SportsRatings: College Football

Video: No more bikini girls, Packers or otherwise: Lingerie bowl cancelled again

In order to cover all aspects of the Super Bowl, followup on important news about the nexus of football and bikini-related issues, and to pander for more hits for this weblog, I must be the bearer of sad news: the Lingerie Bowl has been cancelled again. Evidently it was cancelled last year, too. I for one had thought it was permanently cancelled a long time ago, but I guess I wasn't paying attention.

To see what we'll be missing I present this video. Be warned, it contains questionable camera angles, bad puns from the announcers, an audible expletive, brief nudity, slow motion editing of the most objectionable content, and the possibility of removal from YouTube. In other words, it's pretty awesome and you should watch it now before it goes away.

UPDATE: Too bad, it went away. Instead here's another one with a smarmy comedian interviewing some models.

Super Bowl XLII Odds, Probabilities & Predictions: will New England beat the Giants and the spread?

The New England Patriots have been made a 12 point favorite over the New York Giants by Vegas. This is one of the bigger lines in Super Bowl history: out of the 41 contents, the line was in single digits 28 times. But it's not nearly the largest; that title goes to Super Bowl III in 1969, with the New York Jets were up to 19 point underdogs to the Baltimore Colts. The Jets, of course, won the game as guaranteed by Joe Namath. The San Francisco 49ers were favored by about the same amount over the San Diego Chargers in 1995, and covered, winning by 23.

The last time a team was favored by more than 12 was in 2002; this time the Patriots were the underdog, and like the Jets they pulled off the upset, beating the Rams 20-17 in Super Bowl XXXVI.

Looking at score data for information, we turn to the power ratings, updated for the conference championships. Viewing the predictive component, which uses score info only, New England dominates the league as it has all year, and the Giants, despite their recent success, are far down the list.

rnk Team                         rec   rating  off    def
1.  New England Patriots        18-0   19.66  36.54  16.88
2.  Indianapolis Colts          13-4   11.03  28.13  17.09
3.  San Diego Chargers          13-6    9.33  25.45  16.11
4.  Green Bay Packers           14-4    9.17  27.55  18.38
5.  Dallas Cowboys              13-4    8.69  28.73  20.03
6.  Jacksonville Jaguars        12-6    7.09  26.77  19.67
7.  Pittsburgh Steelers         10-7    5.30  23.06  17.75
8.  Philadelphia Eagles          8-8    4.69  21.54  16.85
9.  New York Giants             13-6    4.29  24.32  20.02
10. Minnesota Vikings            8-8    3.41  22.64  19.22

When every game during the course of the season is counted equally, the Giants' recent performance doesn't carry more weight. Though they beat Dallas and Green Bay, they lost twice to Dallas and once to Green Bay earlier in the season. The Patriots 1st half of season dominance belies the close games they had in the 2nd half of the year. With these parameters, the prediction is bleak for the Giants:

New England Patriots        35
New York Giants             20
Spread =      15.36
Over/under =  54.64

% chance to win:
New England Patriots        83.3%
New York Giants             16.7%

Here the formula predicts an easy win for the Pats, slightly larger than the line. And five chances out of six to yield a New England victory when game results are cross-compared.

When the Patriots and Giants played recently, the result was a 3 point win for New England. Given that New England is not playing as well as it did in the 1st half of the season, and that New York's recent performance is much better than their average, can we make the power rating more sensitive to this?

As I've done before, I split the Patriots into their 1st half and 2nd half of season team; then I took it a step further and isolated the Giants' last five games, which includes the game with the Patriots as well as their playoff run.

rnk Team                         rec   rating  off    def
1.  New England Patriots        10-0   27.04  42.23  15.19
2.  New York Giants 2            4-1   12.75  31.66  18.90
3.  New England Patriots 2       8-0   11.80  29.75  17.94
4.  Indianapolis Colts          13-4   11.34  28.16  16.82
5.  Green Bay Packers           14-4    9.32  27.72  18.39
6.  San Diego Chargers          13-6    9.29  25.59  16.29
7.  Dallas Cowboys              13-4    9.14  28.74  19.59
8.  Jacksonville Jaguars        12-6    6.77  26.86  20.09
9.  Pittsburgh Steelers         10-7    4.94  23.09  18.15
10. Philadelphia Eagles          8-8    3.80  21.42  17.62
11. Minnesota Vikings            8-8    2.99  22.72  19.72
12. Washington Redskins          9-8    2.77  21.35  18.58
13. Seattle Seahawks            11-7    2.36  23.48  21.11
14. Chicago Bears                7-9    1.18  21.45  20.26
15. Tampa Bay Buccaneers         9-8    1.04  18.96  17.92
16. New York Giants              9-5    0.77  21.87  21.09 

Now we see the parity between the Giants' recent performance and New England's 2nd half of the season. In fact, New York is about a point better by this measure, which admittedly cherry-picks the Giants' best stretch of games. But that stretch contains their most recent performances, so it may be reflective of their current level of play going into the Super Bowl.

New York Giants 2           28
New England Patriots 2      27
Spread =       0.94
Over/under =  54.84

% chance to win:
New England Patriots 2      55%
New York Giants 2           45%

So by recent performance, the Giants are a 1 point favorite. But, when comparing game-by-game performance, the Patriots are still judged more likely to win overall...

But can we count on these teams to play as they have recently? Will the Giants revert to their earlier form, where as we can see they wouldn't stay on the field with New England? And could the Patriots recapture their early-season form, in which case again, they would blow out anyone? If those Pats show up, then we're back to a 15-point win for New England.

New York's recent performance has been pretty consistent. So let's assume their level of play is going to remain constant. New England, within its last eight games, has shown varying performance levels ranging from the near-loss to Baltimore to the 34-13 controlling of Pittsburgh. And with the Super Bowl and a 19-0 season at hand, it's very possible that they might be able to regain the hunger and form they had early in the season. If that happens, we might see this:

New England Patriots        39
New York Giants 2           25

A higher scoring game, similar in spread to our original estimate. Notice that the Patriots' decline in their last eight games is almost completely on offense; their defense has been pretty much the same all year.

And what about the chance for a blowout? Nearly half of history's Super Bowls could be considered blowouts or at least very one-sided matches. I don't think it's possible that the Giants can blow out the Patriots; if they manage to win, it will be like their recent playoff games, a close contest. But if the Patriots come out firing and Giants have a bad game? It might look like this:

New England Patriots        42
New York Giants             15 

in this case, the Patriots regain their early-season form (1st 10 games) while the Giants revert to theirs (first 14 games).

The question is which scenario is the most likely. And I don't see the Giants winning this game. The Patriots took their best shot several weeks ago, and that's after every team probing for New England's weaknesses. What more can they have discovered in the interim? Unless Tom Brady's ankle really is hurt and Randy Moss can't play, or they've come up with new schemes to effectively rattle the Patriots' defense, the miracle win remains a long shot.

Though the Pats have played erratically in the last eight games, their place in history is on the line. Therefore I think we'll see the Patriots of old (meaning, September-October) in Arizona. And they'll want to win by a lot, so trying to run up the score isn't out of the question. But at the same time, the Giants aren't going to roll over, and just like New England let up their intensity in the 2nd half of the season, almost spoiling their perfect record, the Pat defense will nap a bit in the fourth quarter if the game's well in hand.

A New York win is possible if the right conditions appear; I just don't think New England will play along. It won't be a blowout per sé, but I'd take New England to regain most of their magic and put the Giants away.

New England Patriots        42
New York Giants             24

Sorry Bikini Girls, Packers lose to Giants: final score 23-20 OT

Unfortunately there will be no more Packer Bikini Girls, and there won't be a very compelling matchup on Super Bowl Sunday. The only drama will be: can the Patriots again beat a team they beat on the road in the last game of the regular season?

A Patriots-Cowboys matchup would have been a rerun as well, but at least Dallas shared the best record in the NFC. Green Bay would have been the best matchup: they had the good record and they hadn't had a shot at the Pats yet. But alas, it was not to be.

The New England-New York game from several weeks ago was fairly close. The Giants led into the 3rd quarter before Brady and Moss engineered a comeback. But the season is really ending in an anti-climactic way after two teams started 8-0. We didn't even get a Pats-Colts rematch in the AFC championship game.

Of the four best teams in the league, we'll see one of them in the Super Bowl. Along with a chance to see history made. Or to see a historic upset if the Giants can pull it off.

Really, no one seems to care anymore who gets to the Super Bowl; the game itself has become so big in the last few decades that people talk about the commercials as much as the game. That or Janet Jackson's tit.

Speaking of tit, here's a last few looks at the Packers Bikini Girls. Too bad their team didn't win or they might have gotten a Playboy pictorial out of their team's success. Better luck next year, ladies.

Odds out of whack for New England - San Diego?

The line on New England vs. San Diego stands at 14 after opening at 15. This line seems to reflect the oddsmakers (and probably moreso, the public) thinking of New England as the dominant team they were during the 1st half of the season, rather than the not-nearly-as-good team they've been ever since.

Once again, the power ratings (points-based) for New England's entire season, and the same power rating when splitting the Patriots into two halves (first eight games, next nine games including 1st playoff game):

rnk Team                          rec   rating  off    def
1.  New England Patriots         17-0   19.88  37.22  17.33
2.  Indianapolis Colts           13-4   11.10  28.10  17.00
3.  Green Bay Packers            14-3    9.78  28.13  18.34
4.  San Diego Chargers           13-5    9.28  25.96  16.67

New England's overall team is 10 points better than San Diego, and with home field a 14-15 point spread doesn't seem unreasonable. But when split into two season-halves:

rnk Team                          rec   rating  off    def
1a  New England Patriots          8-0   26.14  41.68  15.54
1b  New England Patriots 2        9-0   14.38  33.28  18.90
2.  Indianapolis Colts           13-4   10.70  27.97  17.27
3.  Green Bay Packers            14-3    9.83  28.15  18.32
4.  San Diego Chargers           13-5    9.55  26.00  16.45

New England's 1st half team is 17+ points better than San Diego, but the team they've been recently has had close calls with most of the teams they've played. They look more like one touchdown favorites to me. Indeed, here are the score projections these ratings yield for all three comparisons (overall team, 1st-half team, and 2nd-half team):

New England Patriots        33   (Entire season)
San Diego Chargers          21

New England Patriots        38   (1st half season)
San Diego Chargers          19

New England Patriots 2      29   (2nd half season)
San Diego Chargers          22

The Patriots have played fairly consistently during both halves, as well, and did not step their game back up for the Jacksonville playoff game. Here is a graph (courtesy of Google chart-maker) of their game-by-game power ratings for the season:

This suggests they will continue to play like they have in recent months, and that the 14-15 point spread is too favorable to the Patriots. Also it seems that the correct split for New England's season is after game 10, which would make their most recent seven-game average even lower; their five worst performances have come in their last seven games.

That said, I wouldn't bet against the Patriots myself. Vegas usually has a pretty good reason for setting the line the way they do, and a touchdown here or there can change things dramatically. I'm not arguing that the Chargers will beat the line, just that the line is set too high. There is a difference between the two statements..!

Super Bowl probabilities, part III: Patriots' road just got a lot easier

With losses by Indianapolis and Dallas, the New England Patriots' march toward making history just got a lot easier. Both their odds for making the Super Bowl and chances of winning the big game were improved as their top two potential foes were knocked off on Sunday.

This is important, because as the number below suggest, the Patriots' "B-squad" is continuing to show up in the playoff season. This is New England's 2nd half-of-season team, not their dominant 1st-half squad. Here were the projected scores for the New England-Jacksonville game for New England's overall team, their 1st-half-of-season team, and 2nd-half team:

Overall
New England 37      Jacksonville 22

1st-half team
New England 41      Jacksonville 20

2nd-half team
New England 33      Jacksonville 24

Clearly the final result (31-20) was closest to the 2nd-half team projection, both in final score and how close the game was. The Patriots are continuing to play the way they have in the 2nd half of the season; that is, still the best team in the NFL but not the best NFL team of all time, which they may very well have been at 8-0. Here's an updated comparison between the power ratings, first with New England's entire season considered:

rnk Team                          rec   rating  off    def
1.  New England Patriots         17-0   19.88  37.22  17.33
2.  Indianapolis Colts           13-4   11.10  28.10  17.00
3.  Green Bay Packers            14-3    9.78  28.13  18.34
4.  San Diego Chargers           13-5    9.28  25.96  16.67
5.  Dallas Cowboys               13-4    8.72  28.70  19.97
6.  Jacksonville Jaguars         12-6    7.18  26.79  19.61
7.  Pittsburgh Steelers          10-7    5.40  23.11  17.71
8.  Philadelphia Eagles           8-8    4.73  21.53  16.79
9.  New York Giants              12-6    3.87  24.37  20.49

And with New England split into season-halves:

rnk Team                          rec   rating  off    def
1a  New England Patriots          8-0   26.14  41.68  15.54
1b  New England Patriots 2        9-0   14.38  33.28  18.90
2.  Indianapolis Colts           13-4   10.70  27.97  17.27
3.  Green Bay Packers            14-3    9.83  28.15  18.32
4.  San Diego Chargers           13-5    9.55  26.00  16.45
5.  Dallas Cowboys               13-4    9.09  28.79  19.69
6.  Jacksonville Jaguars         12-6    6.79  26.65  19.86
7.  Pittsburgh Steelers          10-7    5.11  23.04  17.93
8.  Philadelphia Eagles           8-8    4.48  21.49  17.01
9.  New York Giants              12-6    3.66  24.34  20.68

With that in mind, I will continue to project the cumulative Super Bowl odds, but using both New England's overall and 2nd-half-of-season teams for the projections (in brackets).

Next week's conference championships - odds to win

New England Patriots 76.1%  [64.2%]
San Diego Chargers   23.9%  [35.8%]

Green Bay Packers    65.0%
New York Giants      35.0%

Odds to reach and win Super Bowl

Team  odds to win:    conf. champ    Super Bowl winner
New England           76.1% [64.2%]   57.5% [41.8%]
San Diego             23.9% [35.8%]   13.0% [19.6%]         

Green Bay             65.0%           21.6% [27.6%]
New York Giants       35.0%            7.9% [11.0%]

The Pats are still big favorites, but their odds decrease markedly if you look only at their play in the 2nd half of the season. Their odds vs. their potential NFC foes look like this (2nd half number in brackets):

New England Patriots 71.6%  [61.4%]
Green Bay Packers    28.4%  [38.6%]

New England Patriots 83.0%  [72.2%]
New York Giants      17.0%  [27.8%]

Clearly the bracketed numbers reflect how they are playing today. Interestingly, San Diego is favored by the game-comparison system over both New York and Green Bay, though they're behind the Packers in overall average:

San Diego Chargers  51.3%
Green Bay Packers   48.7%

San Diego Chargers  60.5%
New York Giants     39.5%

So if the Chargers can make it past the Patriots they have a good shot at winning the whole thing.

Best Passing Offense - Texas Tech Red Raiders

Texas Tech, led by quarterback Graham Harrell in a pass-heavy system, ranks as the top-gaining passing offense in college football when adjusted for opponents' pass defenses.

As with the rushing offense total, the sheer amount of passing attempts a team averages has a lot to do with its total passing yardage output. We can see that the two top teams—who are ahead of the rest of the field by almost 100 yards per game—have the #118 and #120 ranked rushing attack. Clearly the top teams got there not only from effectiveness but also from the design of their offense.

Unlike the rushing list, many of the top passing teams didn't finish with very good records. Without a rushing game to control the clock, or with a defense that gets tired from being on the field a lot, a passing-oriented offense doesn't guarantee success. New Mexico State, Washington State, Nebraska, Arizona, Kansas State, North Texas, and Rice all finished with losing records. Still, Hawaii, Tulsa, Boston College, Missouri, BYU, Boise State, Kansas, and Tennessee all finished with 10 or more wins, compared to only six of the top 25 rushing teams. But only two of the top rushing teams had losing records.

Here are the top 25 teams in average rushing yards, with their unadjusted rank, passing rank, and principal ground gainer(s) [click here for full list]:

#    Team                 rec   yds.  raw  rush rnk starting quarterback
1.   Texas Tech           9-4   460.9   1   118     Graham Harrell
2.   Hawaii              12-1   449.6   2   120     Colt Brennan
3.   Tulsa               10-4   360.1   3    63     Paul Smith
4.   New Mexico St        4-9   358.6   5   117     Chase Holbrook
5.   Louisville           6-6   350.1   4    73     Brian Brohm
6.   Boston College      11-3   339.6   6   101     Matt Ryan
7.   Washington St        5-7   325.4   8    67     Alex Brink
8.   Nebraska             5-7   325.4   7    47     Sam Keller
9.   Missouri            12-2   323.5   9    32     Chase Daniel
10.  Brigham Young       11-2   322.7  14    58     Max Hall
11.  Arizona              5-7   318.9  10    94     Willie Tuitama
12.  Northwestern         6-6   307.4  11    92     CJ Bacher
13.  Cincinnati          10-3   293.2  20    82     Ben Mauk
14.  Kansas St            5-7   292.7  21    81     Josh Freeman
15.  Purdue               8-5   291.3  12    86     Curtis Painter
16.  Boise St            10-3   290.2  23    66     Taylor Tharp
17.  North Texas          2-10  288.6  18   107     Giovanni Vizza
18.  Memphis              7-6   288.6  13    96     Martin Hankins
19.  Rice                 3-9   287.8  15   113     Chase Clement
20.  Kentucky             8-5   287.1  19    48     Andre Woodson
21.  Kansas              12-1   284.7  17    41     Todd Reesing
22.  Tennessee           10-4   279.3  35    54     Eric Ainge
23.  Florida Atlantic     8-5   278.6  16   100     Rusty Smith
24.  Florida              9-4   274.2  38    17     Tim Tebow
25.  South Carolina       6-6   274.1  37    89     C. Smelley, B. Mitchell

It's also hard to tell whether a team's passing success is due to the quarterback or a good corps of receivers. Texas Tech and Hawaii both have multiple receivers in the top 100, Tech with two and Hawaii with four. How much did having Michael Crabtree to throw to improve Harrell's stats? It's hard to say; his completion percentage went up 5 points from last season and he had 10 more touchdowns. A year's improvement or a great receiver joins the team? Or does Crabtree look better than he is because he has Harrell throwing to him? Without changing players in and out, the numbers alone can't tell the whole story.

Navy Midshipmen lead nation in rushing for 2007

Navy finishes the year with the top rushing average—adjusted for opposition—in 2007. They are far and away the #1 team, well ahead of #2 West Virginia.

The Midshipmen rank #1 based mostly on the fact that they almost never pass, ranking last in passing yards. #3 Air Force ranks second-to-last in passing yards as well. So it's often hard to judge which team is really the best rushing team and which simply has a one-dimensional offense.

The #2 and #4 teams don't pass much either; West Virginia can, but has little reason to most of the time, while Arkansas is definitely better off running with McFadden and Jones.

It isn't until we get to #5 that we see a team, Oregon, that has some semblance of balance on offense but ranks high on the rushing chart. Oklahoma State, Southern Cal, LSU, Texas, and Florida are all examples of teams that have undeniably strong running attacks where the yardage isn't the partly the result of relying solely on the run.

Here are the top 25 teams in average rushing yards, with their unadjusted rank, passing rank, and principal ground gainer(s) [click here for full list]:

#    Team                 rec   yds.  raw pass rnk rushers in top 100
1.   Navy                 8-5   340.3   1   120    Kaheaku-Enhada, Kettani
2.   West Virginia       11-2   304.1   3   114    White, Slaton
3.   Air Force            9-4   298.1   2   119    Hall, Ollis
4.   Arkansas             8-5   291.8   4   109    McFadden(#4), Jones
5.   Oregon               9-4   289.7   6    59    Stewart(#7)
6.   Illinois             9-4   281.2   5   108    Mendenhall(#8)
7.   Oklahoma St          7-6   250.7   8    40    Savage, Robinson
8.   Washington           4-9   250.7  18    86    Rankin, Locker
9.   Louisiana-Lafayette  3-9   246.2   7   117    Desormeaux, Fenroy
10.  Southern Cal        11-2   225.6  27    45    Washington, Johnson
11.  LSU                 12-2   222.2  11    52    Hester
12.  Texas A&M            7-6   218.6  13    88    McGee
13.  Oregon St            9-4   217.5  40    98    Bernard
14.  Michigan St          7-6   214.6  25    65    Ringer, Caulcrick
15.  Texas               10-3   213.9  17    35    Charles (#10)
16.  Wisconsin            9-4   212.8  21    80    Hill
17.  Florida              9-4   209.8  23    24    Harvin, Tebow
18.  Central Florida     10-4   208.9   9   111    Smith(#1)
19.  Penn State           9-4   207.0  29    70    Kinlaw
20.  California           7-6   206.7  45    51    Forsett
21.  Ohio State          11-2   206.4  28    97    Wells
22.  South Florida        9-4   206.3  32    54    Grothe
23.  Western Kentucky     7-5   202.5  6*   118    Hayden
24.  Houston              8-5   201.5  10    41    Alridge
25.  Fresno St            9-4   199.1  14    73    Mathews, Miller

For most teams a strong running attack—even at the expense of passing—pays dividends, as most of these teams have winning records. But for Louisiana-Lafayette, their ground game doesn't make up for lack of passing ability. Washington, too, found itself in a bad situation, stuck in a league full of teams with great rushing defenses and themselves having a mediocre passing game.

Teams in the major conferences tend to rank higher when adjusted, while non-BCS teams fell. Central Florida, with the nation's leading rusher Kevin Smith, adjusted down to #18 from #9 due to their weaker schedule. Likewise Houston and Fresno State. Western Kentucky, a provisional Division I-A team, would have ranked 6th if counted this year; their schedule was weak enough to drop them to #23, and almost 50 yards less than their raw average.

It's also interesting that half of the top ten gainers did not see their team in the top 25; sometimes a runner makes the top ten because he gets nearly all of his team's carries, which makes the accomplishment of Darren McFadden all the more impressive, as he was in the top five while sharing carries with another top 50 runner.

Ohio State leads final defensive stats, both scoring and yardage

The Ohio State Buckeyes, despite their performance in their loss to LSU in the BCS championship game, end the 2007 college football season with the #1 defense in the country.

Ohio State finishes #1 in scoring defense, total yards allowed, and passing defense, and #2 in rushing defense. The Buckeyes held 7 of their 13 opponents to fewer than 10 points and gave up two touchdowns or fewer in 11 games. In fact, even the LSU game wasn't a terrible defensive performance; many of LSU's points were set up by mistakes on offense or special teams, and the Tigers' total yardage was not excessive.

Auburn is second when adjusted for their schedule (6th without adjusting), followed by USC, Virginia Tech, Kansas. Teams that rank better when adjusted include Michigan, Oklahoma, Georgia, and Missouri. Iowa ranks 16th despite finishing 6-6 as their offense ranks in the bottom 10 in some measures.

Here are the top 25 teams in scoring defense (click here for full list):

#   Team                         rec   adj. ave  raw rank
1.  Ohio State                  11-2    10.64       1
2.  Auburn                       9-4    12.98       6
3.  Southern Cal                11-2    13.10       2
4.  Virginia Tech               11-3    14.92       3
5.  Kansas                      12-1    15.44       4
6.  West Virginia               11-2    15.91       8
7.  Michigan                     9-4    16.37      23
8.  Oklahoma                    11-3    16.48      19
9.  Georgia                     11-2    16.88      18
10. Utah                         9-4    17.15       5
11. Missouri                    12-2    17.93      37
12. LSU                         12-2    18.37      17
13. UCLA                         6-7    18.62      29
14. Oregon St                    9-4    18.98      33
15. Cincinnati                  10-3    19.17      13
16. Iowa                         6-6    19.22      12
17. Penn State                   9-4    19.34       7
18. Connecticut                  9-4    19.61      14
19. South Carolina               6-6    19.80      39
20. Arizona St                  10-3    19.85      31
21. Clemson                      9-4    19.89      10
22. Brigham Young               11-2    20.00       9
23. Oregon                       9-4    20.09      40
24. TCU                          8-5    20.35      10
25. Florida St                   7-6    20.55      34

The Buckeyes are on top in yardage defense, followed by USC, who is also in the top ten in both defensive categories.

Notice all the 5-7 teams that make the list. Pittsburgh, Vanderbilt, Wyoming, and Arizona all have offense or special teams to blame for not finishing with a winning record; though since these numbers are adjusted for schedule, Arizona and Vanderbilt in particular just played tough teams, holding them well below average for the most part in yardage.

The top 25 teams in total yardage defense (click here for full list)

#    Team                         rec  total yds.  raw rank
1.   Ohio State                  11-2   215.6         1
2.   Southern Cal                11-2   240.7         2
3.   Oregon St                    9-4   259.8         8
4.   Auburn                       9-4   278.5         6
5.   Brigham Young               11-2   292.6        10
6.   LSU                         12-2   297.8         3
7.   Georgia                     11-2   298.8        14       
8.   Pittsburgh                   5-7   298.9         5
9.   Virginia Tech               11-3   299.1         4
10.  UCLA                         6-7   299.9        29
11.  Oklahoma                    11-3   302.8        26
12.  TCU                          8-5   305.1        15
13.  Arizona St                  10-3   305.8        30
14.  West Virginia               11-2   306.1         7
15.  Michigan                     9-4   307.6        24
16.  Kansas                      12-1   312.9        12
17.  Utah                         9-4   314.9        18
18.  New Mexico                   9-4   316.6        13
19.  Clemson                      9-4   318.2         9
20.  Mississippi St               8-5   320.6        21
21.  Vanderbilt                   5-7   328.1        16
22.  Wyoming                      5-7   329.0        22
23.  Arizona                      5-7   334.1        53
24.  California                   7-6   336.0        58
25.  Missouri                    12-2   336.4        59

The Buckeyes also can claim the best passing defense. Despite LSU's success on January 7th, they only passed for 174 yards on Ohio State, much lower than their average.

The top ten passing defenses, based on adjusted yards (click here for full list)

#    Team                         rec   yards
1.   Ohio State                  11-2   215.6
2.   Texas Tech                   9-4   345.5
3.   Auburn                       9-4   278.5
4.   Notre Dame                   3-9   338.1
5.   Michigan                     9-4   307.6
6.   West Virginia               11-2   306.1
7.   Mississippi St               8-5   320.6
8.   Pittsburgh                   5-7   298.9
9.   Southern Cal                11-2   240.7
10.  Clemson                      9-4   318.2

Note Texas Tech, who has the #1 passing offense, is 2nd in passing defense. Notre Dame, despite all their woes this year, was very good against the pass. Michigan, too, was burned early in the year by Appalachian State and Oregon's mobile quarterbacks, but improved over the year and did well against Illinois and Florida. West Virginia was among last year's worst passing defenses, but made the top ten this season.

For rushing defense, the Buckeyes have to settle for #2. They were number one going into the bowl games, but Oregon State held Maryland to 19 yards to finish #1 for the season.

Top ten rushing defenses (click here for full list)

#    Team                         rec   yards
1.   Oregon St                    9-4   45.1
2.   Ohio State                  11-2   51.0
3.   Southern Cal                11-2   54.2
4.   UCLA                         6-7   84.0
5.   Brigham Young               11-2   89.1
6.   Boston College              11-3   89.5
7.   Arizona St                  10-3   90.5
8.   Penn State                   9-4   91.9
9.   TCU                          8-5   92.9
10.  Texas                       10-3   94.8

Southern Cal's rushing defense was roughly comparable to the top two, then it's a wide gap to the rest of the top ten.

The New England Patriots - two very different 8-0 teams

NFL observers can't help but to have noticed a dropoff in New England's dominance this season in the NFL from their early games to their more recent contests. But putting it into numbers makes it very plain. Blowing out all opponents on their way to 8-0, the road to 16-0 was much more difficult. Here's a look at how they've done over the entire season, and by halves of seasons.

New England is obviously the top team in the NFL. Undefeated, 16-0, and in points-based power ratings an 8 or 9 point favorite over the next-best team.

rnk Team                         rec    rating  off    def
1.  New England Patriots        16-0    20.29  37.62  17.32
2.  Indianapolis Colts          13-3    11.65  28.07  16.41
3.  Dallas Cowboys              13-3     9.39  29.38  19.98
4.  Green Bay Packers           13-3     8.97  27.19  18.22
5.  San Diego Chargers          12-5     8.83  25.48  16.64
6.  Jacksonville Jaguars        12-5     7.13  26.97  19.84
7.  Pittsburgh Steelers         10-7     5.68  23.20  17.52
8.  Philadelphia Eagles          8-8     4.84  21.52  16.67
9.  Seattle Seahawks            11-6     3.51  23.44  19.93
10. Minnesota Vikings            8-8     3.40  22.58  19.17
11. New York Giants             11-6     3.38  24.45  21.06
12. Washington Redskins          9-8     2.90  21.08  18.18
13. Chicago Bears                7-9     1.51  21.30  19.78
14. Tampa Bay Buccaneers         9-8     0.86  19.02  18.16
15. Tennessee Titans            10-7     0.42  18.05  17.63
16. Houston Texans               8-8    -0.34  24.02  24.37
17. Cleveland Browns            10-6    -0.97  23.38  24.35
18. Cincinnati Bengals           7-9    -2.03  23.42  25.46
19. New Orleans Saints           7-9    -2.47  23.58  26.05
20. New York Jets                5-11   -2.80  17.70  20.51
21. Arizona Cardinals            8-8    -3.52  23.26  26.79
22. Detroit Lions                7-9    -3.99  22.74  26.74
23. Denver Broncos               7-9    -4.14  20.80  24.94
24. Kansas City Chiefs           4-12   -5.74  14.12  19.86
25. Buffalo Bills                6-10   -5.85  15.19  21.04
26. Carolina Panthers            7-9    -5.91  15.73  21.65
27. Oakland Raiders              4-12   -6.35  18.06  24.42
28. Baltimore Ravens             5-11   -6.96  16.17  23.13
29. Miami Dolphins               1-15   -8.65  17.09  25.74
30. Atlanta Falcons              4-12   -10.54  15.67  26.21
31. San Francisco 49ers          5-11   -11.90  11.49  23.39
32. St. Louis Rams               3-13   -12.67  15.32  28.00

But if we split New England into two teams, their first eight games and their last eight games, it yields the following result:

rnk Team                         rec    rating  off    def
1a  New England Patriots 1       8-0    26.29  41.73  15.43
1b  New England Patriots 2       8-0    14.30  33.52  19.21
2.  Indianapolis Colts          13-3    11.26  27.94  16.68
3.  Dallas Cowboys              13-3     9.74  29.47  19.72
4.  San Diego Chargers          12-5     9.16  25.57  16.40
5.  Green Bay Packers           13-3     9.01  27.22  18.20
6.  Jacksonville Jaguars        12-5     7.05  26.92  19.86
7.  Pittsburgh Steelers         10-7     5.36  23.12  17.75
8.  Philadelphia Eagles          8-8     4.52  21.43  16.91
9.  Seattle Seahawks            11-6     3.50  23.44  19.93
10. Minnesota Vikings            8-8     3.45  22.61  19.16
11. Washington Redskins          9-8     3.23  21.17  17.94
12. New York Giants             11-6     3.08  24.37  21.29

Which is quite amazing. The first-half-of-season Patriots are a full 15 points better than the Colts, whereas the 2nd-half-of-season team is about 3 points better. Indeed, in the ninth game of the year—where their dominance disappeared—they beat the Colts by 4 points (though it was a road game).

After that, they struggled with Philadelphia, even Baltimore, and the New York Giants, though they still finished a record 16-0.

In the first half of the season, the Patriots beat San Diego 38-14, Dallas 48-27, and Washington 52-7. It's fair to say that while the 1st-half team was arguably the best in NFL history—even when compared relatively rather than absolutely—the 2nd-half team is merely the best in the NFL this season.

The drop-off has occurred both on offense and defense, though it is more pronounced on offense, where they average 8 points per-game fewer after adjusting for schedule. The defense also gives up four more points, dropping from the best defense to the 8th best.

What does this mean for the playoffs? Well, the odds I figured for the playoffs were based on New England's overall team average. If you look at their 2nd-half team, these odds change drastically.

Here are the odds the playoff teams have to beat the Patriots:

Team           vs. Pats    vs. Pats 1st half   vs. Pats 2nd half
Jacksonville     22.8           11.8               33.8          
San Diego        22.8            9.6               37.5
Indianapolis     27.7           14.1               39.8

Dallas           28.9           14.8               43.8
Green Bay        25.8           13.3               39.1
Seattle          18.8            5.1               31.6
NY Giants        16.5            1.5               29.4

Note the huge percentage rise for some of these teams. In particular, the Giants wouldn't have stood a chance against the Patriots in November, but have pretty good odds now, and as we saw in New York when they led by 12 points.

Here are New England's cumulative odds of reaching and winning the Super Bowl:

Patriots odds of making Super Bowl
Entire season team:           57.3%
1st half of season team odds: 77.3%
2nd half of season team odds: 40.4%

Odds of winning Super Bowl if they get there
Entire season team:           75.2%
1st half of season team:      88.8%
2nd half of season team:      61.4%

Overall odds of being Super Bowl champs
Entire season team:           43.1%
1st half of season team:      68.6%
2nd half of season team:      24.8%

A very different story. The first-half of season team was almost a Super Bowl shoo-in; the second half team still has good odds of making it, better than 50% odds of winning it if they make it, and a still-high 25% chance of being the team to win it all. When there are eight teams left, this is double the odds of an average team. But it's nothing compared to the over 2/3 odds the 8-0 team would have.

If anything this should give hope to Dallas and Green Bay fans for their Super Bowl hopes—and Jacksonville and Indianapolis fans for their hopes of getting to the game.

But if New England's second-half swoon was due due to laziness or mental fatigue, and the Patriots have re-asserted themselves for the playoffs and can regain their early-season form, this hope may be short-lived.

In any case, the "new" Patriots are still, on average, the best team in the NFL this season. The dominance they showed in the first half of the year wasn't present over last few months; it will be interesting to see whether they can turn it back up today.

Cheerleader break #2 - Miami Dolphins behind-the-scenes

I thought it was time for another cheerleading break, and this one comes courtesy of the Ft. Lauderdale Sun Sentinel.

Who says journalism is dead in the internet age? As this piece confirms, some reporters are still willing to take on tough assignments and uncover the stories that most would shy away from.

What is really interesting is that pro cheerleaders are paid about $50 a game. That's right, for four hours of official work, they make $12.50 per hour. Compared to the players, whose hourly average—again, using only game time for the rate—is at least 1000x that, based on 2001 stats where the average salary is over $1 million.

Now if you average in practice time, travel time, etc. we can assume pro football is a 40 hour/week job, then the hourly pay rate might be closer to $1,500/hr for a player. The cheerleaders, who according to this video practice a lot, go to appearances, yada yada yada, might work 20 hours a week, thus earning $1.25 an hour.

Of course, the players are more valuable to the league, and less easily replaced. But they are also better represented by their union; the cheerleaders have none. They tried, back in 1994, but it doesn't appear anything happened with that idea.

Additionally, some teams don't pay the cheerleaders at all. Young women, kept in sweatshop conditions, subjected to slave labor? This is sounding more and more like a women's prison movie. Which if you watch the video below isn't too far from the truth. Enjoy!

Super Bowl Probabilities, part II

Since the last NFL probability detour, the Wild Card playoff games eliminated some uncertainty, as well as streamlining the process of figuring the next set of probabilities. All four expected teams won last weekend, but three of the four games had probabilities so close that that getting past these games will markedly increase the winners' odds of advancement to the Super Bowl.

Of course, with only eight teams in the running rather than twelve, every team should see an increase in odds. However, some of the favorites' odds actually decrease we will see, due to the elimination of weaker potential opponents.

Here are the percentage picks for the 1st round (divisional) playoffs, followed by the updated odds for reaching and winning the Super Bowl. All probabilities are based on my pair-comparison system that rates each game played by each team and compares them round-robin to the games played by the opponent. Odds are then multiplied through for each playoff game to yield the final projected percentage odds.

1st round games: AFC

New England Patriots       77.2     Indianapolis Colts         60.3
Jacksonville Jaguars       22.8     San Diego Chargers         39.7

1st round games: NFC

Green Bay Packers          63.6     Dallas Cowboys             66.5
Seattle Seahawks           36.4     New York Giants            33.5

Team  odds to win:    1st round   conf. champ    Super Bowl
New England             77.2%       57.3%          43.1%
Indianapolis            60.3%       21.6%          12.8%
San Diego               39.7%       12.0%           6.3%         
Jacksonville            22.8%        9.1%           4.6%    

Dallas                  66.5%       39.1%          14.6%
Green Bay               63.6%       33.2%          11.4%
Seattle                 36.4%       14.8%           4.0%
New York Giants         33.5%       12.9%           3.2%

Interestingly New England's odds of winning their 1st round game went down from 82.5% to 77.2%. This is because there was about a 1/4 chance they'd face Tennessee should the Titans had defeated San Diego. Eliminating this possibility, and the possibility of facing Pittsburgh, leaves the Patriots against the stronger Jacksonville squad. The Colt's first round odds barely changed, as they were guaranteed a roughly similar opponent regardless of Wild Card outcomes. The NFC leaders also did not change much for the 1st round, since their bracket-jumping wild card (Washington) rates better than Tennessee, and therefore did not affect the odds as much.

Conference Championship Game

The Patriots' odds of winning the AFC and going to the Super Bowl drop slightly from 61% to 57.3%. Again, this is the reality of having no upsets in the Wild Card round. They'll face either the Chargers or the Colts should they beat Jacksonsville, and all rate among the top 6 teams in the NFL. The Colts' odds remain almost exactly the same as explained before. San Diego and Jacksonville have increased odds, almost completely the product of having made it past the uncertain wild card round. The Chargers move from 9% to 12% odds of reaching the Super Bowl, while the Jaguars, formerly a 1-in-20 longshot, almost double their chances to 9.1%.

Likewise the lower seeds in the NFC improve their odds, Seattle from 6.4 to 14.8%, and the Giants from 6.6 to 12.9. Head-to-head, according to the power rankings, Seattle only is favored over New York due to playing on their home field; the Giants would be similarly favored (around 55%) at home.

The Super Bowl

New England has already defeated two out of the four NFC teams eligibile for the Super Bowl, and would be favored by my method over each team anywhere from 71% to 83%. Overall their odds of winning the Super Bowl—and thereby finishing 19-0—come out to 43.1%. When I first calculated their odds of achieving this back when they were 9-0, the odds were 47.6%. This was when they were even more dominant, and there were fewer game comparisons. I updated these odds a month later and they were down to 27.6%, due to the Pats' unimpressive showings in several games. Since then, of course, they've gotten four more wins out of the way, and now have only three games left toward the goal.

The Colts' odds are again almost unchanged, but San Diego is interesting. Should they make the Super Bowl, the comparison system favors them against every team except Dallas, to whom they are a very slight underdog. Despite ranking lower in the power rating than Green Bay, they beat them in 53% of the game pairings. Their overall Super Bowl champion odds are 6.3% since they have to get past New England, but if they make it to the big game the Chargers' odds of winning it are 52.8%.

Likewise Jacksonville's odds of winning the Super Bowl—should they make it—are 51%, but their odds of getting there are so slim that their overall odds are but 4.3%. Overall, the odds of an AFC team winning the Super Bowl are a whopping 66.8%.

On the NFC side, Dallas has the best chance of successfully representing the old school league, with a 37.4% chance of victory if they make it. Green Bay is next with a 34% chance of victory. These compare with New England's odds of about 75%, and the Colts' 59% chance. In fact, all of the AFC teams have a better shot at winning the Super Bowl, largely because there's no chance that their opponent will be New England.

New England's overall 43.1% chance is almost three times the next best odds for any team. It's no secret that they're the favorite. If they win this week, they will already be a greater than 50/50 favorite to win the whole thing, even before the AFC championship game, and probably facing the #2 and #3 teams in the league in succession.

Best Scoring Offense - Florida; Most Total Offense - Texas Tech

The Florida Gators end the year with the best scoring offense, adjusted for the defense of their opponents, for the 2007 season as a whole. With Tim Tebow leading the way, scoring 55 TDs through the air and on the ground, Florida scored 59 points against three opponents and over 40 against five others. The Gators are third in raw scoring average, but adjusted for their SEC-quality schedule, they rank first.

Big 12 heavyweights Missouri and Oklahoma finish second and third, with LSU and West Virginia rounding out the top 5. Offensive powers Oregon and Kansas are sixth and seventh, with South Florida eighth. Run-based Arkansas is ninth, and pass-happy Texas Tech finished tenth.

The Hawai'i Warriors, who average the most points, finish only 23rd when adjusted for schedule. Boise State also falls quite a bit, from 4th to 20th, while Nebraska, Clemson, Tennessee, and Arizona State rank higher than their raw averages.

The top 25 teams in college football by adjusted scoring offense for 2007:

                                          adj.     unadj.
#   team                       record    offense   rank
1.  Florida                      9-4      47.35     3
2.  Missouri                    12-2      43.59     8
3.  Oklahoma                    11-3      43.02     5
4.  LSU                         12-2      42.95     11
5.  West Virginia               11-2      42.75     9
6.  Oregon                       9-4      42.70     12
7.  Kansas                      12-1      39.99     2
8.  South Florida                9-4      39.87     21
9.  Arkansas                     8-5      39.22     13
10. Texas Tech                   9-4      38.86     7
11. Kentucky                     8-5      38.68     15
12. Texas                       10-3      37.83     14
13. Navy                         8-5      37.65     10
14. Oklahoma St                  7-6      37.33     22
15. Cincinnati                  10-3      37.10     16
16. Tulsa                       10-4      37.04     6
17. Nebraska                     5-7      36.98     28
18. Clemson                      9-4      36.55     29
19. Louisville                   6-6      36.49     18
20. Boise St                    10-3      36.44     4
21. Tennessee                   10-4      36.13     36
22. Kansas St                    5-7      36.10     18
23. Hawaii                      12-1      35.94     1
24. Michigan St                  7-6      35.87     29
25. Arizona St                  10-3      35.32     37

The top offenses in yardage production contain many of the same names, but many others that don't show up on the scoring offense list. Texas Tech is #1 due to their top-ranked passing attack, while top scoring offense Florida finishes ninth in yardage.

The top 25 offenses in total yards (rushing and passing) adjusted for opposition for the 2007 season.

                                        adj.   unadj.
#   team                         rec   yards   rank
1.  Texas Tech                   9-4   519.6    2
2.  Oregon                       9-4   514.8    10
3.  Tulsa                       10-4   514.7    1
4.  Missouri                    12-2   508.6    5
5.  Oklahoma St                  7-6   500.9    7
6.  Hawaii                      12-1   500.1    3
7.  Nebraska                     5-7   494.6    9
8.  Louisville                   6-6   490.0    6
9.  Florida                      9-4   484.1    14
10. Brigham Young               11-2   479.8    25
11. Texas                       10-3   477.0    13
12. Washington St                5-7   475.5    28
13. Southern Cal                11-2   464.7    29
14. Nevada                       6-7   462.9    11
15. Kansas                      12-1   461.5    8
16. West Virginia               11-2   459.3    15
17. Arkansas                     8-5   458.9    17
18. LSU                         12-2   457.0    26
19. Kentucky                     8-5   454.2    24
20. Oklahoma                    11-3   450.2    19
21. Washington                   4-9   449.1    60
22. Illinois                     9-4   448.7    34
23. Houston                      8-5   448.3    4
24. Boston College              11-3   445.0    33
25. California                   7-6   442.5    50

Other interesting teams include Washington at #21, despite being only 60th in raw yards. They have the 2nd toughest schedule according to Sagarin; the tough defenses they faced in the Pac-10, plus Ohio State, show their offense to be much better than their raw numbers would suggest. Houston on the other hand had a much easier schedule and is only 23rd rather than 4th.

So which teams have the worst offense? Well here is the bottom 10 by scoring, and by yardage:

                                         adj.   
#    team                      record   offense 
111. Louisiana Tech              5-7    17.53   
112. Iowa                        6-6    17.52 
113. Tulane                      4-8    17.19 
114. Western Kentucky            7-5    16.54 
115. Miami OH                    6-7    15.98 
116. Army                        3-9    15.87 
117. San Jose St                 5-7    15.63 
118. Florida Int'l               1-11   14.82 
119. Temple                      4-8    12.94 
120. Northern Illinois           2-10   12.84 

                                        adj.
#    team                        rec   yards
111. Syracuse                    2-10  302.1
112. Iowa                        6-6   293.0
113. Utah St                     2-10  290.8
114. Northern Illinois           2-10  286.9
115. Akron                       4-8   284.9
116. Duke                        1-11  284.7
117. Florida Int'l               1-11  266.3
118. Notre Dame                  3-9   257.0
119. Temple                      4-8   253.6
120. Army                        3-9   245.6

Several teams show up in both measures. Iowa finished 6-6 due to a good defense but pathetic offense that ranked #112 in both scoring and yardage. Army couldn't score much and couldn't gain yardage to save its life, finishing last at #120, with both rushing and passing stats in the bottom ten. Florida International went 1-11 for a several reasons—finishing 118th in scoring and 117th in yardage were two of them. Temple might be the worst of all on offense, 119th in both scoring and yardage measures.

Notre Dame scored more than their yardage would indicate, finishing #102, but some of that is due to their defense. They finished in the bottom 20 in rushing and passing, and were #118 overall. Without adjusting for their tough schedule, they finished dead last in the nation. Irish fans can be consoled by the knowledge that there's nowhere to go but up...!

LSU #1 in final SportsRating College Football Power Rating

Louisiana State finished #1 in the final SportsRatings Power Rating after beating Ohio State for the BCS Championship. They were followed by West Virginia, the Points component champion, who beat Oklahoma 48-28 in the Fiesta Bowl. LSU finished fourth in the Points component and West Virginia finished fourth in the Win/Loss component.

Three Big 12 teams followed: Missouri, Oklahoma, and Kansas. The Tigers beat Arkansas 38-7 and finished second in the Win/Loss component; Oklahoma beat Missouri twice for the Tigers' only two losses but suffered three of their own including a loss to Colorado and the Fiesta Bowl defeat. Kansas lost only to Missouri and finished the season with an Orange Bowl win over Virginia Tech.

Three teams with chequered seasons followed. Southern Cal stumbled mid-season, losing to Stanford, but finished strong with a 49-17 Rose Bowl win over Illinois. Florida's offense played well all year, but the Gators lost four close games, end 14th in Win/Loss but sixth in Points. Oregon was at or near the top of the power rating with just a few weeks left when Dennis Dixon was hurt; the Ducks dropped three straight, only to recover with a 56-21 crushing of South Florida.

Georgia, who beat Hawaii 41-10, and Ohio State rounded out the top ten.

The Final SportsRatings College Football Power Rating for the 2007 season:

#   Team                       record   Rating      Points      Win/Loss
1.  LSU                         12-2    36.07 [ 1]  24.58 [ 4]  11.49 [ 1]
2.  West Virginia               11-2    34.81 [ 2]  26.84 [ 1]   7.97 [ 4]
3.  Missouri                    12-2    34.62 [ 3]  25.66 [ 3]   8.95 [ 2]
4.  Oklahoma                    11-3    33.88 [ 4]  26.53 [ 2]   7.34 [ 6]
5.  Kansas                      12-1    32.29 [ 5]  24.54 [ 5]   7.74 [ 5]
6.  Southern Cal                11-2    28.60 [ 6]  21.81 [ 8]   6.79 [ 7]
7.  Florida                      9-4    27.66 [ 7]  23.24 [ 6]   4.42 [14]
8.  Oregon                       9-4    27.61 [ 8]  22.61 [ 7]   5.00 [10]
9.  Georgia                     11-2    27.00 [ 9]  18.36 [11]   8.63 [ 3]
10. Ohio State                  11-2    26.49 [10]  21.33 [ 9]   5.15 [ 9]
11. South Florida                9-4    23.44 [11]  19.19 [10]   4.24 [15]
12. Cincinnati                  10-3    21.91 [12]  17.93 [12]   3.98 [18]
13. Virginia Tech               11-3    21.00 [13]  16.09 [14]   4.91 [11]
14. Arizona St                  10-3    20.06 [14]  15.46 [16]   4.60 [13]
15. Texas                       10-3    19.41 [15]  15.68 [15]   3.72 [21]
16. Clemson                      9-4    19.25 [16]  16.65 [13]   2.60 [29]
17. Texas Tech                   9-4    18.40 [17]  15.45 [17]   2.95 [25]
18. Tennessee                   10-4    18.02 [18]  12.24 [23]   5.77 [ 8]
19. Auburn                       9-4    17.76 [19]  13.93 [18]   3.82 [20]
20. Arkansas                     8-5    17.50 [20]  13.80 [19]   3.70 [22]
21. Oregon St                    9-4    16.03 [21]  12.43 [22]   3.59 [23]
22. Michigan                     9-4    15.97 [22]  12.53 [21]   3.43 [24]
23. Brigham Young               11-2    15.80 [23]  11.72 [25]   4.08 [17]
24. Penn State                   9-4    15.71 [24]  13.62 [20]   2.09 [35]
25. Kentucky                     8-5    15.29 [25]  11.31 [26]   3.97 [19]

#11 South Florida's Points total nearly put them in the top ten despite four losses; Big East stablemate #12 Cincinnati likewise scored well in Points. Virginia Tech played its best football in the 2nd half of the season to finish 13th. #14 Arizona State lost only to Oregon, USC, and #15 Texas, helping them to stay ahead of the Longhorns despite the Holiday Bowl loss.

Clemson's strong Points rating helps it to a #16 finish, while Tennessee's Win/Loss score puts it at #18. In between the two is the Big 12's Texas Tech, one of three teams to beat Oklahoma. SEC teams Auburn and Arkansas—one of the two teams to beat LSU—round out the top 20.

Oregon State, Michigan, BYU, Penn State, and Kentucky are 21 through 25.

Win/Loss component

The Win/Loss power rating, at the end of the year, gives a good representation of the success each team had during the year, independent of how dominant they were game-to-game.

Here LSU ends on top due to their tough schedule and many wins over quality teams; Missouri's schedule was not nearly as hard, but they lost only two games to Oklahoma, so their losses are penalized far less than LSU's. Still, the (LSU) Tigers come out on top. LSU's score is one of the lowest in any season for a #1 team in the Win/Loss component, as they are the first 2-loss team to top the rating.

Georgia's strong SEC schedule helped it to a final #3, while West Virginia's win over Oklahoma made up for the Pitt loss. Kansas had only one loss, and supplemented its meager schedule with a win over Virginia Tech.

Oklahoma's two wins over Missouri fueled the Sooners at #6 depite three losses, while USC had to overcome the Stanford loss. Tennessee again shows the strength of the SEC, with many wins offsetting four losses; Ohio State's two losses weren't to bad teams, but they didn't have many big victories to get higher than #9. Oregon had several huge wins, as well as many humbling losses, and it all shook out to to #10 in the end.

Win/Loss component of the power rating:

#   Team                       record  Win/Loss
1.  LSU                         12-2    11.49
2.  Missouri                    12-2     8.95
3.  Georgia                     11-2     8.63
4.  West Virginia               11-2     7.97
5.  Kansas                      12-1     7.74
6.  Oklahoma                    11-3     7.34
7.  Southern Cal                11-2     6.79
8.  Tennessee                   10-4     5.77
9.  Ohio State                  11-2     5.15
10. Oregon                       9-4     5.00
11. Virginia Tech               11-3     4.91
12. Hawaii                      12-1     4.71
13. Arizona St                  10-3     4.60
14. Florida                      9-4     4.42
15. South Florida                9-4     4.24
16. Boston College              11-3     4.24
17. Brigham Young               11-2     4.08
18. Cincinnati                  10-3     3.98
19. Kentucky                     8-5     3.97
20. Auburn                       9-4     3.82
21. Texas                       10-3     3.72
22. Arkansas                     8-5     3.70
23. Oregon St                    9-4     3.59
24. Michigan                     9-4     3.43
25. Texas Tech                   9-4     2.95

Hawaii places at #12, with their only loss to Georgia. The problem was their schedule didn't give them much in the way of wins to build a good rating. The highest-ranked team they beat was #42 Boise State. #19 Kentucky and #22 Arkansas finish high despite five losses because of their SEC schedule which for both teams included a win over #1 LSU.

To see the full lists click on the links above the listings.

2007-2008 College Football Bowl results - list of all final scores

Dec 20 Poinsettia    San Diego     Utah 35  Navy 32

Dec 21 New Orleans   New Orleans   Florida Atlantic 44  Memphis 27

Dec 22 Papajohns.com Birmingham    Cincinnati 31  S. Mississippi 21

Dec 22 New Mexico    Albuquerque   New Mexico 23  Nevada 0

Dec 22 Las Vegas     Las Vegas     Brigham Young 17  UCLA 16

Dec 23 Hawaii        Honolulu      East Carolina 41  Boise State 38

Dec 26 Motor City    Detroit       Purdue 51  C. Michigan 48

Dec 27 Holiday       San Diego     Texas 52  Arizona State 34

Dec 28 Champs Sports Orlando       Boston College 24  Michigan St 21

Dec 28 Texas         Houston       TCU 20  Houston 13

Dec 28 Emerald       San Fran      Oregon State 21  Maryland 14

Dec 29 Meineke       Charlotte     Wake Forest 24  Connecticut 10

Dec 29 Liberty       Memphis       Mississippi St. 10  C. Florida 3

Dec 29 Alamo         San Antonio   Penn State 24  Texas A&M 17

Dec 30 Independence  Shreveport    Alabama 30  Colorado 24

Dec 31 Armed Forces  Fort Worth    California 42  Air Force 36

Dec 31 Sun           El Paso       Oregon 56  South Florida 21

Dec 31 Humanitarian  Boise         Fresno State 40  Georgia Tech 28

Dec 31 Music City    Nashville     Kentucky 35  Florida State 28

Dec 31 Chick-Fil-A   Atlanta       Auburn 23  Clemson 20 OT

Dec 31 Insight       Tempe         Oklahoma State 49  Indiana 33

Jan 1  Outback       Tampa         Tennessee 21  Wisconsin 17

Jan 1  Cotton        Dallas        Missouri 38  Arkansas 7

Jan 1  Gator         Jacksonville  Texas Tech 31  Virginia 28

Jan 1  Capital One   Orlando       Michigan 41  Florida 35

Jan 1  Rose          Pasadena      USC 49  Illinois 17

Jan 1  Sugar         New Orleans   Georgia 41  Hawaii 10

Jan 2  Fiesta        Glendale      West Virginia 48  Oklahoma 28

Jan 3  Orange        Miami         Kansas 24  Virginia Tech 21

Jan 5  International Toronto       Rutgers 52  Ball State 30

Jan 6  GMAC          Mobile        Tulsa 63  Bowling Green 7

Jan 7  BCS title     New Orleans   LSU 38  Ohio State 24

Which BCS Conference is Best? Post-Bowl Update

Last time I tried to figure out objectively which BCS conference is the best, the SEC came out on top. Now that the bowl season is over, has anything changed?

To summarize the results from last time (November 10th):

1. SEC
2. Big 12
3. Big East
4. Pac 10
5. Big Ten
6. ACC

At the time I said the Big East was probably a bit too high, and the Pac 10 too low, but otherwise it meshed with how I viewed things. Since then a lot has happened, of course; Oregon collapsed, and Lousiana-Monroe beat Alabama. Then you have all the bowl games. Here is how the conferences did, post-season:

Bowl performance by BCS conferences

                   vs.
Conf.    rec  %   BCS  %
SEC      7-2 (78%) 5-2 (71%)
Pac 10   4-2 (67%) 3-1 (75%)
Big 12   5-3 (63%) 5-3 (63%)
Big East 3-2 (60%) 2-2 (50%)
Big 10   3-5 (38%) 2-4 (33%)
ACC      2-6 (25%) 2-5 (29%)

The SEC indeed did quite well, winning 7 of 9 bowls and 5 of 7 against other BCS foes. The Pac 10 did almost as well, in fewer bowls of course, winning 2/3 overall and 3 of 4 against other BCS teams. The Big 12 did well, the Big East did okay, the Big Ten didn't do as well and the ACC fell apart by any measure.

After this you wouldn't expect the top conference, nor the bottom two, to change. The latest conference analysis by conference analysis by Jeff Sagarin has the major conferences in almost the exact order of their bowl performance, except that the Big Ten ranks lower than the ACC.

My method, which is explained in more detail in the previous post, simply ranks each team by power rating, then compares each team in one conference to each team in the other, and records the hypothetical wins and losses. This way the strength and weaknesses of the conference are all accounted for.

As I mentioned before, these results are dependent of course on how the teams are ranked, and you can figure out the head-to-head results using whatever ranking system you want. Here are the updated results using my power ratings to seed the teams:

         vs: ACC    Big 10   Big 12   Big East  PAC-10   SEC
ACC:                60-72    47-97    32-64     30-90    39-105
Big 10:      72-60           43-89    33-55     32-78    40-92
Big 12:      97-47  89-43             48-48     61-59    71-73
Big East:    64-32  55-33    48-48              37-43    43-53
PAC-10:      90-30  78-32    59-61    43-37              58-62
SEC         105-39  92-40    73-71    53-43     62-58   

The highlighted numbers show changes in the "winner" from last time. The Big East beat the Pac-10 last time, but now the Pac-10 wins; but the Big East ties head-to-head against the Big 12, whereas last time they lost.

This version of the chart shows the changes from last time's comparison. Reading the chart across shows improvement. If you read it down, it shows additional losses accrued since last time (so positive numbers are bad for the conference at the top of the column).

         vs: ACC    Big 10   Big 12   Big East  PAC-10   SEC
ACC:                 +1        +1      -3        -20      +2
Big 10:       -1               -5      -3        -19      +1
Big 12:       -1     +5                -5        -10      +3
Big East:     +3     +3        +5                -8       +2
PAC-10:       +20    +19       +10     +8                 +13
SEC           +2     -1        -3      -2        -13      

So we see an unexpected result. The SEC does a lot worse this time, despite their bowl record. Of course, the last comparison was well before the season was over, and before Alabama and South Carolina had completed their end-of-season collapses and lost to non-conference foes.

The biggest improvement is in the Pac-10, gaining a conference win over the Big East and increasing their win total dramatically vs. most conferences. Two bowl games in particular helped: USC beating Illinois 49-17, and Oregon crushing South Florida 56-21. The updated records vs. other conferences and overall percentages:

   Conf      Rec   Total Record   Change in %
1. SEC       5-0   385-251 (61%)    -3%
2. Big 12    3-1-1 366-270 (58%)    +1%
3. Pac 10    3-2   328-222 (60%)    +13%
4. Big East  2-2-1 247-209 (54%)    +1%
5. Big Ten   1-4   220-374 (37%)    -5%
6. ACC       0-5   208-428 (33%)    -3%

So the order has changed somewhat. The Pac 10 moves into third place, bumping the Big East to fourth. And, when viewed by overall hypothetical percentage vs. all other BCS teams, the Pac-10 finishes 2nd. They still lose head-to-head, slightly, against the Big 12.

The Big East has the oddest change. Its teams moved around in such a manner than they now tie with the Big 12 head-to-head, but lose to the Pac-10 whom they beat before. The Big Ten and ACC both dropped further in comparison. At the time of the first comparison, Miami was doing fairly well, but became a liability later for the conference. Both conferences did poorly overall in bowl games.

The SEC loses some of the dominance it had from the previous comparison. Most of that was due to the surge of the Pac 10; Oregon did fall apart, but their losses were all to other Pac-10 teams, and they won a blowout in their bowl game. Meanwhile USC, Oregon State, and California won their bowl games, and UCLA played BYU closer than expected. The SEC suffered non-conference losses to Clemson and Louisiana-Monroe before coming back strong in the bowls.

Using a different ranking system will of course yield different results. I used a power rating to keep bias from creeping in, as it does in the polls. I personally agree that the SEC is the best conference this year, but year-to-year it changes: I don't subscribe to the opinion that they are automatically the toughest year-in and year-out.

AP Poll, Coaches Poll inconsistencies

The final AP and USA Today (coaches) polls are out. They didn't do too bad of a job during the year, but the final poll has a few things I don't think make sense.

rank, team (1sts), record, points, last week

1. LSU (60)        (12-2)     1620     2
2. Georgia (3)     (11-2)     1515     4
3. USC (1)         (11-2)     1500     6
4. Missouri        (12-2)     1347     7
5. Ohio State      (11-2)     1346     1
6. West Virginia   (11-2)     1342     11
7. Kansas (1)      (12-1)     1303     8
8. Oklahoma        (11-3)     1139     3
9. Virginia Tech   (11-3)     1096     5
10.Boston College  (11-3)      962     14

I don't have a problem with most of the top ten. It's a tough year to order the top ten teams. But within the top teams, I don't like Missouri being ahead of Oklahoma.

If head-to-head competition means anything, then a team that beats another team twice should be ranked ahead of it if the records are close. One loss difference shouldn't change that. Not even one team getting beat up while the other coasts in its bowl game. Missouri's not just ahead, either—they're four spots ahead in the AP poll.

10t Texas          (10-3)     962     17
12. Tennessee      (10-4)     904     16
13. Florida        ( 9-4)     685     9
14. Brigham Young  (11-2)     654     19
15. Auburn         ( 9-4)     648     22

Another big problem is Tennessee finishing ahead of Florida. They have the same record, and the Gators destroyed the Volunteers 59-20. That's a pasting you can't ignore. In the bowls, Tennessee beat Wisconsin, while Florida lost to Michigan, both in close games. How does this move Tennessee ahead of Florida? Four spots ahead in the coaches poll. Bad.

At least the coaches got it right and put Auburn ahead of Florida, whom they beat in Gainesville. This one isn't quite as big of a deal since it was a close game. But they won on the road; they should be ahead unless the voter has a really good reason, which I doubt. In most cases it was just laziness I'm sure.

16. Arizona State (10-3)     587     12
17. Cincinnati    (10-3)     566     20
18. Michigan       (9-4)     508     31
19. Hawaii        (12-1)     460     10
20. Illinois       (9-4)     443     13
21. Clemson        (9-4)     353     15
22. Texas Tech     (9-4)     308     26
23. Oregon         (9-4)     253     29
24. Wisconsin      (9-4)     202     18
25. Oregon State   (9-4)     110     29

Michigan made it back into the poll, but not ahead of Florida in either. They just beat Florida, in the state of Florida, and they have the same record, but they are 3-5 spots lower. The bowl game wasn't a dominant win, but why is logic going out the window when it comes to Florida? It's not that difficult: the Gators lost to Auburn and Michigan; they beat Tennessee.

It could be that voters kept Michigan lower due to the lingering aftereffects of the Appalachian State loss, which is understandable. But why then are the Wolverines ahead of Oregon, who beat them 39-7? That one seems obvious. Now admittedly Oregon is a hard team to rank. Their wins with Dennis Dixon are superb, their losses without him execrable. Then they demolished South Florida, causing a lot of trouble for the pollsters (and yours truly) in deciding how to order these teams. Oregon State should technically be ahead of Oregon as well, though that was an overtime game. The Michigan game was not, to say the least.

Finally, if Wisconsin stays in the poll Penn State should be in, too; they beat the Badgers 38-7 this season. The four 9-4 Big Ten teams all beat each other, but Wisconsin and Penn State were 1-2 against the other three, and the direct comparison is conclusive. If Penn State isn't deemed good enough to get in, Wisconsin should have fallen out. They lost, after all, there's no need for them to stay in. They could have kept Virginia in, instead. But Wisconsin was higher in the previous poll; these things happen.

SportsRatings College Football final 2007 top 25

This is the toughest top 25 to sort out in ages. First off, the top eight or so teams can be ordered in any number of ways. Almost all of them finished with 2 losses, and have a loss or more to non-top 25 teams or even teams with losing records. Add to that the ridiculous number of teams that finished with four losses and the bottom half of the list can be rearranged to anyone's preference.

I put LSU #1 for a lot of reasons. Although I don't like a 2-loss champion, their losses were at least overtime losses...so they should remain the exception. 2-loss teams should not end up #1 as a rule. Their 5 wins over top 25 foes soften the blow.

This is when it gets tough. I made my list from the bottom up, narrowing it to 25 and then evaluating the top spots. And there's no reason not to have Ohio State #2. Their only losses are to top 25 teams, and they've beaten three teams on the list. That's because the Big Ten inched a couple of teams in at the end to have 5 total, same as the SEC, though much lower on average. I could just as easily have put Ohio State #8, but in terms of losses they're cleaner than Georgia and especially USC.

West Virginia beat Oklahoma, who beat Missouri twice, who beat Kansas who beat Virginia Tech. Although West Virginia has a messy loss résumé, Missouri a better record than Oklahoma, Kansas a better record than Missouri, the head-to-head competition wins out. And although USC beat Illinois while Illinois beat Ohio State, this is a secondary comparison not a primary one. Again, there's no perfect logic system for this nutty year.

Hawai'i rounds out my top ten because there just aren't enough teams with good records to put in front of them. This year, any 1-loss team deserves a decent ranking, though in terms of quality the Warriors are borderline top 25 at best. They only lost to the #3 team, after all.

lw   #  Team            rec important games(losses; wins over top 25)
3    1. LSU            12-2 L@KY43-37ot;L Ark50-48ot
                            wVT48-7,wOSU38-24,wFLA28-24,wAub30-24,w=TN21-14
1    2. Ohio State     11-2 L Ill28-21,L@LSU38-24
                            wWis38-17,w@Mich14-3,wPennSt37-17
8    3. Georgia        11-2 L SC16-12,L@Tenn35-14
                            w=Hawaii41-10,wAub45-20,wFLA42-30,wTroy44-34
9    4. West Virginia  11-2 L Pitt13-9,L@SoFLA21-13
                            w=Oklahoma48-28,w@Cincy28-23,wUConn66-21
4    5. Oklahoma       11-3 L@Col27-24,L@TTech34-27,L=WVA48-28
                            wTex28-21,wMiz41-31,w=Miz38-17,w@Tulsa61-21
6    6. Missouri       11-2 L@OK41-31,L=OK38-17
                            w=Ill40-34,w=KU36-28,wTTech41-10
7    7. Kansas         12-1 L=Mizz36-28
                            w=VTech24-21
10   8. USC            11-2 L Stan24-23,L@Ore24-17
                            w@ASU44-24,wIll49-17,wOreSt24-3
5    9. Virginia Tech  11-3 L@LSU48-7,L BC14-10,L=Kansas24-21
                            w=BC30-16,w@Clem41-23,w@Virg33-21
2   10. Hawaii         12-1 L=Georgia41-10
                            wBoiseSt39-27,wFresno37-30
13  11. Boston College 10-3 L@Mary42-35,L FSU27-17,L=VT30-16
                            w@VT14-10,w@Clem20-17,wWake38-28
14  12. Cincinnati     10-3 L@Pitt24-17,L Lou28-24,L WVA28-23
                            wOreSt34-3,w@USF38-33,wConn27-3
21  13. Texas          10-3 L KSt41-21,L@TexAM38-30,L OK28-21
                            w=ASU52-34,wTTech59-43,wUCF35-32
19  14. BYU            11-2 L@UCLA27-17,L@Tulsa55-47
                            wAF31-6,wUtah17-10,wNewMex31-24
18  15. Arizona State   9-3 L@Ore35-23,L USC44-24,L=Tex52-34
                            W OreSt44-32
    16. Oregon State    9-4 L UCLA40-14,L@Cincy34-3,L@ASU44-32,L@USC24-3
                            W@Oregon38-31ot,wUtah24-7
    17. Oregon          9-4 L@AZ34-24,L@UCLA16-0,L Cal31-24,L OreSt38-31ot
                            wUSC24-17,wASU35-23,w@MI39-7,w=USF56-21,wFS52-21
    18. Auburn          9-4 L MissSt19-14,L USF26-23ot,L@LSU30-24,L@GA45-20
                            w@FLA20-17,wClemson23-20ot
    19. Michigan        9-4 L AppSt34-32,L Ore39-7,L@Wis37-21,L OSU14-3
                            wPennSt14-9,wIll27-17,w@FLA41-35
11  20. Florida         9-4 L Aub20-17,L@LSU28-24,L@GA42-30,L Mich41-35
                            w@Tenn59-20,wTroy59-31
12  21. Illinois        9-4 L@Iowa10-6,L Mich27-17,L=Miz40-34,L@USC49-17
                            wPennSt27-20,wWisc31-26,w@OSU28-21
    22. Penn State      9-4 L@MichSt27-20,L@Mich14-9,L@Ill27-20,L@OSU37-17
                            wWis38-7
    23. Tennessee       9-4 L@Cal45-31,L@Ala41-17,L@FLA59-20,L=LSU21-14
                            wGA35-14,wWisc21-17
    24. Texas Tech      9-4 L Col31-26,L@OkSt49-45,L@Mizz41-10,L@Tex59-43
                            wOK34-27,w=Virg31-28
22  25. Wisconsin       9-4 L@PSU38-7,L@Ill31-26,L@OSU38-17,L=Tenn24-17
                            wMich37-21

Others considered (prev. rank): Clemson(23), Virginia(15), Wake Forest, Connecticut(16), South Florida(17), Central Florida(24), Tulsa, Boise State(20), Air Force(25), Utah, New Mexico, Fresno State, Troy
 
key: Loss to ranked team
     Loss to unranked team
     Loss to team with losing record(pre-bowl)
     Win over ranked team
     Win over "others considered" team

After the rest of the 3-loss teams (Boston College, Cincinnati, Texas) and BYU, the attack of the four-loss teams begins. There are so few good candidates for the upper positions that I move Arizona State up three spots despite their loss to Texas. They've only lost to top 25 teams now, and they beat Oregon State and have a better record.

The "chain" of four-loss teams goes like this: Oregon State beat Oregon beat Michigan beat Florida beat Tennessee beat Wisconsin. And in-between, Auburn also beat Florida, Michigan beat Illinois who beat Penn State who also beat Wisconsin.

Texas Tech beat Virginia so they got one of the last spots; Virginia's résumé was dogged by two losses to losing teams. Since they beat Wake Forest and Connecticut, this effectively blocked them and South Florida, despite that latter's quality résumé. A 56-21 loss in your bowl game doesn't help, though. Clemson almost made it; they barely lost to Auburn, but Wisconsin only lost to top 25 teams, and beat one as well.

In all seven teams fell out and seven joined the final rankings. A fitting end to a wild year.

Missouri Tigers - 2007 Lineal Champion

The Missouri Tigers are the 2007 college football season Lineal champion, having defeated former #1 Arkansas in the Cotton Bowl.

Depending on how the title is tracked, Missouri has either has never before held the "lineal crown" for even one week in their history, or this is the third year they've finished at #1. The difference depends on how one handles non-Division I-A equivalent teams that take the title. In some systems, these games are ignored because the title would fall into the hands of a whole different division. I let the team hold the belt until another Division I-A team takes it back.

With that system, Missouri finished the year #1 in both 1926 and 1936.

Either way it's calculated, the title holder eventually meets back up, but in both those years there were "detours" where the systems were out of synch for a while. The current top 25 is unaffected by any of this.

LSU slides to the #3 spot after beating Ohio State. Georgia's win over Hawaii means they only fall one spot as well. Auburn rounds out the top five; four SEC teams, but since the #1 is held by the Big 12, that means next year the top spots might be full of those teams, unless Missouri is beat in the pre-conference season.

Michigan bumps Florida down to #7, and more SEC teams follow completing the top 10.

All-Time Lineal Top 25 as of 1/8/2007

lw  now Team                    rec  relevant results
     1. Missouri               12-2  beat #1 Arkansas
1    2. Arkansas                8-5
2    3. LSU                    12-2 
3    4. Georgia                11-2
4    5. Auburn                  9-4
     6. Michigan                9-4  beat #5 Florida
5    7. Florida                 9-4
6    8. Mississippi State       8-5
7    9. Tennessee              10-4
8   10. Kentucky                8-5
20  11. Southern Cal           11-2  beat #9 Illinois
9   12. Illinois                9-4
10  13. Ohio State             11-2
11  14. Pittsburgh              5-7
12  15. West Virginia          11-2
13  16. Cincinnati             10-3
    17. Wake Forest             9-4  beat #14 Connecticut
14  18. Connecticut             9-4
23  19. Oregon                  9-4  beat #15 South Florida
15  20. South Florida           9-4
16  21. Louisville              6-6
17  22. Rutgers                 8-5 
    23. Texas                  10-3  beat #17 Arizona State
18  24. Arizona State          10-3
19  25. Arizona                 5-7

out:
21      UCLA                    6-7
22      Oregon State            9-4
24      Virginia Tech          11-3
25      Florida State           7-6

Bowl winners Wake Forest and Texas jump into the top 25, while Southern Cal and Oregon gain some ground by beating teams higher on the list than themselves.

Falling out are bowl losers UCLA, Virginia Tech, and Florida State, as well as bowl winner Oregon State

BCS Bowl results - final score: LSU 38, Ohio State 24

It wasn't quite an exact replay of last year's finalé, but LSU controlled both lines of scrimmage for most of the game and scored 31 unanswered points to beat Ohio State 38-24 and win the BCS national championship game.

Matt Flynn threw four touchdown passes to lead the Tigers on offense, while the defense overcame early mistakes to intercept two Todd Boeckman passes and hold the Buckeyes scoreless for the 2nd quarter and most of the 3rd.

Chris Wells scored early for Ohio State on a 65-yard touchdown run where LSU's secondary was caught out of position when he burst through the line. Another LSU defensive breakdown resulted in a 44-yard pass completion that led to a field goal and a 10-0 Buckeye lead.

LSU finally got on the board with 2:30 left in the 1st quarter with a field goal; early in the second, Flynn threw his first touchdown pass to tight end Richard Dickson, who lined up on the weak side and snuck into the end zone wide open to catch the ball and tie the game 10-10.

The next possession was particularly crucial for momentum. Ohio State was driving in LSU territory again, when a penalty slowed them and forced a field goal attempt that was blocked by LSU. The Tigers made the most of the turnover, with Flynn throwing a perfect pass to Brandon LaFell to take the lead 17-10.

By this time LSU was rolling, and three plays later a Chevis Jackson interception of a Boeckman pass on the sideline set up their next score, a 1-yard push by Jacob Hester. Hester was tough all night, gaining 86 yards on 21 carries, and he gave LSU a 24-10 lead at the half.

Ohio State had a chance to turn the flow of the game around in the 3rd, stopping LSU on their first possession, but roughed the punter going for the block, giving the ball back to the Tigers who scored their 4th straight touchdown and made it 31-10.

Finally, though, Ohio State's vaunted defense came up with a big play late in the 3rd quarter. Malcolm Jenkins intercepted a Flynn pass and returned it to the five yard line, nearly scoring—replays showed just a few inches of his foot had touched the sideline on the return. Ohio State faced a 3rd and 1 but the LSU defense backed Wells up three yards. Undaunted, Buckeye coach Jim Tressel called for the fourth down pass play with Brian Robiskie catching the Boeckman throw and giving them hope at 31-17.

The LSU defense wouldn't let the Buckeyes complete their comback. Facing 4th-and-7 after driving to the Tiger 34 yard line, Boeckman was sacked and the ball stripped; on their next possession, Glen Dorsey forced another fumble, which was recovered, but two plays later on 3rd and 15 Boeckman was intercepted again, this time by Curtis Taylor.

LSU ran four minutes off the clock driving inside the Ohio State ten, and instead of running out more of the clock running the ball Flynn threw his fourth TD pass of the night. He ended 19 of 27 for 174 yards and one interception.

The Gatorade dunking commenced, the LSU defense relaxed, and Ohio State managed another touchdown with just over a minute left, but LSU recovered the onside kick. The Tigers finished the season 12-2 in a wild year that had them at #1 twice during the season only to suffer triple-overtime losses both times. They will end #1 this time with no foes left as the first ever 2-loss national champion.

Ohio State lost in the title game for the second straight year. This one was not as embarrassing as last year's by any means, especially since they were not the heavy favorites last season's squad was. Still, the game had some similarities, such as the very early big play that was followed by a long scoring drought. The Buckeyes end the year 11-2.

Does LSU have home field advantage? A look at home team performance in major bowls

LSU is playing in the BCS Championship game, close to home in New Orleans in their home state of Louisiana. Does home field advantage matter in major bowls? Or is it not a factor when two of the top teams meet at the end of the year? And just what should be the critieria for "home advantage" if it's not your "home field"?

The factors cited as being responsible for home field advantage include crowd support and travel distance. The former would be less of a factor in a bowl game, where many fans support the opponent; the latter effect would certainly be more true for older games, especially pre-WWII games on bad roads where travel often meant physical hardship before the well-being of football teams had such importance. Additionally, studies have shown that a team defending its "home turf" has higher testosterone levels prior to game time, giving a very primal physical reason for home field advantage.

Whatever the cause, most statistical analyses of scores show a definite home field advantage, on average about 3 points from a neutral field. It may not be present in all home games; it might be magnified in some; and certain teams and stadiums may see more of an effect than others; but on average, it exists. But does it exist at the highest level of play, the major bowl games?

To try to figure this out, I looked at the results for the major bowls: the current four used by the BCS (Rose, Orange, Sugar, Fiesta), and the Cotton Bowl, which was considered one of the big four before the Fiesta Bowl's emergence as a January bowl, and is still played on New Year's Day.

First let's look at the Granddaddy of Them All, the Rose Bowl:

Rose Bowl
There are two teams that could be considered "home teams" when playing at the Rose Bowl. First of course, is UCLA, where they are actually on their home field (since 1982), and USC, which is also located in the Los Angeles area.

Records
USC: 23-9
UCLA: 5-7

From this it appears that USC plays well at the Rose Bowl but not UCLA. But let's dig a bit deeper. UCLA lost its first five Rose Bowls. How good was the program then? How good were their opponents?

To decide if there was any home advantage, I looked at only games that were considered "upsets" by comparing AP rankings prior to the game. This isn't a perfect method—sometimes higher ranked teams are actually underdogs, as Ohio State can attest to—but overall it's a pretty good indicator. When neither team was ranked I used the results only when one team had a clearly better record than the other prior to the game.

Upsets
USC: 11-2
UCLA: 4-2

Now it appears much clearer: both teams have done very well for themselves, losing only twice each when they were supposed to win, and winning many upsets. These results are made a bit more fair when only "modern era" games are counted; USC had several upset wins from 1930 to 1944 that probably don't reflect current conditions in the game. So, counting only games from the mid-60s on:

Modern upsets
USC: 6-2
UCLA:4-1

Overall, home teams at the Rose Bowl are 10-3 in upset wins/losses. This seems to reflect a definite advantage for the home squad. During the 70s and 80s these teams were 9-1 in beating the Big Ten in upset wins. USC's only upset losses at the Rose Bowl were in 1989 and the 2006 loss to Vince Young and Texas, making the latter feat all the more impressive.

Orange Bowl
The Miami Hurricanes lost their final game at the Orange Bowl this season, but they've had much success there, especially at the bowl game that shares the stadium name. Three of their five national championships were won at home, the most memorable the 1984 win over juggernaut Nebraska.

Miami
Record:6-3 (5-1 modern)
Upsets:4-0 (3-0 modern)

Again, it looks like Miami has a home field advantage on their own home field, which is not surprising. This does show that it probably carries through to big bowl games, though the sample size is small. Combined with what we see from USC and UCLA, it can probably be said that teams that play in big bowls, at least in their home town if not home stadium, have a definite home field advantage.

We can test perhaps test this further with Arizona State in the Fiesta Bowl.

Fiesta Bowl
The Fiesta Bowl didn't start until 1971 and wasn't a major bowl for a while. Its importance grew with the Arizona State-Nebraska game in 1975, and it became a January bowl in 1982. The Miami-Penn State national championship game in 1987 made it one of the biggest bowls, and it has remained since.

Arizona State
Record:5-1
Upsets:1-0

There isn't much to go on here. The first three Fiesta Bowls were mismatches with strong Sun Devil teams against teams willing to go to the new bowl. In 1975 an undefeated Arizona State team proved itself to the nation by beating Nebraska 17-16. They beat Oklahoma in 1983 but that wasn't an upset. So while Arizona State has certainly done well at its home bowl, it doesn't add much useful information.

Cotton Bowl
The Cotton is the hardest to analyze, since there are so many Texas teams that have been in it, and many are not really that close. So this is where we have to start considering distance from the stadium. Two teams, SMU and TCU, normally play in or near Dallas where the Cotton Bowl takes place.

SMU
Record: 2-1-1 (1-1 modern)
Upsets: 1-0 (0-0 modern)

TCU
Record: 2-3-1 (0-0 modern)
Upsets: 1-2 (0-0 modern)

There aren't any really useful results from these teams. They did so-so overall, and 2-2 in total upsets, and all of these games were in the 50s or earlier.

But what about other big Texas teams? Like, Texas itself? And Tech and A&M? These teams have long histories in the Cotton Bowl, and they all play in the state of Texas. But they are all at least three hours away. Do they get the same home team effect as USC, UCLA, Miami, and ASU?

Texas
Record: 11-10-1 (6-7 modern)
Upsets: 4-8 (2-6 modern)

Texas A&M
Record: 4-7 (3-6 modern)
Upsets: 2-3 (2-2 modern)

Texas Tech
Record: 0-3 (0-2 modern)
Upsets: 0-1 (0-0 modern)

These teams don't seem to have any advantage at all in the Cotton Bowl. Texas and A&M are about 3 hours from Dallas, while Tech is at least 5. Overall they have poor records, and while A&M and Tech don't have any useful upset results, the Longhorns seem snakebitten in the Cotton Bowl. The biggest upset was probably in 1978, when Notre Dame shocked unanimous #1 Texas 38-10.

Looking at other teams from the previously analyzed bowls yields similarly ambiguous results. If the team does not play in the stadium or in the same town, home advantage for the game is tenuous, if it exists at all.

Fiesta Bowl: Arizona (1-1, 1-0 modern upsets)

Rose Bowl: California (2-5-1, 0-3 upsets, 0-0 modern upsets)

Orange Bowl: Florida  (3-0, 1-0 modern upsets)

Orange Bowl: Florida State (3-4, 1-2 modern upsets)

Of these, Arizona is reasonably close to the bowl stadium, while the others are 5 hours or more. This doesn't solve whether or not there might be an advantage for an in-state team in bowl games, but there's not enough data for it. Looking at regular-season games played under these conditions might help, or looking at data from smaller bowls, assuming either or both scenario transfers over.

This brings us to the Sugar Bowl, and the team at hand, Louisiana State. As noted, they play in-state and close to home when they go to the Sugar Bowl. But they don't play strictly "at home." If they did, we would expect a big home field advantage.

They play closer to home—about 80 miles away—than any of the "secondary" teams considered (Texas, et al) but not "at home" or in the same city, as USC, UCLA, Miami, and Arizona State. So they're sort of in a "middle area" in terms of having a home advantage. Here's how they've done:

Sugar Bowl
LSU record: 6-7
LSU modern record: 5-2
LSU upset record: 1-3
LSU modern upset record: 1-1

Again, results are inconclusive. They've done ok, but not great in the Sugar Bowl overall. But since 1965 they've done well. Considering games they should have won or lost, they're only 1-3; but two of those were in 1937 and 1938. Their only win over a higher-ranked team was in 2002 over Illinois, and most people expected them to beat the Illini that year; likewise, their 1987 loss to Nebraska was an upset in poll rankings only.

So in conclusion: home field advantage holds true for the big bowl games when there is definitely a home field, or at least a home town. Being in the home state does not have the effect, at least in the same degree, especially for teams that are several hours away.

For teams that are about an hour away, like LSU? More data is needed, but for now there's nothing suggesting a positive effect by wins and losses alone. A more thorough analysis of point spreads would give a better indication. Also considering the distance away of the opponent might shed some light.

I would guess that LSU will have a small home advantage tonight. They're a lot closer, and the crowd will be majority Tigers. But it's probably closer to being a neutral field game than an actual home game.

GMAC Bowl results - final score: Tulsa 63, Bowling Green 7

For once the defense shared credit with the offense in a Golden Hurricane victory as Tulsa crushed Bowling Green 63-7 Sunday evening.

Tulsa's defensive unit didn't allow a point, as only a 78-yard kickoff return kept the game from being a shutout. The offense had its normal production and was aided by several Bowling Green turnovers—including four first-half fumbles that led to Tulsa touchdowns.

Not that Golden Hurricane quarterback Paul Smith needed the assistance; he passed for 312 yards and five touchdowns and run for another as Tulsa reached their highest point total of the year. The game was similar to their November win over Houston, another 8-5 team which they beat 56-7.

Normally the Tulsa defense is more generous, giving up 30 points or more eight times this season, but tonight Bowling Green couldn't sustain a drive, and the two times they threatened to score they fumbled once and failed a fourth down conversion on the other.

Tulsa jumped to a 21-0 lead in the first quarter, scoring after each of three Falcon fumbles, one on a punt return. They extended the lead to 28-0 before Bowling Green drove inside the Tulsa ten, only to suffer yet another fumble; Tulsa drove all the way to the other end for a touchdown again, making it 35-0.

Just before the half there was more bad news for Bowling Green. Quarterback Tyler Sheehan led them back inside the Tulsa 10 yard line, but the Falcons failed on fourth down. Worse, Sheehan was injured on their final possession just before the half.

In the second half Tulsa picked up right where they left off, with Smith throwing his third TD pass and making it 42-0 before Roger Williams' kickoff return finally put the Falcons on the board.

With a touchdown run and two more TD passes from Smith—the last one with just over three minute remaining—the blowout was complete.

Everything came together for Tulsa in this game, and they finish the season 10-4, two of the losses coming from Conference-USA champ Central Florida. Bowling Green dips to 8-5, held to a single digit score for the only time this year.

BCS Championship preview - LSU vs. Ohio State

Monday Jan. 7th: BCS Championship game in New Orleans 8:00pm eastern

#1 Ohio State (11-1) vs. #3 Louisiana State (11-2)

A very even matchup, with well-rounded but inconsistent LSU against the Buckeyes' dominant defense. The winner will be the first two-time BCS champion.

Vegas line: Louisiana State by 3 1/2

The line opened at 4 points.

Pts. Power Rating: Louisiana State 26   Ohio State 22   

LSU's fifth-ranked scoring offense takes on Ohio State's #1 defense, and the result is about a 4.5 point spread. The Tigers' defense ranks #12 while the Buckeye offense is only #37. The Tigers' offensive rating is slightly inflated due to their overtime games, and their scoring defense is likewise harmed. Both would be in the top ten if the overtime scores are discounted, and the expected score 24-19.

Yardage analysis:  Louisiana State 14    Ohio State 14 

In adjusted yardage, it's the 19th ranked LSU offense against the #1 OSU defense; this coupled with LSU's #5 rating on defense and the Buckeyes' #68 ranking on offense leads to an even lower score projection and an even tighter game. In this scenario, both teams may need help from their defenses to score points.

When Ohio State has the ball
Ohio State passing offense: #100    Louisiana State passing defense: #12
Ohio State rushing offense: #19      Louisiana State rushing defense: #15

LSU's defense is solid in both areas, whereas Ohio State's passing game has been erratic at best. They can run the ball with Chris Wells, but the Tigers have a tough rushing D and should be able to concentrate more forces there. This theory didn't hold out against Arkansas, and Boeckman has shown himself to be more of a threat than Casey Dick, but the LSU defense is healed and should be at full strength. It's going to take ball control and good play calling for Ohio State to score against LSU.

When Louisiana State has the ball
Louisiana State passing offense: #52  Ohio State passing defense: #1
Louisiana State rushing offense: #11  Ohio State rushing defense: #2

Louisiana State has its work cut out for it, too. They're much better than Ohio State on offense, slightly better running and far better passing, but the Buckeye defense is great at defending either one. LSU can't count on having the success Illinois did in the final game just due to running a similar offense, but they can play two quarterbacks to keep Ohio State guessing. In this way they might be able to sustain some drives and perhaps get some big plays.

Pairwise-comparison win %
Ohio State                 46.2
Louisiana State          53.8

Louisiana State's game performances all rate pretty high, as do most of Ohio State's, but overall LSU had more games against tough competition. Add in home advantage, and the edge goes to the Tigers 84 to 72, when comparing both team's games head-to-head.

Louisiana State's key games
Wins over bowl teams(6): #5 Virginia Tech 48-7; #11 Florida 28-24; Mississippi State 45-0; vs. Tennessee 21-14; Auburn 40-34; @Alabama 41-34
Losses (2): @Kentucky 43-37 (3ot); Arkansas 50-48 (3ot)

LSU's first three games, including the Virginia Tech and Mississippi State games, were their most impressive, as they outscored their opponents 137-7. At that stage it didn't matter who they played, the offense soared and the defense shut down almost all scoring.

Toward the middle of the season, every game was a nail-biter. Florida, Kentucky, Auburn, and Alabama all took LSU to the wire. Offensive production dropped and the defense allowed at least 24 points a game. Injuries and fatigue had a lot to do with LSU's drop, but their aura of dominance was nevertheless gone.

Two triple-overtime losses are all that stood between LSU and a 13-0 season. At the same time, with a helping of bad luck, a 7-5 year could have resulted as well. Will a month off returns LSU to its early-season form? If so, Ohio State stands little chance.

Ohio State's key games
Wins over bowl teams(5): #22 Wisconsin 38-17; @Michigan 14-3; @Penn State 37-17; @Purdue 23-7; Michigan State 24-17
Losses (1): Illinois 28-21

The Buckeyes didn't face a tough non-conference foe like Virginia Tech; indeed the first half of their schedule was bereft of bowl teams. But in their final seven games they faced six bowl teams, including a road win over Michigan, who beat Florida in the Capital One bowl.

Offense has been Ohio State's problem all year. They shut out Akron except for a safety the offense gave up while producing only 20 points on the Zips. They had Michigan State down 24-0 before an interception and fumble, both returned for touchdowns, handed the Spartan 14 points in just over one minute. Though the offense improved over the season, the last two games—the loss to Illinois and win over Michigan—were not exactly examplary offensive performances. Almost all of these breakdowns were attributable to quarterback Todd Boeckman, who is capable of playing quite well when he limits his turnovers.

The defense was great all season, save for an anomalous game against Illinois where they gave up four touchdowns, twice their previous high (which itself only happened in only two games). Other than that, they've been dominant and provide the main reason this Buckeye team made it back to the championship game. Defense is why Ohio State has a chance to win this game.

Psychology

The main factor for Ohio State is going to be their response to last year's disaster. On one hand, their confidence may have been affected by the whomping Florida layed on them; but on the other, it could also provide motivation. That game was a year ago, and the Buckeyes have played a lot of football since then. They may have underestimated Florida, but they won't do the same with LSU.

The Tigers are hungry as well. After two losses, they understand that they are vulnerable to teams not nearly as good as Ohio State, and that they are lucky to have made it here. Getting a second (or third) chance doesn't happen often.

Final analysis

LSU's offense is in many ways similar to Illinois' offense. That could be a concern for Ohio State, but there's also the chance that the Buckeye defense just had a poor game—their only one out of twelve—against Illinois, and that the scheme had less to do with it than pundits are claiming. Additionally, LSU's offense isn't exactly a paragon of consistency itself. I'd bet that the Buckeye defense is solid in slowing down the Tiger offense and keeping the game low-scoring.

I'd wager the same about LSU's defense. With Glen Dorsey healthy, I don't think the Buckeye offense will generate a lot of points, especially since they haven't done so on a consistent basis all year. The game will be hard-fought, low-scoring, and a essentially a tossup.

LSU has had several close, hard fought games this year, winning tight contests against Florida, Auburn, Alabama, and Tennessee. They dropped two triple-overtime games as well. But this experience in close games gives them an advantage over the Buckeyes, who had one close game (Illinois) in which they came apart and couldn't get a stop at the end.

LSU also has a practical home advantage by playing in New Orleans. With that, and from being fully healthy for the first time in months, if the game goes down to the wire—perhaps even into overtime—the Tigers will be able to battle full strength and come out on top.

Prediction: Louisiana State 19   Ohio State 17

NFL probabilities - playoffs, conference champs, Super Bowl

A little NFL detour here, and a little late, since two of these games are over already and of course will affect the odds. But I wanted to publish the unadulterated odds for the final 12 teams before I update them this week for the final eight.

I use the pairwise-comparison method, which should be fairly accurate after 16 games each, yielding 256 game-to-game comparisons.

Clearly the odds are going to be a bit uninteresting because of Godzilla, aka New England, eating up the percentages. The NFL brackets are, of course, convoluted by the bracket-jumping ability of the wildcard teams, which makes it a real pain in the ass.

Wildcard games: AFC

Pittsburgh Steelers        48.8     San Diego Chargers         72.3
Jacksonville Jaguars       51.2     Tennessee Titans           27.7

Wildcard games: NFC

Tampa Bay Buccaneers       48.4     Seattle Seahawks           51.2
New York Giants            51.6     Washington Redskins        48.8

Team  odds to win:    wild card   1st round   conf. champ    Super Bowl
New England            100.0%       82.5%       61.0%          45.8%
Indianapolis           100.0%       61.6%       21.4%          12.7%
San Diego               72.3%       29.1%        9.0%           4.8%         
Pittsburgh              48.8%       10.0%        2.9%           1.2%
Jacksonville            51.2%       13.9%        5.0%           2.5%    
Tennessee               27.7%        2.9%        0.7%           0.2%

Dallas                 100.0%       67.4%       39.6%          14.5%
Green Bay              100.0%       68.1%       36.1%          12.5%
Seattle                 51.2%       16.8%        6.4%           1.4%
Tampa Bay               48.4%       14.0%        4.8%           1.0%
New York Giants         51.6%       17.1%        6.6%           1.6%
Washington              48.8%       16.6%        6.5%           1.8%

New England emerges with a not-quite-50% chance of winning it all, while the next best number is from Dallas at 14.5%, then the Colts and Packers are nearly tied for 4th most likely. After that it drops off to San Diego at under 5%, Jacksonville at 2 1/2, and the rest around 1% (except Tennessee, who is steered into facing New England if they win the wild card game).

A team's odds are better if they can hold off facing New England the longest, which is (one reason) why Tennessee fares so poorly and the Chargers do relatively well—if they win, they don't face New England right away. Although Indianapolis ranks #2 and beats Dallas head-to-head most of the time, Dallas' overall odds are higher because they have a better hope that someone can beat the Pats before the Super Bowl.

I will be glad when the wild card situation is over; working out the odds in a normal, stable bracket is much easier.

GMAC Bowl preview - Bowling Green vs. Tulsa

Sunday Jan. 6th: GMAC Bowl in Mobile 8:00pm eastern

Bowling Green (8-4) vs. Tulsa (9-4)

The 2nd to last bowl game. Important fact: Bowling Green is not from Bowling Green, Kentucky, but rather, Ohio.

Vegas line: Tulsa by 4 1/2 to 5

The line opened at 4 1/2 and is still in that range.

Pts. Power Rating: Tulsa 41   Bowling Green 38   

This game is being pitched as a battle of high-powered offenses, and you would expect a high score. But it's more accurate to say that both teams have weak defenses; Bowling Green ranks 97th and Tulsa 107th in adjusted scoring defense. Tulsa does score quite a few points on average, ranking 25th on offense, while Bowling Green is merely average at 56th.

Yardage analysis: Tulsa 52     Bowling Green 37 

If Tulsa converts its yardage into points effectively, they could win by a comfortable margin; their offense is #2 in adjusted yardage. Often teams like the Golden Hurricane gain a lot of passing yards, but when they get into the red zone and the field is compressed, they're less effective; Tulsa is 80th in red zone scoring percentage. Both defenses still rank poorly and Bowling Green's offense is 74th.

When Tulsa has the ball
Tulsa passing offense: #3    Bowling Green passing defense: #59
Tulsa rushing offense: #63  Bowling Green rushing defense: #113

Tulsa's passing offense is one of the country's most productive, but unlike the top 2 teams (Texas Tech and Hawai'i) their running game is average rather than non-existent. This will add an extra dimension to their attack on Bowling Green, who can't stop the run.

When Bowling Green has the ball
Bowling Green passing offense: #24    Tulsa passing defense: #113
Bowling Green rushing offense: #111   Tulsa rushing defense: #97

The Falcons may be able to run the ball somewhat too, not because they're any good at it, but because Tulsa isn't good at stopping it either. But the bread and butter of both teams is the pass, and since Tulsa's defense is so brittle, the air attack should be the concentration.

Pairwise-comparison win %
Bowling Green      51.3
Tulsa                    48.7

Surprisingly, after all other indicators point to Tulsa, the game-combination comparison gives a slight edge to Bowling Green. This either means Tulsa's power rating is inflated by a few highly-rated outliers (such as their 56-7 win over Houston), or Bowling Green's power rating is pulled down for a couple dud games (like the 33-point loss to Miami, Ohio). In other words, the mean favors Tulsa, where the mode and/or median barely go to Bowling Green.

Tulsa's key games
Wins over bowl teams(5): #19 BYU 55-47; Houston 56-7
Losses (4): @UTEP 48-47; @#24 UCF 44-23; @#24 UCF 44-25; #4 Oklahoma 62-21;

Tulsa played only one game where everything came together on offense and defense: when they beat Houston 56-7 and came within minutes of shutting out the Cougars. It was a defensive performance like no other all season for the Golden Hurricane. They had five wins over poor to mediocre teams where the final margin was within ten points and the defense gave up at least 23 points: UAB 38-30, Marshall 38-31, SMU 29-23, at Army 49-39, and at Rice 48-43. Their sixth close game was the win over Brigham Young.

A defensive breakdown was central to their worst loss, to UTEP. Oklahoma, of course, scored a lot on them, as did Central Florida in both meetings. Tulsa is essentially a three-loss team, the second UCF game being a practical instant replay of the first.

Bowling Green's key games
Wins over bowl teams: None.
Losses (4): @Miami Ohio 47-14; @Ohio 38-27; @Michigan State 28-17; @Boston College 55-24

Bowling Green's résumé is pretty bad. No wins over bowl teams; no wins even over teams with a winning record, other than provisionally Division I-A Western Kentucky. Losses to two non-bowl teams. Their most impressive performance may have been against Michigan State, a game that was tied at the half.

Their offense scored 30 points or more eight times, but the defense gave up 30 six times and at least 20 points in each of their first ten games. The Falcons' last two games were their best all-around efforts, winning at Buffalo 31-17 and against Toledo 37-10.

Psychology

Both teams had decent winning streaks late in the season. Bowling Green finished by winning four straight, including the two good performances at the end. Tulsa lost in the Conference-USA title game to a UCF team that beat it previously; in between those two losses Tulsa won five straight. But the conference championship game probably meant more to them than this bowl game will.

Bowling Green turned its fortunes around this year, going from 4-8 in 2006 to 8-4 in the 2007 regular season. Despite this, they have a history of poor bowl ticket sales and again won't sell their allotment; Tulsa should do quite a bit better but neither fan base is making the trip in droves to Alabama. The Golden Hurricane have had a similar record for three years now, good but not great.

Final analysis

There's no question Tulsa can beat Bowling Green; they beat one team that is clearly better, and another of similar quality 56-7. But they've also shown they can lose to a worse team if the defense doesn't do its job, and that almost any team can score a lot and stick with them. So it's doubtful they'll win by a very comfortable margin unless the defense has a game like they did against Houston.

Bowling Green, on the other hand, has not defeated any team nearly as good as Tulsa. They didn't embarrass themselves on the road against Michigan State, the team they played that is most similar in quality to Tulsa. But Boston College's passing attack put 55 points on them, the most all year, and B.C. doesn't have the running game Tulsa does. Clearly their hope is to trade score for score, tire out the already sketchy Tulsa defense, and hopefully play as well as they did in their last few games.

The Falcons have the 7th best red zone defense in the country, while Tulsa has the 80th-best red zone percentage. While these are unadjusted figures, the two teams' opposition is close enough (104th vs. 107th, a la Sagarin) to make a fair comparison. This suggests that Tulsa's score will be closer to the projection from scoring average (41) than to the score (52) derived from comparing their offensive yardage to Bowling Green's defense. At the same time, however, the larger number reflects the key comparison of Tulsa's rushing offense vs. the poor Falcon rushing defense.

Tulsa should be able to run pretty well on Bowling Green. This is crucial for taking pressure off both their passing game and their defense, which is often on the field a long time (they're 94th in time of possession). Further, should they need to run time off the clock the ground game will be a big plus. The ability to run the ball should help ensure victory for the Golden Hurricane.

Prediction: Tulsa 46    Bowling Green 44

International Bowl results - final score: Rutgers 52, Ball State 30

Ray Rice and Rutgers tore though Ball State, racking up nearly 600 yards of offense and defeating the Cardinals 52-30 in Toronto. Rice rushed for a 90-yard touchdown and finished with 280 yards for the day.

The Scarlet Knights took a 14-0 lead in the first quarter and never looked back. Rice had over 100 yards in the first half while Ball State managed only three field goals in falling behind 24-9 at the break.

Rice's long TD run came on Rutgers' first possession of the second half. In all he had 4 touchdowns, with Mike Teel passing for the other three—each of them for over 35 yards. The Cardinals did find the end zone a few times as they generated almost 500 yards of offense themselves, but Rutgers and Rice never let up and the game wasn't close at any juncture.

Teel passed for over 300 yards while completing 16 of 25 with one interception. Ball State quarterback Nate Davis had nearly as many yards and three TDs of his own, but was only 25 of 49 and was sacked seven times by the relentless Scarlet Knight defense.

Rutgers finished 8-5 while Ball State dropped to 7-6. Rice hasn't yet decided whether he will return for his senior season.