the season is out will look-up each member and their affiliation. I will put the link to that document in this blog when it happens.
Total Div IA Teams:.....................119 Total Div IA Teams playing this week:...101
Total Games involving Div IA Teams:......56
Div IA Teams playing non-IA teams:.......11 (All games played at Div IA home)
Div IA Teams losing to non-Div IA team....0
Average Points per game:.................51 Highest Total:..........................109 (Fresno State[w] at Toledo)
Lowest Total:............................12 (Wake Forest[w] at Florida State)
Average spread of victory:...............19 Highest Spread:..........................54 (South Carolina State at Clemson[w])
Lowest Spread:............................1 (three games) (Fresno State[w] at Toledo & New Mexico State[w] at UTEP & Iowa at Pittsburgh[w])
Visiting Teams that won:.................18 Visiting Teams that won - Non-Div IA:.....0
Conf.......W.....L ACC.......28....13 Big 12....33.....8 Big East..16....11 Big Ten...31.....8 C-USA.....19....25 MAC.......20....29 MWC.......23....11 Pac-10....17....17 SEC.......32....11 Sun Belt...9....19 WAC.......14....15 Ind........4.....6
Interesting Facts:
Four of the AP Top 25 did not play in Week 4
Number of Teams still undefeated: 27
Distribution of Undefeated Teams across Conferences
ACC........1 Big 12.....7 Big East...2 Big Ten....4 C-USA......1 MAC........1 MWC........3 Pac-10.....1 SEC........6 Sun Belt...0 WAC........1 Ind........0
Current Undefeated Team to Face a Current Undefeated Team:
