Category Archives: college football

Bowl Predictions 2014: Week 4

Okay, the new predictions are up. Let’s do a quick overview.

The Playoff
So this is the scenario I was faced with when I was done projecting everyone’s record:

You can see what I wound up with on the page. I decided that taking the four best teams would be the committee’s top priority, and given that, I had to take Mississippi State over Oregon.

As for the other access bowls, this week I put Clemson in over Duke. With Auburn loss this past weekend, my projected loss to Alabama will give them three losses overall, and I think the committee will probably eschew 3-loss teams if there are enough 2-loss teams. So I matched Clemson up with Nebraska.

East Carolina is still my best guess for the Group of Five slot. They’ll have two losses but they will still have the best resume of any of the available teams. It pains me to see Marshall not get a chance, but those are just the breaks. (Speaking of Marshall, for the past few weeks I’ve tried to use the Heart of Dallas Bowl to give them a matchup with a major conference foe, but that may not work out if there aren’t enough Big 12 teams.)

The other access bowls were about matchups. I liked the idea of having a “Rose Bowl in Exile”, if you will, between Ohio State and Oregon, so I put that in Dallas. The Peach will wind up falling on the sword, as for lack of better ideas I gave them UCLA and East Carolina. Hopefully the next couple of weeks will clear things up on this front.

ACC
I’m now projecting Notre Dame to lose three games, which means they fall into the ACC’s bowl hierarchy. Notre Dame doesn’t get a lot of games against SEC teams, so I figure they’ll slot into one of the ACC’s matchups against a SEC team. In this case, I sent them to the Music City Bowl.

This causes headaches for the rest of the league, but in the end I was able to accommodate everyone. As a side note, I think this will be a very tough year for the Belk Bowl to get a North Carolina team, but then again the matchups are out of the hands of the bowls now anyway (for most conferences). With Utah slotting into the Sun Bowl, one of my goals was definitely to avoid a rematch of the 2012 Sun Bowl with them and Georgia Tech. Also, Miami went to the Sun Bowl in 2010, which is still relatively recent.

Big 12
Right now the Texas-Oklahoma State looks like it will determine which team gets to go a bowl game. Based on recent play, I picked Texas to go to… the Texas bowl.

Big Ten
I tried to avoid sending Rutgers to the Pinstripe bowl because they went there last year, and besides, I figure Penn State is close enough. (Also, Penn State fans should be happy about getting to go to any bowl, considering.)

Pac-12
I tried to create a Washington-Boise State matchup in the Las Vegas Bowl, except it causing other issues. I also then had the bright idea to look up Boise’s upcoming out-of-conference games, and sure enough they’re going to kick off the 2015 season against the Huskies. So that’s out.

Otherwise, with three Pac-12 teams getting into the Committee-controlled bowls that throws a bit of a wrench into the works. It’s worth noting that the way the whole thing is set up every year there will be at least one of the Power 5 conferences getting three teams in.

SEC
Missouri (you know, the team that lost to Indiana a while back) is probably going to win the SEC East, mostly because (like Duke in the ACC) they dodge all the contenders from the SEC West. Georgia, meanwhile, has a permanent rivalry game against what I’m sure will be a pissed-off Auburn team this coming weekend.

(Dear Mike Slive: before you retire, consider my advice. It would have really helped your conference this year!)

So what’s probably going to happen is this awkward situation where Missouri is going to get blasted by Alabama or Mississippi State in the SEC Championship game, but they’ll still be 10-3 at that point so out of obligation the Citrus Bowl will take them. Meanwhile, the SEC West, having beat each other up to the point where LSU and Ole Miss have three losses (and Auburn four) probably won’t send any more teams to the Committee bowls.

But hey, there’s still four weekends of football left to be played. A lot can happen, and this will probably all be different next week.

This Weekend in College Football: Week 11

As usual, all times Eastern and all predictions wrong.

Noon:

  • Georgia @ Kentucky (ESPN): I still have no idea what happened to Georgia last week, but suffice it to say, I don’t envy Kentucky right now.
  • Iowa @ Minnesota (ESPN2): Minnesota! You were having such a nice little season, and then you had to go lose to Illinois. Oof. Iowa, meanwhile, managed to score 48 (48!) points against Northwestern last weekend, surely making several Iowa fans dizzy in the process. I’m giving a slight edge to Iowa.
  • Wisconsin @ Purdue (ESPNU): This one might get ugly for the Boilermakers.
  • Baylor @ Oklahoma (FS1): I’m not entirely what’s going to happen in this one. Looking at the stats, these teams are pretty even, but Oklahoma has one more loss. I consider this a tossup, basically. I’m going with a minor upset for the Sooners.
  • Texas-San Antonio @ Rice (FSN): It’s hard to see how UTSA has much of a chance here, but the advanced stats say this is about even. I guess we’ll have to just wait to find out.
  • Southern Methodist @ Tulsa (CBSS): This is probably SMU’s best remaining chance to win a game this year, but I’m not seeing it.
  • Pennsylvania State @ Indiana (BTN): Penn State has now lost four straight, but I still have them as slight favorites over the Hooisers.

12:30:

  • Georgia Tech @ North Carolina State (ACC): NC State managed to reverse their four game slide finally with a touchdown win over Syracuse. Meanwhile, GT is coming off their most complete effort since the Miami game, dominating an inferior Virginia team from start to finish.
    The main worry for us is going to be NC State’s dynamic Jocaby Brissett, who could certainly do plenty to exploit our defense. The defense played better against Virginia last week, but they were arguably one of the worst offensive teams we’ve played all season. Watching the game, the UVA offense did very little to help itself.
    On paper, the NC State defense looks overmatched, sporting one of the worst run defenses in the country. The key for the Jackets will be to take advantage of this and, as usual, give the defense plenty of room.
  • Duke @ Syracuse (ACC/RSN): It’s hard to see how Syracuse will keep up with Duke.

3:30:

  • Notre Dame @ Arizona State (ABC): I’ve had Notre Dame losing this game in my bowl predictions for several weeks, so I’m not going to back down now.
  • Texas Agricultural and Mechanical @ Auburn (CBS): It’s hard to see how TAMU is going to win this one.
  • Michigan @ Northwestern (ESPN2): I wouldn’t expect a lot of points in this one. Michigan also needs this one pretty badly to get to a bowl, so I’m sort of thinking that means they probably won’t get it.
  • West Virginia @ Texas (FS1): It’s hard to see how Texas is going to score enough points to keep up with the Mountaineers.
  • Tulane @ Houston (ESPNU): Tulane just isn’t very good.
  • Iowa State @ Kansas (FSN): I wouldn’t recommend watching this one. Iowa State is slightly less awful, though.
  • Connecticut vs. Army (@New York, NY; CBSS): UConn had an out-of-nowhere upset of Central Florida last weekend. If they lose to Army, it won’t be out-of-nowhere, per se, but it would still be pretty surprising.

4:00: Washington State @ Oregon State (Pac12): I wouldn’t have had Wazzou has a favorite before one of their all-time best quarterbacks broke his leg last week, so…

6:30: Virginia @ Florida State (ESPN): Florida State will have to work pretty hard to inject any drama into this one.

7:00:

  • California-Los Angeles @ Washington (FS1): UCLA upset Arizona last weekend, but nonetheless they remain a solidly “good” team. I think UDub could give them some problems but I still have the Bruins in the end.
  • Hawaii @ Colorado State (ESPNU): Of the many teams hoping for a shot at the Group of Five slot for the big money bowls, Colorado State was definitely helped by East Carolina’s loss last weekend. Problem is, their loss to was to another team vying for that slot: Boise State. Either way, no big problems are anticipated for them against Hawaii.
  • Boise State @ New Mexico (CBSS): I’ll give Bob Davie credit for sticking his what he said when he was a commentator and indeed running a spread option offense at New Mexico. Other than that, I got nothing for this, Boise should win easily.

7:15: Louisville @ Boston College (ESPN2): Boston College may be the most surprising 6-3 team in college football, but I think they’ll probably drop to a slightly less surprising 6-4 after this.

7:30:

  • Kansas State @ Texas Christian (FOX): This is one is a tossup to me. I think these are both pretty good teams with good offenses. Kansas State has a better defense, but TCU’s offense is that much better than K-State’s. I’m basically guessing TCU.
  • Florida @ Vanderbilt (SEC): I figured Florida would win this one regardless, but boy howdy was that game against Georgia satisfying to watch.

8:00

  • Ohio State @ Michigan State (ABC): This one projects to be close, but honestly, I like Sparty a lot here. Michigan State has just been more well-tested than the Buckeyes. Keep an eye on it, though.
  • Alabama @ Louisiana State (CBS): Game of the day, most likely. Did you know that Les Miles is the only current SEC coach to have beaten Nick Saban twice? Of course, that fact is somewhat tempered by the fact that a lot of SEC coaches haven’t been around long enough to try to beat Saban twice, but still, at night, in Baton Rogue, it’s all about the Les Miles Reality Distortion Field. What could happen? I have no idea. But I’m going with Alabama anyway.
  • Colorado @ Arizona (Pac12): The Buffs have zero conference wins so far, and with their remaining schedule being Arizona, Oregon, and Utah that doesn’t figure to change.

10:00: Oregon @ Utah (ESPN): Since their loss to Arizona over a month ago, Oregon has done a lot more to look like a top team than they did up to that point, culminating last week’s demolition of Stanford. Utah has certainly been game this season in the Pac-12, but it’s hard to see them keeping up with the Ducks.

10:30: San Jose State @ Fresno State (CBSS): Why should you stay up to watch two sub-.500 Moutain West teams play? I have no idea, but hey, this one should be close. Giving a slight edge to the Spartans.

Bowl Predictions 2014: Week 3

Okay, as announced previously the predictions are up. Since it’s so late in the week already I’m not going to go too deep into it this time, though there haven’t been any results that would change anything.

The Playoff
The one thing is that I don’t really care for waiting around until Tuesday for the CFP Poll to be released. Also, since I’m doing a predictive set of, well, predictions the poll doesn’t contain that much relevance to me.

What relevance I can try to glean, though, is perhaps how the committee thinks. Right now, the committee’s top 10 is:

  1. Mississippi State
  2. Florida State
  3. Auburn
  4. Oregon
  5. Alabama
  6. Texas Christian
  7. Kansas State
  8. Michigan State
  9. Arizona State
  10. Notre Dame

Which makes sense. The two undefeated teams are at the time, followed by a pretty defensible ranking of the 1-loss teams. I don’t think anyone is screaming bloody murder about this, except for maybe Notre Dame fans. (As the joke goes, though, Notre Dame’s best “win” might be their narrow loss to Florida State.)

So what can we tell, though? Well, most metrics have Mississippi State as a better team than Florida State. In fact, many advanced stats don’t think very highly of FSU at all. This definitely isn’t last year’s utterly dominant FSU team. Last year FSU had only one game decided by less than a touchdown: the win over Auburn in Pasadena.This year, they’ve had two, and Clemson took them to the brink. (If anything, Clemson probably should have won that game.) The main difference is the defense, which simply suffocated opposing offenses, while this year they have been slightly more porous.

That said, Miss State has been somewhat shaky since their dog became the top in college football. After a decisive win over Auburn in early October, the Bulldogs have since struggled a little with Kentucky and Arkansas.

But, again, these are major college football’s only two undefeated teams, and any poll conducted by humans is going to put them at the top. I can’t blame them for that.

And again, what I’m interested in is what will happen.

My prediction for the end-of-season top six is:

  1. Florida State, as the only undefeated team left
  2. Alabama, as SEC champions, having beaten Mississippi State and Auburn
  3. Mississippi State, with their only loss being to Alabama
  4. Oregon, Pac-12 champions and a win over Michigan State (and necessarily Arizona State)
  5. Michigan State, Big Ten champions (best predicted wins: Nebraska twice, Ohio State)
  6. Kansas State, Big 12 champions (best predicted wins: TCU and Baylor)

Obviously, a lot can change between then and now. But the conventional wisdom seems to be that the committee is valuing best wins over best losses, and if that holds, then I think my top six is reasonable.

Filling out the other “access bowls” remains difficult. I will probably switch out Clemson for Duke at some point. I still have East Carolina as the Group of Five representative, because I have no clue who to put there even though they lost to Temple.

I need to work on the weekend TV guide, so I will eschew the conference breakdowns this week.

The Hat Has a Great Want For You To Exercise Your Suffrage

The official transcription from Les Miles on our civic duty to vote. pic.twitter.com/C80CACKzIF
— Robert Stewart (@TigerRagRobert) November 3, 2014

We need to invent that Futurama head-in-a-jar technology for Les Miles, because I need him to coach football forever.

I keep trying to figure out how I would describe him to someone who doesn’t pay attention to college football. I think I would probably say, “he has a very interesting take on English vocabulary, syntax, and grammar”.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t link EDSBS’s take on this.

The bowl predictions are up, I’ll write about them in a bit.

This Weekend in College Football: Week 10

As usual, all times Eastern and all predictions wrong.

11:30: Air Force @ Army (CBS): Air Force should be able able to seal up their first Commander-in-Chief’s Trophy since 2011 in this one.

Noon:

  • Wisconsin @ Rutgers (ESPN): The pain doesn’t look likely to stop for the Scarlet Knights just yet, who are presumably reeling aftre consecutive blowout losses to Ohio State and Nebraska. Fortunately for them, though, they get Indiana next week.
  • Maryland @ Pennslyvania State (ESPN2): Maryland may represent the best offense Penn State has seen all year, which isn’t really saying much, which I think leads to their inflated defensive numbers.
  • Oklahoma @ Iowa State (FS1): Oklahoma’s season is lessened by losing two out of their last three, but not so much so that they’re suddenly vulnerable to Iowa State or anything.
  • Duke @ Pittsburgh (ESPNU): Eight plays, five fumbles lost. I’ve made posts about luck on the football field in the past, but that one really takes the cake. I’ll talk about it more when I talk about Tech, though. For now, with the way Duke is playing I’m just not sure who they’re going to lose to the rest of the season. There’s nothing about Pitt that makes me think they’ll take it to Duke.
  • East Carolina @ Temple (ESPNEWS): East Carolina has taken care of business in the American so far, and while this isn’t the completely awful version of Temple from, well, most of their history, I don’t think they’ll present much of a challenge for ECU.
  • Central Florida @ Connecticut (CBSS): A team that could challenge ECU, maybe, is Central Florida, who should no issues dispatching a terrible UConn. I mean, seriously: UConn averages 14 points a game.
  • Louisiana-Monroe @ Texas Agricultural and Mechanical (SEC): Texas A&M got to the meat of their schedule three weeks ago, and they blinked. Consecutive losses to the Mississippi schools were bad enough, but then there was the complete meltdown against Alabama last week. Suffice it to say, UL-Monroe may be exactly what the Aggies need right now.
  • Northwestern @ Iowa (BTN): Neither of these schools scores a lot of points, and neither allows a lot. It figures to be a tight, low-scoring contest, which I figure probably favors Iowa.

12:30:

  • North Carolina @ Miami (ACC): UNC squeaked out a win over Virginia last week, while Miami went out and pasted Virginia Tech last Thursday. It’s hard not to favor Miami’s ability to play, like, any defense at all.
  • Boston College @ Virginia Tech (ACC): Even though they’re 4-4, VPI’s bowl streak is in very serious trouble. The only sure win on the schedule looks to be Wake Forest. I don’t think they’ll beat Boston College, but this is probably a better bet for them than UVA or Duke.

1:00: Washington @ Colorado (Pac12): Colorado isn’t as tire fire awful as they were the past few years, but man that defense is still pretty bad, and UDub is a team that is capable of taking advantage.

3:00:

  • Western Kentucky @ Louisiana Tech (FSN): The Hilltoppers will throw the ball, but they can’t defend it. Louisiana Tech is moer balanced and looks like a better team overall. It also gives them a chance to get to 5-0 in the Conference USA East division, which would really put them in control.
  • North Carolina State @ Syracuse (ACC/RSN): Boy howdy, FSU sure made NC State look good back in September, didn’t they? Of course, they’ve done that more than a few times in recent weeks, but anyway since then the Wolfpack have lost four straight and it hasn’t really been that close (even if you exclude the 41-0 shallacking from Clemson). But, again, Syracuse may be what they need. The Orange aren’t bad enough that they have no chance, it’s just from where I sit I think that NC State has a better than good chance of winning.

3:30:

  • Georgia vs. Florida (@Jacksonville, FL; CBS): Florida fans could use more than a few cocktails at this point, I’d guess. I just don’t see any chance for the Gators in this game whatsoever.
  • Purdue @ Nebraska (ABC/ESPN2): For most of this season, I’ve been stuck thinking that Purdue is as awful as they’ve been in the recent past.
  • Texas Christian @ West Virginia (ABC/ESPN2): This is, admittedly, not a game I had exactly circled on the calendar at the start of the year. I think West Virginia will give them a fight. I think they will give them a hell of a fight. But goodness me TCU’s only loss was to the only team that could keep up with them, and they only lost by three. The rest of the schedule since then is a trail of devastation. I kept checking on their game last week just to see them break 80. It was ridiculous. I like them, even in the craziness of Morgantown. (Probably a good thing for them it’s not at night, though.)
  • Virginia @ Georgia Tech (ESPNU): So, yeah, five fumbles. One calculation put the odds of forcing five fumbles in thirteen possessions at 0.00245%. Okay, so those are pretty low odds. The odds of recovering all five? Too low to be expressed as a percentage, because it’s about a 1 in 1.3 million chance.
    As for this one, well, it’s hard to say. The defense remains a huge issue, though it’s hard to say how bad they were last week what with the being up 28-0 5 minutes into the game and all. Virginia’s offense doesn’t scare anyone per se, but with how bad our defense is it doesn’t need to be scary. The Cavs are coming off two straight close losses to Duke and Carolina, so they will certainly be in the mood to get back on a winning streak, especially if they want to make a bowl.
  • Brigham Young @ Middle Tennessee State (CBSS): It’s gotten pretty ugly for the Cougars after losing their all-everything quarterback. Is it bad enough to lose to a former Sun Belt team? That’s really the big question here. BYU can still score against not so great defenses, but in their currently four game losing streak they haven’t allowed less than 30 (though one of those went to overtime). Hard to say, but tentatively taking the Stormin’ Mormons.
  • Indiana @ Michigan (BTN): Michigan’s offense is lost, lost in the woods with no compass, and a missing shoe. Their hated athletic director resigned today. A loss to Indiana, which doesn’t seem unlikely, would probably result in Brady Hoke not being too far behind.

4:00:

  • Kansas @ Baylor (FS1): Man, at least Kansas is as awful as they’ve been for most of the past few years. Makes these things easy. Baylor should be able to score however many they want here.
  • Houston @ South Florida (ESPNEWS): USF isn’t horrible, they’re just not good. I don’t think it’ll be Houston by much, but it’ll be Houston in the end.
  • Kentucky @ Missouri (SEC): Well, both these teams have beaten Vandy and South Carolina, so I think they’re actually kind of even. I’m giving a slight edge to Mizzou, though.

4:30: Southern California @ Washington State (Pac12): I don’t think USC will have a problem, per se, but I think this one might not be as comfortable as you might expect given the records.

7:00:

  • Auburn @ Mississippi (ESPN): Well, this one isn’t going to end 10-7, I feel pretty good about saying that. Auburn had a bit of trouble with South Carolina last week as well. At any rate, let’s not bury the lede too much more: this one is a fight to stay in national title contention. At Ole Miss, and with that defense, I think the Rebels may gut it out, but I think this one is pretty much even.
  • Old Dominion @ Vanderbilt (ESPNU): Vandy could very well lose this game, I’m not even kidding. I’m not going to predict that, but I wouldn’t be surprised.
  • Colorado State @ San Jose State (CBSS): The Rams are kind of legit, huh? I wonder if they want that game from Boise back in September back. They should be able to handle the Spartans.

7:15: Arkansas @ Mississippi State (ESPN2): Both these teams can score, but I think Miss State can score better, if that makes any sense. The Bulldogs should remain undefeated.

7:30:

  • Stanford @ Oregon (FOX): Stanford can’t score, and while they have an awesome defense, Oregon just figures to be too much. I expect this one to be tight at the half and then Oregon gets out to a comfortable lead by the end of the game.
  • Texas @ Texas Tech (FS1): Red Raider fans might be wondering if they can get a refund on their recent coach purchase. Alas, they cannot, and so they will charge out again with a less-than advertised offense. The Longhorns’ offense, meanwhile, is nearly nonexistent, and so I think they’ll probably lose. Maybe.
  • Tennessee @ South Carolina (SEC): Tennessee isn’t awful, but they’re still a notch below even this diminished South Carolina side.

8:00:

  • Notre Dame vs. Navy (@Landover, MD; CBS): I think Notre Dame will lose at least one other game. This isn’t it. (But enjoy the last of a rare CBS triple-header!)
  • Illinois @ Ohio State (ABC): Don’t look, but after an upset of Minnesota last weekend Illinois is 4-4. They might even make a bowl if they’re not careful. The Buckeyes don’t have much to worry about in this one unless they get caught looking forward to Sparty next weekend.
  • Oklahoma St @ Kansas State (ABC): K-State keeps doing it… and they should keep on keeping on until they run into TCU next week.

10:30:

  • Arizona @ California-Los Angeles (ESPN): Well, one of these teams wasn’t taken to double overtime by Colorado last weekend, so I’m taking Arizona.
  • San Diego State @ Nevada (CBSS): SDSU has one of those “hasn’t played anyone with an offense” sort of high-ranking defenses, so it’s hard to cite that as a factor here. Tentatively going with Nevada in this one.
  • California @ Oregon State (Pac12): Cal might have the most exciting 4-4 record in college football, thanks to an awesome offense and a defense that can keep anyone on it. That said, Oregon State might be not good enough that they can’t score on every drive, which could be fatal.

10:45: Wyoming @ Fresno State (ESPN2): This one might be good for halftime entertainment more than anything else. Just sort of picking Fresno.

11:00: Utah @ Arizona State (FS1): This is very quietly a must-watch game. Arizona State is at the fringes of national talk, but Utah is very quietly 6-1. The numbers make these teams look about even. I’m very slightly going to give the edge to the home team.