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January 03, 2023

2022 National Championship Game Preview, Odds, & Prediction: #1 Georgia vs. #3 TCU

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National Championship Game in Inglewood, Ca
When: Monday, January 9 at 7:30 pm ET
TV: ESPN

#1 Georgia Bulldogs (14-0) vs. #3 TCU Horned Frogs (13-1)

Both teams needed some luck to survive the semi-finals, will the championship game live up to those instant classics?

Vegas line/spread: Georgia by 13 (over/under 62)

Georgia is an very big favorite early, one of the biggest of the bowl season.

Strength power rating: #1 Georgia 35, #8 TCU 26

Best/Worst removed: Georgia 35-25

Turnover corrected: Georgia 36-24

The Strength power rating puts Georgia #1 and TCU is just #8. The Bulldogs are favored by about 9 points, increasing to 10 when we make a filtered "median" by throwing out each team's best and worst games. Correcting for mostly-random turnovers which have benefitted TCU greatly, Georgia's expected win margin expands to 12 points, and that's not a coincidence that it almost matches the opening Vegas line.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -13 Spread
Georgia	66.8%	44.4%
TCU	33.2%	55.6%

As Georgia has a big advantage in the Strength power rating, it's no surprise that they win the vast majority of game comparisons, basically 2 out of 3. But TCU wins most of the time vs. the large opening spread.

When Georgia has the ball

Georgia scoring offense(adj): #4	TCU scoring defense(adj): #20
Georgia rushing offense(raw): #22	TCU rushing defense(raw): #70/#69
Georgia passing offense(raw): #15	TCU passing defense(raw): #92/#52

TCU's scoring defense is similar to Ohio State's, so expect the Bulldogs to score easily at times and bog down at others; that's just the nature of the Bulldog offense. The other numbers (rushing/passing) are unadjusted and should be taken with some skepticism, but they show Georgia has a balanced offense, and suggest TCU's vulnerability on defense since even the per-play rankings aren't great. Remember that TCU played one of the toughest schedules in the nation.

Georgia QB Stetson Bennett (3,823 yards, 23 TDs, 7 int) was 23 of 34 for 398 yards against Ohio State, with 3 TDs and one pick, and as expected he spread the yardage among many receivers. The ground game wasn't used as much as it normally is but the passing game worked so well they took what the Buckeyes gave them, and that's probably what they'll do vs. TCU. They key for Bennett will be to avoid getting the pick-sixes that killed Michigan.

When TCU has the ball

TCU scoring offense(adj): #7	Georgia scoring defense(adj): #1
TCU rushing offense(raw): #19	Georgia rushing defense(raw): #1/#5
TCU passing offense(raw): #29	Georgia passing defense(raw): #66/#19

Max Duggan (3,546 yards, 32 TDs, 6 int) didn't have an especially good game against Michigan, connecting on just 14 of 29 attempts for 225 yards, 2 TDs and 2 interceptions. But the ground game made up for it; Kendre Miller is the leading RB with 1,399 yards and 17 TDs but against the Wolverines it was Emari Demercado who led with 150.

TCU's offense is facing another top defense; Michigan ranked #3 in scoring defense before the Playoff game, while Georgia is #1. The Bulldogs are #1 by quite a bit, and even their "weakness"—the #66 raw passing defense, is mostly due to the fact that teams know they can't run the ball on the Bulldogs; they're #19 on a per-attempt basis. Ohio State's CJ Stroud managed 348 yards while the Buckeye running game was held to 119.

While Ohio State's #2 scoring offense put up 41 (and almost 44) against them, the Bulldogs held Tennessee to just 13 points during the regular season. TCU's total will likely fall within that broad range.

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): Georgia: #85 TCU: #49

Neither team has particularly great nor terrible special teams overall.

Georgia's season (14-0) • SOS: #8

Non-conf losses: 0
Home losses: 0
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 9-0
Record vs. top 25 teams: 6-0

+#15 Oregon 49-3
Samford 33-0
@#19 South Carolina 48-7
Kent St 39-22
@Missouri 26-22
Auburn 42-10
Vanderbilt 55-0
=Florida 42-20
#6 Tennessee 27-13
@#22 Mississippi St 45-19
@Kentucky 16-6
Georgia Tech 37-14
+#17 LSU 50-30
+#4 Ohio State 42-41

Georgia opened with probably their best effort of the season, one of the very best of any team this year, the 49-3 demolition of Oregon in Atlanta. At the time it was thought that maybe Oregon's offense wasn't good but the fact was that Georgia was the best team in the country from the start of the season. Oregon would finish in the top ten in offense.

But even the 2nd game would show the Bulldogs propensity to slack off against weaker teams, something that would show up against Kent State and almost bit them at Missouri. Each time they did what they needed to do when games were too close, like the later game at Kentucky—and indeed, against Ohio State in the Playoff.

Along the way they beat five Committee top 25 teams, more than anyone else, and 8 bowl-bound teams, before Ohio State made it six and nine. Before that the biggest win was over Tennessee, where they held the top offense in the nation to just 13 points. They also beat South Carolina 48-7 and Mississippi State 45-19. Add in the 20 point win over LSU and they beat 5 top 25 teams by an average of 29.4 points, 5 points more than their average margin over the rest of their slate. Add in Ohio State and that average margin falls to 24.7, still pretty impressive.

Georgia's last three games were once at home and twice in Atlanta, so they haven't played out of state since November 19.

TCU's season (13-1) • SOS: #3

Non-conf losses: 0
Home losses: 0*
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 9-1
Record vs. top 25 teams: 3-1

@Colorado 38-13
Tarleton St 59-17
@SMU 42-34
Oklahoma 55-24
@Kansas 38-31
Oklahoma St 43-40 2OT
#9 Kansas St 38-28
@West Virginia 41-31
Texas Tech 34-24
@#20 Texas 17-10
@Baylor 29-28
Iowa St 62-14
+#9 Kansas St 28-31 OT
=#2 Michigan 51-45

TCU's schedule was even tougher than Georgia's, despite playing 1-11 Colorado and Tarleton State. Nine of their other 11 opponents went to a bowl game, and the two that didn't were 5-7 and 4-8. And then, of course, they beat the Committee #2 Michigan to get to the final.

Early on TCU played at a level clearly below Georgia but the gap narrowed in the 2nd half of the season. Their standout efforts were the 55-24 win over Oklahoma, the first meeting with K-State, a 38-28 win, the 17-10 road win at Texas, and the 62-14 win over a very underrated Iowa State team. Their loss to K-State—essentially another home game in Arlington—was still a very strong effort, basically their average performance. So there wasn't any breakdown on TCU's part, it was just a close game that could have gone either way at the end—much like the Michigan game. They played fantastic on offense against Michigan, but not so great on defense—until you give the defense credit for the two pick sixes, then things even out a bit. Overall it was clearly a better performance than the K-State game.

Nor did TCU have any truly subpar offensive or defensive outings. Typically their best games were great games on offense; they had only one extraordinary defensive performance (Texas 17-10) and unlike Georgia, they held no opponents under 10 points. And while Georgia has now had just 2 "close call" wins, TCU lived by them, with 9 wins by 10 or fewer points. In fact seven games in a row—from Kansas through Baylor—were hard-fought wins, many of them comebacks, the most memorable being their last-second "sprint" field goal that beat Baylor. And now, of course, the Michigan win, which was very close but was also a rare game where they led the whole way.

Key Injuries / opt-outs

So far no certain injury outages. A few players for Georgia are listed as questionable.

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: Georgia is a huge favorite, opening at almost two touchdowns. TCU might get some motivation from this, as they were motivated enough over the Michigan spread of 7 points.
Location: California; this will essentially be Georgia's first non-home game in a month and a half
Coaching: No change. Kirby Smart is in his 7th year at Georgia; Sonny Dykes is in his first year at TCU, his 12th head coaching year overall
Motivation: For this game, motivation is a given. The question is whether there's anything extra for one team or another. Certainly TCU has to be the hungrier team, as Georgia won it all last year.
Momentum: Momentum isn't really relevant in the national championship game, especially with a Playoff where each team just won a game. And in this case, both wins were somewhat similar—close games that required some luck on the part of the victor. The only difference is that Georgia was coming back all game, while TCU was holding off Michigan from the start.

This is a tough one to parse. Teams that are trying to repeat are never at peak hunger; it's part of the reason repeating is so difficult. And teams that are part of a big turnaround season often run out of gas near the finish line. But in both these cases, the Playoff format softens the blow. If Georgia lacked hunger, it would have manifested against Ohio State (and maybe it did). And if TCU had stage fright it would have shown up vs. Michigan (and there was no real sign of it). Now that they're in the final game, maybe "extra" hunger or lack of it isn't really a thing?

Final analysis

Both squads are lucky to be here. Ohio State makes that field goal and Georgia's season is over. The officials decline to overturn what looked like a clear touchdown to everyone in that stadium, and TCU is most likely going home too. Those were back and forth games where any outcome was possible; Georgia and TCU both got lucky. There's really no point to saying that other than it points to the fact that any outcome is possible in the title game.

Both teams are playing less-than-stellar defense lately; for Georgia, this means they are playing good but not great defense, while TCU is playing decent-to-poor defense. I'd look for another high-scoring game as both offenses have been clicking. That could mean anything from a very even shootout to a blowout. It's not very likely TCU can scores enough on Georgia's defense to blow away the Bulldogs, but if the Georgia offense is having a good day it could be very one-sided in the Bulldogs' favor. There's a reason they're such a big favorite.

When you look at Alabama and all the times they tried to repeat in the Playoff era, you see that they won it all in 2015, then got to the finals in 2016 and lost to Clemson; won it all in 2017 and tried to repeat in 2018 and lost to Clemson again; then won it all in 2020 and tried to repeat in 2021 and lost to Georgia. With Alabama going 3 for 3 in getting to the championship game after a championship, and going 0 for 3 in those games, it doesn't bode well for Georgia. Something about the "repeat" mindset just takes the edge off great teams.

And with both teams playing poor defense lately (each relative to how well they normally play) it suggests another shootout game like we saw in both semifinals. It's not hard to imagine Georgia's offense bogging down like it does occasionally—as it did at times against Ohio State—and this time, when they need a comeback, maybe they don't get it for the first time. TCU knows how to play through adversity, it's part of who they are. Georgia just expects to win and so far, it's happened. One team or the other is going to run out of luck this time, maybe it's Georgia's turn. Repeating is just too difficult.

I didn't think TCU would make it here, but since they did, I'm going to pick an upset. As usual, a close game that TCU barely wins. And I know this means we would be blessed with three great Playoff games and that hasn't happened yet, but it's due to happen once before the Playoff goes crazy with 12 teams.

Prediction: TCU 35, Georgia 31

More previews, odds, and predictions: View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule.

January 03, 2023 at 06:38 PM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

December 15, 2022

2022 Frisco Bowl Preview, Odds, and Prediction: Boise State vs. North Texas

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Frisco Bowl in Frisco, TX
When: Saturday, December 17 at 9:15 pm ET
TV: ESPN

Boise State Broncos (9-4) vs. North Texas Mean Green (7-6)

Boise State travels 1,500 miles into North Texas's backyard. Both teams lost their conference title game to end up here.

Vegas line/spread: Boise State by 12 (over/under 63)

Boise is one of several 10+ point favorites in the earlier bowl games. It's unclear whether Vegas has spotted North Texas any consideration for playing very close to home; it appears not as 12 is a pretty hefty spread. The line moved up from 10, and the over/under was up from 56.5 to 60, then to 63 on game day.

Strength power rating: #64 Boise State 33, #90 North Texas 28

Best/Worst removed: Boise State 33-27

Turnover corrected: Boise State 33-28

We're giving North Texas partial home field advantage for playing in-state, and really, almost in-city as Frisco is just 35 miles from Denton. It still leaves Boise State the favorite but not with much leeway.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -10 Spread
Boise State	57%	41.4%
North Texas	43%	58.6%

Boise State wins most of the game-comparisons but against the hefty 10 point spread the odds flip against them.

When Boise State has the ball

Boise State scoring offense(adj): #62	North Texas scoring defense(adj): #109
Boise State rushing offense(raw): #38	North Texas rushing defense(raw): #107
Boise State passing offense(raw): #109	North Texas passing defense(raw): #115

This matchup favors the Broncos pretty clearly, even though their offense is very average North Texas's defense is very below average. While the rush/pass numbers are unadjusted the teams play roughly similar schedule strength, and North Texas's defense looks bad across the board no matter how you slice it. Particularly the ground game led by George Holani would be promising, except that Holani will miss the game with an injury. 2nd leading rusher Ashton Jeanty (643 yards) has a similar per-carry average.

When North Texas has the ball

North Texas scoring offense(adj): #61	Boise State scoring defense(adj): #53
North Texas rushing offense(raw): #24	Boise State rushing defense(raw): #25
North Texas passing offense(raw): #36	Boise State passing defense(raw): #4

North Texas has almost the exact scoring offense rank as Boise State, but the Broncos counter with a decent defense. And although the Mean Green can run the ball and pass (at least against their poor opposition), Boise State's defense is up to the task of slowing them down. In fact, looking at Boise State's yardage numbers on defense, you'd think they have a lockdown D for sure! Top 25 vs. the run, Top 5 vs. the pass? But remember these are unadjusted for competition, and Boise played the #100 schedule in the country out of 131.

So while their rush and pass defense are no doubt good, they're not that great. Look at their scoring defense—which is adjusted—for reference. That's how good their defense is. Their unadjusted scoring defense is #11, so you'd expect them to have the #25 and #4 yardage defenses, unadjusted. In this case it doesn't matter too much because North Texas has an SOS of #105, so you can probably compare the two teams rankings fairly. Just not against teams who play a tough schedule!

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): Boise State: #79 North Texas: #30

One way North Texas might keep the game close is via special teams play.

Boise State's season (9-4) • SOS: #100

Non-conf losses: 3 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 5-3
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-1

@#14 Oregon St 17-34
@New Mexico 31-14
Tennessee-Martin 30-7
@UTEP 10-27
San Diego St 35-13
Fresno St 40-20
@Air Force 19-14
Colorado St 49-10
Brigham Young 28-31
@Nevada 41-3
@Wyoming 20-17
Utah St 42-23
Fresno St 16-28

Boise State lost their opener at eventual top 25 team Oregon State, and in game four suffered a terrible loss at UTEP that stands as their worst performance. The Broncos had four solid wins after that over three bowl teams. They lost a close one at BYU but finished 9-3 heading into the rematch with Fresno State, whom they beat previously 40-20. This time they lost, however, 28-16 and instead of playing Washington State in the L.A. Bowl they ended up in the Frisco Bowl against North Texas.

Boise has a lot of non-conference losses and 2 home losses; neither is a good sign.

North Texas's season (7-6) • SOS: #105

Non-conf losses: 3 • Home losses: 1
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 1-5
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-2

@UTEP 31-13
SMU 10-48
Texas Southern 59-27
@UNLV 27-58
@Memphis 34-44
Florida Atlantic 45-28
Louisiana Tech 47-27
@#25 UTSA 27-31
@Western Kentucky 40-13
Florida Int'l 52-14
@UAB 21-41
Rice 21-17
@#25 UTSA 27-48

North Texas started with a 31-13 win at UTEP (remember, UTEP beat Boise 27-10) but were crushed by SMU 48-10. They racked up 59 on Texas Southern but allowed 58 to UNLV in their next game. Then the Mean Green had a 6-game stretch of quality, starting even with the 10 point loss at Memphis and including a 4-point loss to UTSA along with four wins, the best being a 40-13 win at Western Kentucky. Their last three efforts were poor and they lost two of them, including the rematch with UTSA which went much worse.

We noted Boise's non-conference losses but North Texas matches them with three, though they only had one home loss. Their record vs. bowl teams is much worse, too, with only one win. They are 0-2 against top 25 teams but it's the same team (UTSA) twice.

Key Injuries / opt-outs

#1 rusher George Holani (1,133) is out with injury for Boise State, while backup QB Hank Bachmeier has entered the transfer portal.

#3 receiver Stefan Cobbs is questionable for Boise. For North Texas, #3 rusher Oscar Adaway is questionable.

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: Boise State is a pretty big favorite and may get a bit overconfident.
Location: North Texas is playing 35 miles from home while Boise is 1500 miles from Boise. That's worth a couple points probably.
Coaching: Despite their 7-6 record and bowl appearance, head coach Seth Littrell was fired by North Texas; DC Phil Bennett will coach the team during the bowl.
Motivation: Both teams lost their conference title game so they both had slightly higher hopes for the bowl season. Note that Boise has only been to one bowl in the last four years as they didn't go in 2020 and their bowls were cancelled in 2021 and 2018 (called after delays).
Momentum: Neither team has momentum after their conference title game loss but from last season both teams saw an improvement. Boise State did better than last year's 7-5 and last year was unable to compete in their bowl game, so they should be somewhat pleased now. North Texas improved from 6-6 last year but apparently 7-6 is not good enough for such a high-profile program(?) and they fired their coach.

The coaching change is the big question here, and it comes as a bit of a surprise. It's not like North Texas is a huge coaching destination, and the team did (slightly) better than last season. How will the team respond? Normally coaching changes don't make much difference, surprisingly. If the team is really upset that a coach left, or got fired, then they might play poorly but in general it's mostly a non-factor.

Both teams lost their conference title game but it hits harder for Boise State, who beat Fresno State earlier in the year. North Texas couldn't beat UTSA the first time and was an underdog in game two, so they were prepared for coming here. For Boise, a win wouldn't have improved their bowl game very much, as Fresno State is playing on the same day.

The chance for Boise to be unmotivated and overconfident is perhaps offset by North Texas losing their coach, though the Mean Green does get to play close to home. A lot of random little factors to consider, perhaps.

Final analysis

Lots of factors to discuss here. George Holani's absence puts a damper on Boise's ability to exploit North Texas's rushing defense, but backup Ashton Jeanty should be able to capitalize much the same.

Boise is a 10 point favorite, which is probably a bit high, especially for a game in North Texas's back yard. But the Mean Green's loss of their coach probably affected the line. One reason it's hard to see the effect of losing a coach is that the oddsmakers adjust for it, so there is little effect "against expectations" i.e. the spread.

North Texas firing their coach has some people puzzled. Weren't they a whole lot worst before he got there? Yes, but he also had a .500 record and went 0-5 in bowl games. Every school imagines they're going to be the next Boise State, a program that became a Power Five level program for nearly a decade. And that's another factor—how disappointed will Boise and its fans be after another decent-but-not-great season? After so many years of 12-1, the slow decline into a perennial 9-4 is a big downer. They don't see themselves as being in the same situation as North Texas—just another Group of Five conference title game loser.

So does a disgruntled Boise State take out their frustrations on a coach-less North Texas? Or do the Broncos come in flat and go through the motions, only to find that a half-hearted attempt won't cut it against a team playing close to home? It's always tempting to split the difference and say the underdog covers but loses, but that's a cop-out.

It would certainly be ironic if North Texas finally won a bowl after Seth Littrell gets fired, but Boise State hasn't won a bowl since 2017 so something's got to give. Looks like I'm taking the cop-out: Boise wins, North Texas covers.

Prediction: Boise State 33, North Texas 27

More previews, odds, and predictions: View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule.

December 15, 2022 at 06:28 PM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

2022 Armed Forces Bowl Preview, Odds, and Prediction: Air Force vs. Baylor

View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule here

Armed Forces Bowl in Fort Worth, TX
When: Thursday, December 22 at 7:30 pm ET
TV: ESPN

Air Force Falcons (9-3) vs. Baylor Bears (6-6)

Air Force really should be the "home" team in the Armed Forces Bowl but it's Baylor playing pretty close to home.

Vegas line/spread: Baylor by 3 1/2 (over/under 43)

The Bears were about a touchdown favorite to win but the line moved from 6 1/2 to 3 1/2. It's expected to be a lower-scoring game, the o/u dropping from 49.5 to 48.5 before plunging to 43.

Strength power rating: #19 Baylor 31, #61 Air Force 17

Best/Worst removed: Baylor 31-17

Turnover corrected: Baylor 32-17

Our power rating has the Bears favorited by a lot more than Vegas, two touchdowns instead of one. This is with partial home field advantage added for Baylor playing in-state and much closer than Air Force.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -6.5 Spread
Baylor	78%	68%
Air Force	22%	32%

As can be gleaned from our score projection Baylor wins most of the comparisons straight up and more than 2/3 against the initial 6.5 point spread.

When Air Force has the ball

Air Force scoring offense(adj): #93	Baylor scoring defense(adj): #34
Air Force rushing offense(raw): #1	Baylor rushing defense(raw): #45
Air Force passing offense(raw): #131	Baylor passing defense(raw): #80

Air Force's offense doesn't look like a good match for Baylor's defense at first blush, with the properly-adjusted figures showing the #93 offense against the #34 defense. The rest of the numbers here are unadjusted for opponents, which is a BIG deal since Air Force plays the #130 schedule in the nation while Baylor's SOS is #16.

But you get the idea from Air Force's raw numbers. #1 in rushing and dead last in passing yards, so what do you think they're going to do in the bowl game? The question is how good is Baylor's rushing defense, and we can confidently say it's a lot better than the raw value of #45 would suggest. The key is really how well they've prepared for the triple option, which is a whole thing of its own, but with almost a month to work on it they should be pretty decent at least. Brad Robert leads the Falcons with 1,612 yards and two others combine for over 1,300 yards. That's over 3,000 yards on the ground from three players, and the Falcons are close to 4,000 overall.

When Baylor has the ball

Baylor scoring offense(adj): #25	Air Force scoring defense(adj): #31
Baylor rushing offense(raw): #33	Air Force rushing defense(raw): #9
Baylor passing offense(raw): #61	Air Force passing defense(raw): #2

Things are pretty even here, as the adjusted scoring offense and defense ranking tell us. When you look at Air Force's rushing and passing defense, that's when you see how raw figures skew the truth. Air Force does not have the best defense in the country, which is what you'd gather if they really had the #2 rush defense and #9 pass defense. Against the #130 schedule, those kind of things are possible. For comparison, their #2 pass defense ranks #33 in pass efficiency defense, a more insightful metric than raw yardage.

But Air Force's adjusted scoring defense rank of #31 shows their D is capable of matching up against Baylor's #25 offense. The best offense they've played is #62 Boise State, so this game is going to test them in a big way. The Bears have the first offense that is worthy of their defense!

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): Air Force: #106 Baylor: #119

Neither team has good special teams so they ought to cancel each other out. But it also means the game might get sloppy between the drives. Baylor's special teams coordinator was fired after the close of the season.

Air Force's season (9-3) • SOS: #130

Non-conf losses: 0 • Home losses: 1
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 1-3
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-0

Northern Iowa 48-17
Colorado 41-10
@Wyoming 14-17
Nevada 48-20
Navy 13-10
@Utah St 27-34
@UNLV 42-7
Boise St 14-19
=Army 13-7
New Mexico 35-3
Colorado St 24-12
@San Diego St 13-3

Air Force played just about the weakest schedule in the country, with just four bowl teams. At least Northern Iowa is a good FCS team and they handled them well in the opener as well as Colorado which gave them a Power Five win. They were edged by Wyoming on the road and later Utah State, while Boise handed the Falcons their only home loss. They won four straight at the end and in their final game got their only win over a bowl team.

Baylor's season (6-6) • SOS: #16

Non-conf losses: 1 • Home losses: 3
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 3-6
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-3

Albany NY 69-10
@BYU 20-26 2OT
Texas State 42-7
@Iowa St 31-24
Oklahoma St 25-36
@West Virginia 40-43
Kansas 35-23
@Texas Tech 45-17
@Oklahoma 38-35
#9 Kansas St 3-31
#3 TCU 28-29
@#20 Texas 27-38

The Bears crushed Albany in the opener but fell to BYU in double overtime. Being in the Big Twelve means playing 8 bowl teams in-conference and Baylor went 3-5 among those, with their best win the 45-17 crushing of Texas Tech on the road. They dropped three straight at the end but all three of those teams ended up in the final Committee Top 25. The last two losses in particular were strong efforts worthy of a top 25, they just fell short against TCU (29-28) and at Texas (38-27).

Baylor did suffer three home losses, the worst being 31-3 to Kansas State.

Key Injuries / opt-outs

Baylor starting safety Devin Neal entered the transfer portal, and #2 receiver Gavin Holmes is questionable. Backup QB Kyron Drones has entered the portal as well.

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: Baylor is the favorite, which is to be expected as a Power Five team; they aren't favored by so much that they might feel overconfident though. And playing a triple option team is always a challenge that has to be prepared for.
Location: Baylor will be playing in-state, so that's a consideration; Air Force is 10 hours away and a different time zone. However, they're playing on TCU's home field and the local crowd will probably root against them.
Coaching: No change at head coach for either school. Baylor coach Dave Aranda did fire the team's defensive coordinator and special teams coach.
Motivation: Air Force won 9 games last year, too, and played in a Texas bowl then, too. Baylor is playing in Texas which is good but this probably isn't the bowl they hoped for when they were 6-3, and it's nothing like the season they had last year as 11-2 Big Twelve champions headed to the Sugar Bowl.
Momentum: Air Force won 4 straight at the end of the year while Baylor lost three straight. But is momentum even real? This is a good test case.

An obvious potential motivation issue for Baylor, and they need to take this game seriously to win it. On offense they'll be facing a pretty good defense they can't afford to underestimate, and on defense they need to prepare for Air Force's "flexbone" triple option.

Final analysis

Baylor picked either the right time or the completely wrong time to switch defensive coordinators, as they'll be preparing for a very different kind of opponent in Air Force. Also probably a good time as any to lose a starting safety, as they won't be covering receivers very much. The challenge for the Bears is preparing for Air Force and the triple option. The offense and defense rankings indicate that Baylor has the talent to reign in the Falcon offense if they prepare seriously, but the issue of motivation lurks behind that statement.

Two things could cause lack of motivation: players comparing this year to last year, and being deflated after Baylor's three-game skid. The latter is probably the lesser issue as they played very well in the last two games and there's no sign the team quit. But losing those games put the team in a lackluster situation compared to the previous season when the Bears won the Big Twelve and went to a New Year's Six bowl game.

Now, their only consolation is playing close to home, but they're playing at TCU's home stadium, which means some local fans that will root for Air Force, and unless Baylor fans show up the "in-state partial home field advantage" goes away.

Baylor has faced the #13, #17, #25 and #26 rushing teams and gave up an average of 33.25 points in those games; those were Baylor's last four opponents. Those programs are probably roughly like Air Force's #1 rushing when the numbers are adjusted for schedule. If Baylor gives up 30 points or more it's a toss-up game. The new DC will have to prep immediately for the option, and while the Bears might do a good job there, for a less-than-motivated team it's a big challenge.

The trouble for Air Force, though, is their schedule. They haven't played a team ranked higher than #62, and Baylor is the #19 team. The best defense they faced is #36 Navy, while Baylor is #34. They managed 13 points against Navy. This bowl will be a good test of motivation vs. team strength, and for picking up option defense in a hurry. We have Baylor overcoming the motivation issues and talent winning out over a team that hasn't been tested much.

Prediction: Baylor 31, Air Force 13

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December 15, 2022 at 06:23 PM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

2022 Alamo Bowl Preview, Odds, and Prediction: #13 Washington vs. #20 Texas

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Alamo Bowl in San Antonio, TX
When: Thursday, December 29 at 9:00 pm ET
TV: ESPN

#12 Washington Huskies (10-2) vs. #20 Texas Longhorns (8-4)

This is it, our first review of a bowl with two ranked teams. Enjoy!

Vegas line/spread: Texas by 3 (over/under 67.5)

Despite their lower committee rank Texas is a pretty solid favorite, though the line has dropped from 6 1/2 to just 3 points. The over/under is down from 68.5.

Strength power rating: #6 Texas 40, #21 Washington 26

Best/Worst removed: Texas 40-27

Turnover corrected: Texas 41-26

Unlike the Texas Bowl where Dallas is a neutral ground between Texas Tech and Ole Miss, in this case San Antonio is very close to Austin and very far from Seattle so we give partial home field to the Longhorns. We end up with Texas being a huge favorite, much bigger than the Vegas spread as the Longhorns rank in the top ten in Strength.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -6 Spread
Texas	78%	62.5%
Washington	22%	37.5%

Texas wins outright almost 4 of 5 times and covers more than 3 in 5 in our game-comparison system vs. the early 6 point spread.

When Washington has the ball

Washington scoring offense(adj): #8	Texas scoring defense(adj): #8
Washington rushing offense(raw): #71	Texas rushing defense(raw): #29
Washington passing offense(raw): #1	Texas passing defense(raw): #88

It's a great matchup when Washington has the ball—a top ten offense vs. a top ten defense. Both at #8 to be exact, in adjusted scoring defense. The other numbers for rushing and passing are raw numbers and less valuable, but it's certainly worth noting that Washington is the #1 passing team in the nation by raw yardage, and that Texas is only #88 in raw pass defense. But the Longhorns face a lot of pass-happy teams; in yards per attempt they're #23, and pass defense efficiency they're #42. The Huskies passing attack will be a challenge for them but Texas is much better than their raw yardage figures would suggest. Former Indiana QB Michael Penix Jr has thrown for 4,354 yards and 29 TDs vs. just 7 interceptions, and both Rome Odunze and Jalen McMillan have topped 1,000 yards already.

Texas LB DeMarvion Overshown (#2 w/95 tackles) has opted out of the bowl game.

When Texas has the ball

Texas scoring offense(adj): #10	Washington scoring defense(adj): #62
Texas rushing offense(raw): #26	Washington rushing defense(raw): #33
Texas passing offense(raw): #63	Washington passing defense(raw): #90

Texas has an offense equal to Washington's and Washington's defense isn't close to being as good as the Longhorn D. That's the basis of the argument in favor of Texas, and it's a good one. The elements of the Texas offense—rushing and passing—don't add up to a top ten scoring defense, mostly because they are raw numbers unadjusted for Texas #4 SOS. But there are other elements, such as Texas having great special teams, that allow them to turn fewer yards into more points. They're 25th in red zone conversions, too. Basically the matchups here with Washington are skewed toward the Huskies favor since they played the #53 SOS. Bijan Robinson (1,580 yards, 18 TDs) is the Longhorns main weapon, but he has opted out so the Longhorns will have to look elsewhere (and their #2 rusher is opting out as well).

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): Washington: #101 Texas: #6

If ever special teams ranking should be noted it's in this case, where Texas is in the top ten and Washington in triple digits. Worth at least a point, right?

Washington's season (10-2) • SOS: #63

Non-conf losses: 0 • Home losses: 0
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 3-2
Record vs. top 25 teams: 2-1

Kent St 45-20
Portland St 52-6
Michigan St 39-28
Stanford 40-22
@#18 UCLA 32-40
@Arizona St 38-45
Arizona 49-39
@California 28-21
#14 Oregon St 24-21
@#15 Oregon 37-34
Colorado 54-7
@Washington St 51-33

If there's any doubt the Playoff Committee pretty much just ranks by number of losses (which is ok), see Washington. In the past they've said a remarkable amount about Strength of Schedule but Washington managed to play 7 losing (or FCS) teams out of 12 games on a 9-game Power Five slate. They did end up beating two top 25 teams back to back but their first four games are pretty weak competition, and all at home. Once the Huskies ventures on the road they lost twice in a row.

But then their chart does something amazing. Every week they got a little better. It seemed that way in "real life" but a lot of teams seem that way and it doesn't show up so nicely on their chart. Six weeks in a row, like stair steps. Sure it's probably a fluke, and six wins in a row will in some cases end up this way randomly...but there might be something to it. It might mean they're set to play at or near the top of their range instead of the average point. Also note the lack of non-conference losses, nor home losses. That's going to be more common with 2-loss teams of course, but it's good nonetheless.

Texas's season (8-4) • SOS: #4

Non-conf losses: 1 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 5-4
Record vs. top 25 teams: 2-2

Louisiana-Monroe 52-10
#5 Alabama 19-20
#25 UTSA 41-20
@Texas Tech 34-37 OT
West Virginia 38-20
=Oklahoma 49-0
Iowa St 24-21
@Oklahoma St 34-41
@#9 Kansas St 34-27
#3 TCU 10-17
@Kansas 55-14
Baylor 38-27

Texas came very close to being undefeated, about as close as a 4-loss team can get, and played two of the best games that any team played all season in the college football world.

First the losses: to #5 Alabama by 1 point; at Texas Tech in overtime; at Oklahoma State by a touchdown; and at home to #3 TCU by a touchdown. They probably should have gotten two of those (though to be fair, Iowa State and Kansas State wins were close too).

The big wins: the Longhorns beat Oklahoma 49-0 on a neutral field, which rates as the biggest win of any team all season, even ahead of Georgia 49-3 over Oregon. The 55-14 win at Kansas was "off the charts" too.

What does this mean? That Texas is arguably the best team in the country when they play at their peak. But they rarely make it there, and have a lot of variation in how well they play. They've never lost by a lot or played a terrible game, but they don't show consistent dominance. You also have to factor in the 4th toughest schedule in the country.

Key Injuries / opt-outs

Texas backup QB Hudson Card (928 yards, 6:1) has entered the transfer portal, as have a few backup defensive players and a backup offensive lineman. More important are the opt-outs: LB DeMarvion Overshown (#2 w/95 tackles) and #1 rusher Bijan Robinson (1,580 yards, 18 TDs) as well as #2 rusher Roschon Johnson (554 yds).

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: Texas being a favorite might surprise some, and might piss Washington off as the higher-ranked team. It insures they won't take the Longhorns lightly, though that was very unlikely to begin with.
Location: Texas is playing about an hour from home and should have a lot more fans, pretty close to a home environment but not quite.
Coaching: No change.
Motivation: Washington certainly likes how this year turned out after last year's 4-8 effort, and the pandemic-shortened 3-1 season in 2020. Texas probably has mixed feelings about all the close losses but last year they were 5-7 and didn't go bowling, so they really aren't in much of a different situation than Washington.
Momentum: Texas can't be said to have much momentum, since every time they got going they'd drop a close game. They finished with two good wins thought. Washington has the most momentum I've seen since Auburn in 2010, getting better seemingly every week on their chart. Will it follow through?

Most people talking about this game are noting Washington's turnaround from 4-8 to 10-2, but Texas did a similar jump from 5-7 to 8-4, given how close they were to beating teams like Alabama and TCU. The main thing is both teams got back to a bowl game and are playing a quality opponent, so I don't see any downside for Texas. Both teams should be pumped for this game.

But Washington does have a lot more of that elusive "momentum" which sometimes delivers, sometimes not. Finding the inflection point is the hardest thing when predicting anything: when does the trend continue and when does it reverse?

Final analysis

If the Texas that beat Oklahoma 49-0 and Kansas 55-14 shows up, the Huskies have no hope. Texas wins in a rout. But that team only showed up in 17% of the Longhorns' games.

Meanwhile if Washington's rating keeps climbing the stairstep they've made over the last 7 weeks then they'll beat any team Texas fields (that isn't related to those two games mentioned).

In 2010 Auburn kept climbing and climbing a stairstep, seen to the left. The first graph is before the national title game with Oregon, and I was trying to figure out if it was for real. Could they really keep getting better each week? The final game was clearly an outlier, but would the series pick up where it left off? In other words, do I just use their average game or will it be closer to the top of the stairs?

As it turned out, I used the average and predicted an Oregon win; instead, they played near the top of the range—just up from the main "steps" and beat the Ducks. Same of the "steps" flattened after the bowl season but the Tigers kept the stairs going up somehow. And Washington's steps are even more pronounced. This is basically to call the game: if Washington doesn't play at the top of the stairs, they lose; if they do, they win. And almost everything else points to Texas or is a draw.

Meanwhile while doing all this thinking, a key offensive and defensive player have joined the crowd of Texas players opting out or transferring, while nothing of the sort is happening for Washington. Let's give this one to the Huskies.

Prediction: Washington 30, Texas 23

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December 15, 2022 at 06:09 PM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

2022 Peach Bowl Preview, Odds, & Prediction: #1 Georgia vs. #4 Ohio State

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Peach Bowl in Atlanta, GA
When: Saturday, December 31 at 8:00 pm ET
TV: ESPN

#1 Georgia Bulldogs (13-0) vs. #4 Ohio State Buckeyes (11-1)

This is the big one, the game most people figured would be in the national championship game but we get to see it a week early.

Vegas line/spread: Georgia by 5 (over/under 61.5)

Georgia is a pretty hefty favorite over Ohio State; before the Michigan game this would have been a lot tighter. Also the location helps. The line held steady for about three weeks, before dipping 1/2 point before game day and down another point on game day as "big wagers by influential bettors" came in according to ESPN.

Strength power rating: #1 Georgia 34, #2 Ohio State 29

Best/Worst removed: Georgia 34-30

Turnover corrected: Georgia 35-28

In our book this is #1 vs. #2. Despite Ohio State's loss to Michigan they still out-rate the #3 Wolverines and everyone else other than the Bulldogs. We give a large chunk of home-field advantage to the Bulldogs, too, for playing in what is basically their home away from home in Atlanta.

Throwing out each team's best and worst games narrows things by about a point, while correcting for turnovers widens the spread to a touchdown, pretty much matching the oddsmakers' line.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -6.5 Spread
Georgia	57%	46.2%
Ohio State	43%	53.8%

Georgia wins most of the game comparisons but doesn't cover the majority of the time when game performances are compared.

When Georgia has the ball

Georgia scoring offense(adj): #3	Ohio State scoring defense(adj): #16
Georgia rushing offense(raw): #18	Ohio State rushing defense(raw): #23
Georgia passing offense(raw): #19	Ohio State passing defense(raw): #14

This is the biggest advantage in the game, and it's not huge. Georgia's #3 scoring offense vs. Ohio State's #16 defense. The other numbers (rushing/passing) are unadjusted and should be taken with some skepticism. But they show Georgia has a balanced offense and Ohio State no major weakness on defense. QB Stetson Bennett (3,425 yards, 20:6) is normally thought of as a game manager but if so he's among the best, and can run when needed. The receiving yards and running plays are spread out over a number of players, suggesting a machine-like offense that gets the job done, though results vary from week to week. On their good weeks they outclass Ohio State's defense, but on the off weeks they have struggled against lesser defenses.

When Ohio State has the ball

Ohio State scoring offense(adj): #2	Georgia scoring defense(adj): #1
Ohio State rushing offense(raw): #28	Georgia rushing defense(raw): #1
Ohio State passing offense(raw): #14	Georgia passing defense(raw): #51

Ohio State has the 2nd best offense in the country. Of course, Georgia has the top defense in the country. This is a great matchup and will be amazing to see CJ Stroud (3,340 yards, 37:6) face off against the top D in the nation. Two receivers for the Buckeyes (Marvin Harrison Jr and Emeka Egbuka) already top 1,000 yards. The ground game is strong but Georgia boasts the #1 rushing defense in the nation (this number is unadjusted but very likely would be the same when adjusted for opposition). Ohio State's #2 rusher TreVeyon Henderson (571 yards) is out with injury, also.

The pass defense number for Georgia is misleading based on the offenses they've faced; on a per-attempt basis they are #13 and they're #11 in pass efficiency defense, so the "hole" suggested by the #51 ranking is a good example of why unadjusted figures aren't reliable. And per-game pass numbers, even if adjusted, can be misleading if all teams do is try to pass the ball. Since Georgia's rush defense is so lockdown teams go to the air often, and that leads to overinflated pass numbers. That's not to say Stroud can't move the ball against the Bulldog pass defense—it's clearly their best option.

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): Georgia: #79 Ohio State: #71

This might be where the game is won, but it's tight here, too, so who will have the big play? No real predictive value here.

Georgia's season (13-0) • SOS: #24

Non-conf losses: 0 • Home losses: 0
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 8-0
Record vs. top 25 teams: 5-0

+#15 Oregon 49-3
Samford 33-0
@#19 South Carolina 48-7
Kent St 39-22
@Missouri 26-22
Auburn 42-10
Vanderbilt 55-0
=Florida 42-20
#6 Tennessee 27-13
@#22 Mississippi St 45-19
@Kentucky 16-6
Georgia Tech 37-14
+#17 LSU 50-30

Along the way they beat five Committee top 25 teams, more than anyone else, and 8 bowl-bound teams. The biggest win was over Tennessee, where they held the top offense in the nation to just 13 points. They also beat South Carolina 48-7 and Mississippi State 45-19. Add in the 20 point win over LSU and they beat 5 top 25 teams by an average of 29.4 points, 5 points more than their average margin over the rest of their slate.

Georgia started and ended the season in Atlanta, where the Peach Bowl will be played.

Ohio State's season (11-1) • SOS: #39

Non-conf losses: 0 • Home losses: 1
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 6-1
Record vs. top 25 teams: 2-1

#21 Notre Dame 21-10
Arkansas St 45-12
Toledo 77-21
Wisconsin 52-21
Rutgers 49-10
@Michigan St 49-20
Iowa 54-10
@#11 Penn State 44-31
@Northwestern 21-7
Indiana 56-14
@Maryland 43-30
#2 Michigan 23-45

Ohio State's first two games weren't that impressive offensively, as they scored just 21 on Notre Dame and 45 on Arkansas State. But after that the offense went on a tear and had several off-the-charts performances, starting with 77 vs. Toledo, then 52 on Wisconsin, 49 vs. Rutgers 49 vs. Michigan State, 54 vs. Iowa, 44 vs. Penn State, 56 on Indiana, and 43 vs. Maryland. The only bad performance in this stretch was the 21-7 win over Northwestern that took place in a wind storm and made passing and kicking the ball impossible.

But after 10 straight games (not counting Northwestern) of 43 points or more the Buckeyes only put up 23 against Michigan at home, a bad note to end the year on, especially when facing one of the only superior defenses in the country next time around. And giving up 45 points to a similarly good offense was their defense's worst outing by quite a bit. They had held 9 of 11 opponents to 21 or under and 31 was the previous high.

From an overall perspective the season was great: six wins over bowl teams, two wins over top 25 opponents. And before the Michigan game they were arguably the best team in the country. To lose by 22 on your home field can really affect a team, especially when it's to your hated rival, and no rivalry is more full of hate than Ohio State-Michigan, not even Auburn-Alabama or Oklahoma-Texas.

Key Injuries / opt-outs

Ohio State's leading rusher Miyan Williams (817 yards, 13 TDs) has had the flu recently and missed practice but is expected to play. 2nd leading rusher TreVeyon Henderson (571 yards) has been out with injury most of the season and won't be back.

#2 receiver Ladd McConkey (675 yds) is questionable for Georgia.

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: Georgia is a fairly big favorite, and that probably doesn't sit well with Ohio State. Doesn't add much motivation to winning a Playoff game though. And Ohio State's interviews about being the underdog don't inspire confidence either, with cliché sentiments like "we've been counted out before" that aren't really true.
Location: This is very important. Georgia playing in Atlanta is basically a home field when the opponent is outside the South. Maybe not fully a home field but a "home-away-from-home-field." See Analysis for an estimate of Georgia's HFA when in Atlanta.
Coaching: No changes.
Motivation: Any team in the Playoff is motivated, but how extra motivated are they? Georgia is probably not "extra" motivated as they won it all last year, and we've seen how that works with Alabama, who alternates championship years generally. Yet the Tide tend to win the first Playoff game even on "off-years." Meanwhile Ohio State didn't make the Playoff last year so there's motivation there, and they surely want to rematch Michigan...or do they?
Momentum: Ohio State backed into the Playoff and their loss was terrible, so they really have no momentum to speak of. But Georgia did just fine in a similar situation last year. This year they coast into the Playoff.

It's hard to really say one team could be more "up" for a Playoff game than another. We know that neither team will be "down" or unmotivated to win this game. It's more a question of which team has some extra motivation. It is possible that Georgia is less motivated since they were here last year, they won it all, and Ohio State missed the Playoff last season and will be more "up."

At the same time the Michigan game probably took something out of them. Losing on the road to the Wolverines last year was one thing, but losing at home, the second year in a row, when they've been raised from pups to believe Ohio State never loses to Michigan? It's even more telling to read about how the players like Stroud were affected by negative comments from fans on Twitter; they seem to feel the fanbase is abandoning them. This really paints a picture of a team not mentally up to the task of competing in a Playoff game.

Final analysis

Ohio State has a great offense, 2nd in the country only to Tennessee. Of course, Georgia held Tennessee to 13 points. That's probably the most basic comparison we can make, outside of the power rating estimate. Meanwhile Georgia has the #3 offense while #5 offense Michigan torched the Buckeyes for 45 points. Of course those were Ohio State's worst defensive performance and Georgia's best (or 2nd best to the Oregon game). But it makes you consider the possibilities. The most comparable defense Georgia faced was LSU and they scored 50 points; Ohio State faced the #3 defense with Michigan and scored 23.

I also looked at Ohio State's game vs. Northwestern, a 21-7 win in Evanston during 20 to 40 mile per hour winds that rendered Ohio State's passing game useless. Discounting this game, Ohio State pulls almost equal to Georgia in our power rating, separated by about a point. Should this game count? It's certainly not representative of Ohio State's quality, and not for anything that was their own fault either. At the same time, though, they should have been able to impose their will on Northwestern on the ground and really couldn't. If we do exclude that game as a fluke, our projected winning margin for Georgia essentially comes down to home field advantage for playing in Atlanta.

And let's talk about Georgia playing in Atlanta. They started and ended the season there, beating Oregon 49-3 and LSU 50-30. In both cases, those are above the projected margin for a neutral field (by a lot). In Atlanta they're in-state, close to home, in fact it's really their home away from home. They might not have "home field advantage" when playing Alabama, and maybe not even LSU but certainly Oregon was a fully home game for the Bulldogs. And Ohio State is pretty similar—they should get the majority of normal home field advantage in the Peach Bowl.

Georgia's home field advantage could be the difference overall. I looked at seven games since 2017 that Georgia played in Atlanta, not counting the 2020 Peach Bowl against Cincinnati since the power ratings for that year are wonky. Five of the seven times, Georgia outperformed the power rating's expectation for a neutral field. The two underperformances were big and the average ended up at 1.7 points. Every game except one was against teams also from the South (Alabama, LSU, Auburn) and the biggest effect was vs. Oregon. I expanded the search (Georgia has played 40 times in Atlanta, starting in 1902; I used just the 23 (-Cincy) from 1955-2022, the post-WWII era (there are none from 1945-1954), and the average was an even 2 points. It's 2.6 over the last 50 years and 3 points over the last 25, but I'm not sure it gets more accurate by excluding the older figures as it changes a lot moving from excluding one game to the next. Two points seems about right.

But for all that, I'm thinking it will be Georgia in a rout. The first-round Playoff games tend to be routs, and Ohio State has to get over the Michigan loss. Are they that motivated to play the Wolverines again? Maybe, and they'll say so, but they seemed really off at the end of that game. It should be a great game, and all the stats point to it, and obviously anything can happen—but I'm going out on a limb and saying it's not close.

Prediction: Georgia 41, Ohio State 22

More previews, odds, and predictions: View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule.

December 15, 2022 at 02:19 PM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

2022 Rose Bowl Preview, Odds, & Prediction: #8 Utah vs. #11 Penn State

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Rose Bowl in Pasadena, CA
When: Monday, January 2 at 5:00 pm ET
TV: ESPN

#8 Utah Utes (10-3) vs. #11 Penn State Nittany Lions (10-2)

A great Rose Bowl, even if they only got the Big Ten's third best team.

Vegas line/spread: Penn State by 1 (over/under 53.5)

Utah was a slim favorite right up until kickoff. The line was down from Utah - 2 1/2 to just a point the day before kickoff, with the over up 1.5 points. By kickoff Penn State was a 1-point favorite.

Strength power rating: #9 Penn State 29 #10 Utah 28

Best/Worst removed: Penn State 29-28

Turnover corrected: Utah 29-28

These teams rank so close in our Strength power rating that the result can best be considered a double overtime game. Penn State actually ranks a notch higher at #9 to Utah's #10 but it's very tight.

If we remove each team's outliers, Penn State still wins and maybe it's only a 1-overtime game. However if we attempt to correct for the effect of mostly-random turnovers, Utah is now the overtime winner. In every case neither team "wins" by even 1/2 a point.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -2.5 Spread
Utah	52.6%	41%
Penn State	47.4%	59%

Although Penn State is the favorite in Strength (by about 0.2 points) when comparing their game results against each other the Utes win the majority. So in this way you could say our power rating favors Utah; if the teams played 156 times the Utes would win 82 and lose 74, but the average of those games is a Penn State win by 0.2 points.

Against the small spread things change pretty dramatically and Penn State wins almost 3 of 5 times.

When Utah has the ball

Utah scoring offense(adj): #15	Penn State scoring defense(adj): #11
Utah rushing offense(raw): #10	Penn State rushing defense(raw): #14
Utah passing offense(raw): #48	Penn State passing defense(raw): #49

Everything's pretty close here, down to the rushing and passing figures, which are raw values, uncorrected for opposition, but they've played about the same level of schedule. Utah can score and Penn State can defend, both in the top 25. Looks like a very even matchup when Utah has the ball.

QB Cameron Rising (2,939 yds, 25:7, 409 rushing) is a dual threat leader of Utah's offense; he averages 6.0 yards per carry even after subtracting 62 sack yards (his NFL average would be 6.9 yards per carry). Three running backs share the workload and five receivers top 300 yards, but Utah's leading rusher, Tavion Thomas (687 yards) is opting out, as is their leading receiver, TE Dalton Kincaid (890 yards).

When Penn State has the ball

Penn State scoring offense(adj): #11	Utah scoring defense(adj): #12
Penn State rushing offense(raw): #43	Utah rushing defense(raw): #16
Penn State passing offense(raw): #51	Utah passing defense(raw): #25

Another dead even matchup when values are adjusted. Penn State's rushing and passing figures are better than they lookbecause Penn State faces tough defenses in the Big Ten. But Utah's numbers might underestimate their defense too since they play against great offenses in the Pac-12.

Fifth-year senior Sean Clifford (2,543 yards, 22:7) leads the Lion offense and two backs, Nicholas Singleton and Kaytron Allen, have over 800 rushing yards each. Clifford isn't quite the dual threat Rising is but he can run; he has 177 net rushing yards on the year (+87 sack yards). His top target Parker Washington (611 yards) is opting out, but he has several others to choose from, and Utah is missing star corner Clark Phillips.

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): Utah: #54 Penn State: #56

As if everything else weren't close enough, these teams are dead even in special teams.

Utah's season (11-2) • SOS: #41

Non-conf losses: 1 • Home losses: 0
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 5-3
Record vs. top 25 teams: 3-2

@Florida 26-29
Southern Utah 73-7
San Diego St 35-7
@Arizona St 34-13
#14 Oregon St 42-16
@#18 UCLA 32-42
#10 Southern Cal 43-42
@Washington St 21-17
Arizona 45-20
Stanford 42-7
@#15 Oregon 17-20
@Colorado 63-21
=#10 Southern Cal 47-24

Utah looked like a possible 13-0 team from my vantage point at the beginning of the season but hit a bump right away, losing at Florida 29-26. The Utes blasted Southern Utah for 73 points to vent their frustrations, and looked unstoppable for several games before UCLA outran them 42-32. They had another track meet with USC but won that one 43-42 at home, and three more wins put them in the Pac-12 driver's seat—until they lost at Oregon. The Ducks lost to Oregon State which put the Utes in a rematch with USC, which they were losing badly until they started winning after which it became a rout.

Utah has a pretty impressive 3-2 record against Top 25 teams, with two of those being USC of course.

Penn State's season (10-2) • SOS: #38

Non-conf losses: 0 • Home losses: 1
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 4-2
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-2

@Purdue 35-31
Ohio U. 46-10
@Auburn 41-12
Central Michigan 33-14
Northwestern 17-7
@#2 Michigan 17-41
Minnesota 45-17
#4 Ohio State 31-44
@Indiana 45-14
Maryland 30-0
@Rutgers 55-10
Michigan St 35-16

Penn State won their first three games pretty impressively, beating Purdue on the road, bowl team Ohio 46-10, and Auburn 41-12 (only Georgia beat Auburn that easily).

But the next three games seemed to take Penn State out of any title talk. Unimpressive wins over Central Michigan and Northwestern led to a 41-17 loss at Michigan, and while they rebounded against Minnesota the Ohio State loss left them no room to win the East division. They soldiered on with no one really paying attention, beating bowl team Maryland 30-0 and three other losing teams by a total of 135-40. Alabama's claim to fame (and their argument for being in the Playoff) was their close losses to top teams, but Penn State lost to an undefeated team and a 1-loss. If Michigan and Ohio State were to make it to the championship game, Penn State has a very real argument for being #3 in the nation—as long as they can beat Utah.

Key Injuries / opt-outs

Utah's top receiver, Dalton Kincaid, and leading rusher Tavion Thomas are both opting out. CB Clark Phillips, who has 6 interceptions this season, is also opting out.

For Penn State #1 receiver Parker Washington is opting out as is starting CB Joey Porter.

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: Utah is a slight favorite; Penn State might not agree
Location: Both teams are pretty far away from Pasadena but while Salt Lake City is 11 hours and 1 time zone away, College Station is 40 hours and 3 time zones away. Would definitely be some points to Utah back in the days of train travel.
Coaching: No change.
Motivation: Both teams are probably pretty happy to be in the Rose Bowl. Utah had to beat USC to get here, and Penn State needed...Utah to knock USC out of the Playoff, moving Ohio State up from the Rose Bowl and putting Penn State in. So both teams owe their Rose Bowl trip to Utah.
Momentum: Utah certainly has some, while Penn State finished strong too.

Not a big edge here either way as far as I can tell. Utah's coming off a big win and Penn State won four in a row at the end. One difference might be last year's experience. Utah went to the Rose Bowl last year while Penn State was in the Outback bowl at 7-5. That won't diminish Utah's experience—they want a Rose Bowl win after last year's heartbreak—but it adds a bit for Penn State.

Final analysis

This game is pretty even and I'm surprised the line is more than one point either direction. It's probably because Utah has some big wins and Penn State doesn't—though the Lions didn't have a chance other than Michigan and Ohio State, and no one else who had a chance to beat those teams did. The games were pretty lopsided at the end but Penn State was leading in the 3rd quarter against Michigan and leading in the 4th quarter against Ohio State.

Utah also has bigger losses to opt-outs—their leading rusher and leading receiver. The Utes have plenty of others in those positions but in a close game it could definitely be the difference.

It's curious that Utah's win over USC in the Pac-12 title game sent both Utah and Penn State to the Rose Bowl. Neither team has a lot of weaknesses, they're full of strengths, and both are led by a veteran quarterback that knows how to win. Last year's Rose Bowl was one of the best bowl games and I think this one will live up to it. I'm sticking with the pick for an overtime game, with Penn State the underdog winner getting their first big win on the last day of their season, and hand Utah another Rose Bowl heartbreak.

Prediction: Penn State 31, Utah 28 OT

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December 15, 2022 at 12:11 AM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

December 14, 2022

2022 Citrus Bowl Preview, Odds, & Prediction: #17 LSU vs. Purdue

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Citrus Bowl in Orlando, FL
When: Monday, January 2 at 1:00 pm ET
TV: ABC

#17 LSU Tigers (9-4) vs. Purdue Boilermakers (8-5)

The Citrus Bowl is the consolation prize for the losers of the SEC and Big Ten title games.

Vegas line/spread: LSU by 15 (over/under 54)

LSU is a huge favorite over Purdue, among the biggest of the bowl season; there are about 5 bowls with a roughly 10-point line, and now this one is the biggest of them all, moving from 10 1/2 to 15, while the over sinks from 58.5 to 54.

Not only did the line make a huge move, but headlines too as betting on the game in New Jersey was suspended on Friday the 30th, and all bets placed after December 15th were voided! This was apparently due to Drew Brees, who is acting as a Purdue assistant, being affiliated with a sportsbook.

Strength power rating: #12 LSU 33, #37 Purdue 25

Best/Worst removed: LSU 33-25

Turnover corrected: LSU 33-25

The Strength power rating favors LSU by 8 points, and this doesn't change if we remove the team's upside and downside outlier, nor if we correct for the influence of turnovers (both teams have nearly an even turnover margin, so there was very little overall influence).

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -10.5 Spread
LSU	67.5%	47%
Purdue	32.5%	53%

LSU is favored in over 2/3 of the comparisons, but the Tigers fall short of the opening spread the majority of times.

When LSU has the ball

LSU scoring offense(adj): #28	Purdue scoring defense(adj): #49
LSU rushing offense(raw): #45	Purdue rushing defense(raw): #42
LSU passing offense(raw): #38	Purdue passing defense(raw): #50

LSU has an edge here but it's not monstrous. The Tigers are borderline top 25 on offense and Purdue is well short of that. Due to the disparity in schedule strength LSU's advantage isn't clear from the the rushing/passing figures. From these we can just glean that LSU has a balanced offense, and that Purdue doesn't have a glaring weakness on the defensive side.

But there's clearly a key to LSU's offense: Quarterback Jayden Daniels, who leads the team in passing (2,774 yards, 16:3) and rushing yards (818, 11 TDs). Daniels is "questionable" for the game but is actually expected to be at or near 100%. We'll look at how Purdue has done against dual-threat quarterbacks in the Analysis section at the bottom. The Tiger air attack might be slowed as receivers Kayshon Boutte and Jaray Jenkins have opted out. They spread the yardage around pretty well however.

When Purdue has the ball

Purdue scoring offense(adj): #35	LSU scoring defense(adj): #14
Purdue rushing offense(raw): #104	LSU rushing defense(raw): #71
Purdue passing offense(raw): #17	LSU passing defense(raw): #40

Here we see Purdue's decent offense matching up with LSU's top 25 defense. And it's clear that Purdue wants to pass the ball behind Aidan O'Connell (3,490 yards, 22:13), with WR Charlie Jones (1,361) the main target. Again, LSU's defensive numbers for rush/pass are hurt by their very tough schedule, so Purdue might have less opportunity than indicated. However, LSU will be missing a starting safety who is opting out; two others are "questionable" which means we should assume they will play.

Update: A slew of Purdue opt-outs has hit the fan. First and foremost, QB Aidan O'Connell. Also Charlie Jones and TE Payne Durham, #1 and #2 receivers with 1,361 and 560 yards each. This changes the complexion of the offense quite a bit. 6th-year senior Austin Burton (199, 3:1) will take over; he's accurate in limited action, completing 24 of 32 passes.

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): LSU: #130 Purdue: #84

LSU surprisingly has almost the worst special teams in the country. Purdue isn't very far ahead, though.

LSU's season (9-4) • SOS: #1

Non-conf losses: 1 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 6-3
Record vs. top 25 teams: 2-3

#13 Florida St 23-24
Southern U. 65-17
#22 Mississippi St 31-16
New Mexico 38-0
@Auburn 21-17
#6 Tennessee 13-40
@Florida 45-35
Mississippi 45-20
#5 Alabama 32-31 OT
@Arkansas 13-10
UAB 41-10
@Texas A&M 23-38
@#1 Georgia 30-50

LSU didn't start the Brian Kelly era well with a home loss to a questionable FSU team (that turned out to be quite good and finished #13). Their next four wins weren't all that great and they got clobbered by Tennessee 40-13. But the next five wins—in particular the overtime win vs. Alabama—put them in the running to be the first 2-loss team in the Playoff. That all died with the A&M upset loss, and the 50-30 loss to Georgia suggests there wasn't really much hope. But it has to be disheartening to blow it before you even get your shot.

LSU ended up with the toughest aggregate schedule in the nation, playing 5 top 25 teams and 9 bowl teams—and 2 others were 5-7.

Purdue's season (8-5) • SOS: #27

Non-conf losses: 1 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 3-5
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-2

#11 Penn State 31-35
Indiana St 56-0
@Syracuse 29-32
Florida Atlantic 28-26
@Minnesota 20-10
@Maryland 31-29
Nebraska 43-37
@Wisconsin 24-35
Iowa 3-24
@Illinois 31-24
Northwestern 17-9
@Indiana 30-16
=#2 Michigan 22-43

Purdue's season got off to a bad start just like LSU's but the Boilermakers knew it was going to be tough to beat Penn State. They played pretty well and crushed Indiana State 56-0 in their 2nd game, but lost a wild game at Syracuse and weren't looking hopeful at 1-2. The 2-point home Florida Atlantic win didn't convince anyone otherwise.

But the Minnesota and Maryland road wins turned things around and soon they were 5-2. With the Big Ten West completely wide open, Purdue seemingly blew their title shot with losses Wisconsin and Iowa. But three wins later, enough teams had collapsed that Purdue emerged the West winner. Their prize was a 43-22 drubbing by Michigan. And a trip to the Citrus Bowl.

Key Injuries / opt-outs

After having almost no opt-outs, everything fell apart soon after coach Brohm left. Purdue's #3 RB Kobe Lewis (146 yards) was the only one in the portal, but he's been joined by starting QB Aiden O'Connell and #1 and #2 receivers Charlie Jones and Payne Durham. On defense, starting corner Cory Trice is in the opting out as well.

For LSU, the Tigers #2 and #3 receivers have opted out. On defense starting safety Jay Ward is opting out of the bowl, along with starting DE BJ Ojulari. Two other d-backs are listed as questionable.

So is quarterback Jayden Daniels who re-aggravated his ankle injury against Georgia, but he has a full month to get ready, and coach Brian Kelly said on Dec. 4th that Daniels would be at 100% for the bowl game.

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: LSU is a solid favorite. Maybe too solid, is there a chance they get overconfident? I think maybe so, but it might not matter too much.
Location: Neutral site in Orlando; the relative distances and fan support suggests it will be a partisan LSU crowd. We didn't adjust for that in our power rating estimates.
Coaching: Purdue coach Jeff Brohm was hired away by Louisville; interestingly, the interim coach will be his brother Brian Brohm.
Motivation: LSU probably has a motivation problem facing an also-ran Big Ten team when they were poised to make the Playoff until they blew it. Purdue's problem is being motivated now that their coach left. LSU did have a much better season than last year's 6-6, while Purdue was 8-4 last year too.
Momentum: Both teams ended on a bum note, getting blasted by a 13-0 team.

Neither team is in great shape motivation-wise. Expectations got ahead of LSU and they finished with two losses. Purdue's finish wasn't as bad, as they hardly expected to beat Michigan and for a while didn't look like they'd win the Big Ten West. The Boilermakers are undoubtedly more psyched to have an opponent like LSU than vice versa. But then their coach leaves and that's all up in the air. It seems to make little predictable difference, though teams whose coach is leaving seem to do fairly well; they get over it and focus on the game, unless there's a big sense of betrayal, I suppose. And with his brother, Brian Brohm filling in, it makes it better maybe? Or at least kind of weird. Even weirder: Drew Brees is going to be an assistant coach for the game.

Final analysis

LSU and Purdue are both conference runner-ups, but neither of them can claim to be the 2nd best team in their conference. LSU was close at one time, but Purdue never was. The disparity in accomplishment shows why LSU is ranked by the Committee and Purdue isn't: LSU has a 6-3 record against bowl teams, Purdue's is 3-5.

In bowl games like these with a big favorite who (let's be honest) doesn't think much of the opposing football program, there's always the chance of complacency and an upset. And LSU is ripe for one after losing their last two games. The Georgia game means nothing, that loss was obvious. But the game before against Texas A&M was a pretty bad sign. And you'd think they were a lot more motivated to win that game than they will be to beat Purdue.

Purdue has faced three dual-threat quarterbacks this year: Garrett Shrader of Syracuse, N'Kosi Perry of FAU, and J.J. McCarthy of Michigan. Purdue did pretty bad in all those games, losing to Syracuse and Michigan and only beating FAU 28-26. And none of those three can run nearly as well as Jayden Daniels. This alone almost takes away the chance of me picking Purdue to pull off the upset.

Not that they can't play well and exceed expectations. I don't think the coaching change will affect them all that much, they're playing in a big game and had to know Brohm would go to Louisville at some point. The fact that his brother is sticking around to coach the team is interesting. It provides a lot of continuity.

So with that established—a good performance by Purdue but they can't overcome Jayden Daniels, who we are assuming is 100% after a month of healing—we're just going with the Strength power rating's judgement here, which stayed the same regardless of filtering out best and worst game, or correcting for turnovers.

Update: But it didn't filter out the effect of Purdue's offense losing its QB and two top targets. Now starting a 6th-year senior who has started one game before, and with Brian Brohm and Drew Brees coaching, this is getting surreal. I'm downgrading Purdue a bit but keeping it short of a blowout, as LSU probably isn't going to even think they have to try now. And maybe they don't. But even if they build a big lead they'll probably just want to get off the field—I just don't see them keeping their foot on the gas, which could allow Purdue to almost catch up. Almost.

Prediction: LSU 33, Purdue 20

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December 14, 2022 at 07:02 PM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

2022 Cotton Bowl Preview, Odds, & Prediction: #10 USC vs. #16 Tulane

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Cotton Bowl in Arlington, TX
When: Monday, January 2 at 1:00 pm ET
TV: ESPN

#10 USC Trojans (11-2) vs. #16 Tulane Green Wave (11-2)

At the beginning of the season who could have seen this matchup coming? Maybe in mid-December but for a New Year's Day-ish bowl game?

Vegas line/spread: USC by 2 (over/under 64)

The line has stayed pretty tight around USC as a slight favorite, up from 1 1/2 to 2 and staying near there for the last few weeks up to game day. The o/u is up 2 points.

Strength power rating: #11 USC 36, #24 Tulane 32

Best/Worst removed: USC 37-32

Turnover corrected: Tulane 35-34

USC is a 4-5 point favorite in our Strength power rating, as Tulane doesn't quite match their Committee ranking. Since USC has the #1 turnover margin in the country, the points from those turnovers boosts their power rating a lot. And since turnovers are largely random and don't continue into the future with a great degree of likelihood, factoring them out can give a more accurate picture of a team's strength. USC falls from #11 to #27 without their turnover margin, making Tulane a 1 point favorite! The bottom line is, USC needs turnover margin to be a top ten team; without it, they're borderline top 25.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -2.5 Spread
USC	62%	57.4%
Tulane	38%	42.6%

These numbers from the game-comparison system make sense given that USC's average game is a 4-point win.

When USC has the ball

USC scoring offense(adj): #6	Tulane scoring defense(adj): #28
USC rushing offense(raw): #51	Tulane rushing defense(raw): #73
USC passing offense(raw): #5	Tulane passing defense(raw): #18

It's hard to compare teams with different schedule strengths, but the Scoring Offense and Scoring Defense numbers are corrected for schedule, so we can confidently state that USC has a top ten offense while Tulane's defense is borderline top 25. The rest of the numbers need investigation, but it's clear that USC likes to pass more than run—particularly since leading rusher Travis Dye (884 yards) was lost for the season in mid-November—and Tulane's pass defense is pretty good. And as it turns out, the teams' SOS aren't that far apart.

Newly-crowned Heisman Trophy winner Caleb Williams (4,075 yards, 37:4 ratio) is coming off an injury and is officially "questionable" but says he's going to play. The oddsmakers aren't so sure, or certain that he'll be 100%. It's a big plus for the Trojans, obviously. if he's fully healthy, or rather a huge minus if he isn't. Tulane's defense is pretty good, and if he's still hobbled it could be a long night as USC's protection isn't the best.

When Tulane has the ball

Tulane scoring offense(adj): #37	USC scoring defense(adj): #61
Tulane rushing offense(raw): #30	USC rushing defense(raw): #62
Tulane passing offense(raw): #58	USC passing defense(raw): #112

Tulane's offense is good, not great, but that's okay since USC's defense is very average. And not good against the pass, even if the raw figures are bit harsher than reality. Tulane's Tyjae Spears has rushed for 1,376 yards and 15 TDs while QB Michael Pratt is a dual threat: he has 10 rushing TDs of his own to go with his 25:5 passing ratio. The Green Wave has several long ball threat receivers, too, just the kind that hurt the Trojans all year. Shane Watts and Duece Watts average 19.8 and 18.5 yards per reception.

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): USC: #83 Tulane: #46

Tulane has the edge here but it's probably not one that will affect the game much.

USC's season (11-2) • SOS: #45

Non-conf losses: 0 • Home losses: 0
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 5-2
Record vs. top 25 teams: 1-2

Rice 66-14
@Stanford 41-28
Fresno St 45-17
@Oregon St 17-14
Arizona St 42-25
Washington St 30-14
@#8 Utah 42-43
@Arizona 45-37
California 41-35
Colorado 55-17
@UCLA 48-45
#21 Notre Dame 38-27
=#8 Utah 24-47

USC's chart looks like it slopes downward, starting from an enthusiastic beginning to a tired defeat at the end. But that's almost completely caused by the first and last bars. USC's schedule was really not very hard; they played 6 bowl teams in 12 games (not counting 5-7 Rice) but ended with UCLA and Notre Dame before the Pac-12 title game. There they lost for a second time to Utah, this time emphatically instead of by 1 point. The difference was that Caleb Williams was playing hobbled and couldn't keep them in the game.

It's interesting to look at the game-by-game effect turnovers had in helping USC have a successful season. If we count each turnover as being worth 4 points (the accepted value), and note that they won the turnover battle by [4,4,2,4,0,0,1,1,0,1,3,2,-1], then if they'd had a +0 margin each game, they would have lost to Stanford, Oregon State, and UCLA in addition to both Utah games. Of course, they wouldn't have played in the 2nd one, so they'd be 8-4 now instead of 11-2.

Tulane's season (11-2) • SOS: #60

Non-conf losses: 1 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 7-2
Record vs. top 25 teams: 1-0

Massachusetts 42-10
Alcorn St 52-0
@#9 Kansas St 17-10
Southern Miss 24-27
@Houston 24-21 OT
East Carolina 24-9
@South Florida 45-31
Memphis 38-28
@Tulsa 27-13
UCF 31-38
SMU 59-24
@Cincinnati 27-24
UCF 45-28

Despite playing 1-11 UMass, 1-11 USF, and FCS Alcorn State, Tulane also played nine bowl teams so their SOS is a respectable #60. After beating UMass and Alcorn by a combined 94-10 they traveled to Manhattan (Kansas) and upset the future Big Twelve champs 17-10. Maybe they got a little big-headed at that point because their next game was their worst: a 27-24 home loss to Southern Miss. The Green Wave recovered and won five straight but it looked like they wouldn't be American Athletic champs after losing at home to UCF. But they beat SMU and Cincy to get another shot and this time they won, 45-28.

Key Injuries / opt-outs

For USC on defense, starting LB Ralen Goforth is transferring. On offense #1 receiver Jordan Addison is out with an ankle injury and key offensive line starter Andrew Vorhees is injured and won't play.

For Tulane, #7 receiver Dea Dea McDougle is out with injury.

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: USC is only a slim favorite against a Group of Five opponent, which might irk them a bit.
Location: A good neutral site as it's quite a bit closer to Tulane so the fan representation should be there. USC is two time zones away.
Coaching: No changes.
Motivation: I think both teams will be pretty motivated. Tulane for obvious reasons—after a 2-10 season in 2021 they're 11-2 and playing in a New Year's bowl against USC. And for USC this is also a big step up from last season's 4-8 record. Normally a team that barely missed out on the Playoff would be unmotivated, but few thought USC would be in contention for a Playoff bid back in August. And maybe Tulane isn't the big opponent they envisioned, but they're such a small favorite they can't take them lightly.
Momentum: I suppose Tulane has quite a bit more since they won their conference title game and USC had their worst game of the season.

Definitely a mixed bag for the Trojans, as they went from a likely Playoff matchup with Georgia to a bowl game vs. Tulane. But the Cotton Bowl is better than any bowl the Trojans have been to since 2017...when they went to the Cotton Bowl. Even Caleb Williams only went to the Alamo Bowl with Oklahoma last year (though they played Oregon). Tulane is certainly going to be pumped to play USC in a big bowl game. Maybe a bit too pumped, as sometimes teams on the big stage for the first time find it rough going.

Final analysis

Tulane is taking a big step onto the national stage here, but the Group of Five game has been around since the Playoff started, and most of those teams have done really well. Boise State, Houston, and UCF scored upsets in 2014, 2015 and 2017, and no team really embarrassed itself by being blown out. Part of that is the lack of enthusiasm some of the "big name" teams have shown to being placed with the Group of Five team, clearly. USC could fall victim to that too, but in most cases the Power Five team is a huge favorite with the oddsmakers; that's not the case here. USC won't assume they're going to win this game, especially with Caleb Williams' questionable status.

Let's talk more about USC's turnovers, because it's a reason they're a top ten team and not just a top 25 team. USC is about average in recovering fumbles, but they are #2 in interceptions gained with 19, #1 in fewest lost fumbles with 2, and #3 in fewest INTs with 4. Overall their turnover margin is +21; the 2nd best is 14!

Not all of this is sustainable. USC has fumbled 11 times and only lost the ball twice. They've also recovered 8 of their opponents' 13 fumbles, slightly more than average. Clearly those recovery numbers are a "bounce of the ball" and they shouldn't have had possession around five times on average. You can argue about interceptions but they're only #21 in Passes Defended so they should probably had 13 picks instead of 19. That's 11 times they randomly gained possession, equal to perhaps 44 points or 3.4 points per game. That makes the game a tossup by our power rating. Add in Caleb Williams not being 100% and his very low INT total is in jeopardy. Let's just say that quite a bit of USC success this year has been luck, in addition to skill, and probably moreso than any other team.

How motivated will USC be? We know Tulane will come in fired up. USC has both pros and cons, but one great indication that they're "all in" is the almost complete absence of transfer portal and opt out players. That's a good sign that the team wants to play hard and win this game.

Then the real question becomes: will Caleb Williams be 100%? Because if he's not, then it's a loss for USC. We've seen how the offense runs when he's hurt, and it's not pretty. We can probably assume he'll be a lot more healthy than he was in that game, obviously, but will he be able to run the ball, and dodge tacklers and avoid sacks like he's famous for?

The injury was bad, no doubt, but Williams managed to play on it the rest of the game. Which probably made it worse, but he could run (forward at least). An injury on which you can play is not one that keeps you out of a game a month from now. So he's going to play, it's just a matter of how healed he is. And it will only get better and better. Lincoln Riley was probably preparing people for the worst, but I'm assuming Williams will play and that enthusiasm will be contagious. Meanwhile Tulane will give a hearty effort but might be a bit in over their heads.

Prediction: USC 40, Tulane 30

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December 14, 2022 at 01:45 AM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

December 13, 2022

2022 ReliaQuest Bowl Preview, Odds, & Prediction: Illinois vs. #22 Mississippi State

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ReliaQuest Bowl in Tampa, FL
When: Monday, January 2 at 12:00 noon ET
TV: ESPN

Illinois Fighting Illini (8-4) vs. #22 Mississippi State Bulldogs (8-4)

A fairly typical bowl game that became something completely different with the unexpected death of Mississippi State head coach Mike Leach.

Vegas line/spread: Mississippi State by 4 (over/under 46)

Mississippi State is now a 4 point favorite before kickoff. The line opened for Mississippi State by 1 but moved toward Illinois days before Leach's hospitalization was reported. It held pretty steady following the news but moved back to Mississippi State steadily in the last few weeks.

Strength power rating: #15 Illinois 23, #18 Mississippi St 22

Best/Worst removed: Illinois 23-22

Turnover corrected: Mississippi State 23-22

Illinois isn't ranked by the Committee but in Strength they're #15 in the nation, slightly in front of the Bulldogs. Illinois feasts on turnover margin and if this is factored out Mississippi State becomes the slim favorite.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -2 Spread
Illinois	50%	48.6%
Miss St	50%	51.4%

Despite Illinois winning the average game by just over a point, the game-comparison system calls it a 50/50 draw when comparing performances against each other. Naturally that makes Mississippi State the slight favorite against the spread.

When Illinois has the ball

Illinois scoring offense(adj): #49	Miss St scoring defense(adj): #30
Illinois rushing offense(raw): #48	Miss St rushing defense(raw): #55
Illinois passing offense(raw): #97	Miss St passing defense(raw): #36

Illinois doesn't have a great offense, nor does Mississippi State have a great defense, but neither is bad. Illinois will have some issues moving the ball consistently. The ground game is the Illini's forte, with RB Chase Brown (1,643 yards, 10 TDs) one of the best in the nation. Mississippi State's unadjusted rush defense looks mediocre but they play a tough schedule so it's a bit misleading.

Update: With Chase Brown opting out, the Illini's next option is Reggie Love III who has 277 yards on the season, and a 4.7 average to Brown's 5.0 ypc.

When Mississippi State has the ball

Miss St scoring offense(adj): #22	Illinois scoring defense(adj): #5
Miss St rushing offense(raw): #130	Illinois rushing defense(raw): #8
Miss St passing offense(raw): #11	Illinois passing defense(raw): #6

Contrasting Illinois, Mississippi State doesn't run the ball much at all. That's a sign of a Mike Leach team. Instead they run the Air Raid (Leach coined the term), with Will Rogers racking up 3,713 yards, 34 TDs and 6 interceptions. He spreads the ball around well, with 9 players above 250 receiving yards. They're going up against one of the nation's best offenses, though; the Illini are solid in all areas. These offense/defense matchups make it clear why the oddsmakers and our power ratings forecast such a low scoring game.

Two key offensive players will be out, however (transfer portal). One is the team's leading receiver, Rara Thomas, but as I noted they have lots of targets so it won't stop the Air Raid, just make the long ball a bit harder as he led the team with 14.2 yards per catch. The other is the team's #2 rusher, but they don't run the ball anyway. Illinois is missing their best d-back, Sydney Brown, who has 6 interceptions, taking away a big worry for the Bulldogs in the secondary.

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): Illinois: #87 Mississippi St: #12

Special teams play favors the Bulldogs, often a consideration in a close contest.

Illinois's season (8-4) • SOS: #51

Non-conf losses: 0 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 4-2
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-1

Wyoming 38-6
@Indiana 20-23
Virginia 24-3
Chattanooga 31-0
@Wisconsin 34-10
Iowa 9-6
Minnesota 26-14
@Nebraska 26-9
Michigan St 15-23
Purdue 24-31
@#2 Michigan 17-19
@Northwestern 41-3

Illinois looked promising after week one, but following the loss to Indiana many wrote them off (and by "many", I mean *I* did). But the Illini persevered and racked up several wins, beating Wisconsin, Iowa, and Minnesota in a row as part of a 6-game win streak. Just when we started to count on Illinois as a good team they went and lost to Michigan State at home, then to Purdue, and by the time they played Michigan they were counted out before the game started but almost managed to beat the Wolverines in Ann Arbor. Their last game, a trouncing of Northwestern, probably reflects the Wildcats 1-11 season more than a statement by the Illini.

MSU's season (8-4) • SOS: #19

Non-conf losses: 0 • Home losses: 1
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 4-4
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-3

Memphis 49-23
@Arizona 39-17
@#17 LSU 16-31
Bowling Green 45-14
Texas A&M 42-24
Arkansas 40-17
@Kentucky 17-27
@#5 Alabama 6-30
Auburn 39-33 OT
#1 Georgia 19-45
East Tennessee St 56-7
@Mississippi 24-22

Mississippi State's teams under Mike Leach have tended to be unpredictable, but this season played out pretty much as expected once it was established that the Bulldogs would A) trounce bad teams like Arizona and Texas A&M, B) lose to ranked teams like LSU, and C) beat the majority of unranked bowl-bound teams like Memphis, Bowling Green, and Arkansas. The only exception to these rules was the loss at Kentucky. Or, if you modify the rule: they beat bowl teams at home but lose on the road, then the only exception is the season-ending win over Ole Miss. They also struggled a bit too much with Auburn, their sole win in a 4-game slump that shook them out of any big time daydreams. They pulled out of that and finished strong, especially with the Egg Bowl win.

Key Injuries / opt-outs

Rara Thomas, Mississippi State's #1 receiver with 626 yards, has entered the transfer portal, as has Dillon Johnson, #2 rusher with 488 yards.

For Illinois, leading rusher Chase Brown (1,643 yards) has opted out, as has starting corner Sydney Brown (6 interceptions).

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: Illinois became the favorite once the betting public got a hold of the line, but now it's moved back to Mississippi State.
Location: Pretty neutral, though about twice as far for Illini fans to travel
Coaching: This is the big one. We're trying to see if there was ever a case of this happening before, or whether to just treat it like a coach retiring. It's a big mystery how the death of Mike Leach will affect the game.
Motivation: See above. Any questions about Mississippi State have a new focus. As for Illinois, they have to stay focused themselves as they were probably the more motivated team since they missed a bowl the last two years. It's already their best season since 2007.
Momentum: Both teams lost momentum late in the year but recovered with season-ending wins.

Nothing really matters here except Mike Leach's untimely demise. DC Zach Arnett will coach the team during the bowl game.

Final analysis

As we mentioned in the offense section, Mississippi State loses their #1 receiver and #2 rusher to the dreaded transfer portal. It's not a good thing but we note how many targets Will Rogers has, and the fact that the running game isn't essential for them to have success. Still not ideal. And Illinois losing their key running back and a very dangerous defensive back (6 int) might shift the favorite to Mississippi State in any case.

But the only absence we need to talk about is Mike Leach. This is a fairly unprecedented situation, as far as I know there aren't any major college football programs that have had a coach die during the season at any point. My only guess is that since the players wanted to play the game (the school announced they'd play, I'm just assuming they asked the players first) that it will be most like the situation when a coach retires. In those cases players have responded well to send the coach out with a win, and this would be the ultimate way of doing so. Players have done the same for players who have died during the season.

This would have been a tough game to pick just a few days ago but now I'm not sure overthinking it makes sense; it seems the players will be motivated, though it's entirely possible they'll be more shellshocked and lethargic. I guess we'll find out what happens in this kind of situation.

Prediction: Mississippi State 21, Illinois 15

More previews, odds, and predictions: View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule.

December 13, 2022 at 11:32 PM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

2022 Sugar Bowl Preview, Odds, & Prediction: #5 Alabama vs. #9 Kansas State

View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule here

Sugar Bowl in New Orleans, LA
When: Saturday, December 31 at 12:00 noon ET
TV: ESPN

#5 Alabama Crimson Tide (10-2) vs. #9 Kansas State Wildcats (10-3)

A great matchup befitting the Sugar Bowl.

Vegas line/spread: Alabama by 7 1/2 (over/under 58)

Alabama is a solid favorite, up from a field goal initially to a just over a touchdown on game day. The o/u is up a total of 4 points.

Strength power rating: #4 Alabama 28, #7 Kansas St 24

Best/Worst removed: Alabama 29-23

Turnover corrected: Alabama 31-21

For the full season Alabama is more than 4 points better than Kansas State; this increases to 6 if we remove each team's outliers—since K-State has a huge upside outlier that disappears. If we correct for turnovers this also hurts K-State who has benefitted greatly from turnovers (and hopes this continues). In the latter case Alabama is a 10 point favorite.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -3 Spread
Alabama	64.1%	55.8%
Kansas St	35.9%	44.2%

Pretty straightforward—Alabama wins most of the game "trials" based on this season's game ratings, and covers the majority of the time against the spread.

When Alabama has the ball

Alabama scoring offense(adj): #4	Kansas St scoring defense(adj): #7
Alabama rushing offense(raw): #29	Kansas St rushing defense(raw): #63
Alabama passing offense(raw): #23	Kansas St passing defense(raw): #56

The top line numbers are very representative of Alabama's offense and K-State's defense. It's a battle of top tens. The rest of the figures, for rushing/passing offense/defense, are raw numbers skewed because these teams play very tough opponents. Alabama's rushing offense, for example, is #6 per play, which is a better estimate of how good it is. And K-State's pass defense is #23 per-play. The other two numbers (Bama pass offense and K-State rush defense) might be closer to the truth. But only the scoring offense and scoring defense numbers are properly adjusted for opponents.

That said, Alabama's offense centers on Bryce Young (3,007 yards, 27 TDs, 5 int) and is balanced by a solid ground game.

When Kansas St has the ball

Kansas St scoring offense(adj): #12	Alabama scoring defense(adj): #2
Kansas St rushing offense(raw): #17	Alabama rushing defense(raw): #31
Kansas St passing offense(raw): #93	Alabama passing defense(raw): #16

Unlike many programs with missing QBs this bowl season, Kansas State has a problem of Too Many Quarterbacks as starter Adrian Martinez (1,261 yds, 6:1) is back from injury while Will Howard (1,423, 15:2) has been playing very well lately. Martinez adds a running dimension (615 yards, 10 TDs) that they could really use against the Tide. The ground game in general is the Wildcats' focus, led by Deuce Vaughn's 1,425 yards. Of course Alabama's defense is killer as always, and the rush/pass raw numbers don't do it justice, rather the #2 scoring defense ranking should tell the story.

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): Alabama: #21 Kansas St: #30

Strong teams often have strong special teams, but not always. In this case it's true for both squads.

Alabama's season (10-2) • SOS: #26

Non-conf losses: 0 • Home losses: 0
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 5-2
Record vs. top 25 teams: 2-2

Utah St 55-0
@#20 Texas 20-19
Louisiana-Monroe 63-7
Vanderbilt 55-3
@Arkansas 49-26
Texas A&M 24-20
@#6 Tennessee 49-52
#22 Mississippi St 30-6
@#17 LSU 31-32 OT
@Mississippi 30-24
Austin Peay 34-0
Auburn 49-27

Alabama started strong and it looked like another championship season for the Tide. The Texas A&M home game was kind of a surprise and looks really bad now—in retrospect it was a big clue the Tide weren't a #1-caliber team if the 1-point win at Texas hadn't already hinted it (though in retrospect that looks ok). The Tennessee loss was a hit but it didn't sink them; they still controlled their destiny to the Playoff. Hence the 30-6 rebound win over Mississippi State. But the 2nd loss, to LSU, took the wind out of their sails and they almost lost to Mississippi the next week. The offense sleepwalked through Austin Peay, and though they were able to get psyched to beat Auburn soundly, that was no big deal to anyone but themselves. It's almost like that was more important than any non-Playoff bowl game could be.

Alabama's two losses were by 4 points total and both on the road to ranked teams. But they easily could have lost two more games and been 8-4, so claiming an "almost undefeated" season isn't very representative of their experience. Looking at their chart they definitely played best in the first half of the season, and much lower after their 2nd loss burst their Playoff bubble.

Kansas St's season (10-3) • SOS: #2

Non-conf losses: 1 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 7-3
Record vs. top 25 teams: 1-3

South Dakota 34-0
Missouri 40-12
#16 Tulane 10-17
@Oklahoma 41-34
Texas Tech 37-28
@Iowa St 10-9
@#3 TCU 28-38
Oklahoma St 48-0
#20 Texas 27-34
@Baylor 31-3
@West Virginia 48-31
Kansas 47-27
@#3 TCU 31-28 OT

Kansas State was a a wildcard coming into 2022, no one could be sure how good they'd be. They shut out South Dakota, then crushed Missouri and after two games it looked like they had real potential. But they got big-headed fast and lost to Tulane 17-10 at home, a loss that looked really bad at the time and now looks reasonable (except the home part). They shocked Oklahoma the next week, a win that looks obvious now as the Sooners finished 6-6. It appeared that K-State was an up and down team to have those wins and losses, but really they were revealing how good (or bad) other teams really were.

The Wildcats played TCU tough on the road but fell by 10 points, then turned around and destroyed Oklahoma State 48-0 in one of the best performances of the year for any team. Then they lost to Texas at home. This did nothing to fix their "up and down" reputation. Neither did beating Baylor 31-3. But the team finally achieved an even keel over their last three games, and at a very high level, with QB Will Howard starting for the injured Adrian Martinez, beating West Virginia, Kansas, and even TCU in the rematch. He also started the OK State game and took over in the Baylor win, but didn't play in the Texas loss. No wonder people are thinking he should start the bowl game, even as Martinez adds another dimension.

Key Injuries / opt-outs

Alabama is losing at least a dozen players to the transfer portal, but almost all of them are deep 2nd or 3rd stringers. Exceptions are #4 WR Traeshon Holden (331 yards, 6 TDs) and starting offensive lineman Javion Cohen. Including backups, five offensive linemen will be gone, which could make substitutions an issue.

No players are listed as opting out or in the portal for K-State, and QB Adrian Martinez appears to be healthy to play, but leading receiver Malik Knowles is still listed as questionable. K-State has said he will play too, however.

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: Alabama probably feels like they deserve to be a bigger favorite (than the original 3 points), but Kansas State is good. Now that the line has gone up so much, it might be more motivation for K-State to rally as underdogs.
Location: The Sugar Bowl is sort of Alabama's home away from home but we don't give any points for that
Coaching: No change.
Motivation: The opt-out issue was a mixed bag for Alabama. On the plus side, all the major players are staying and playing in the bowl. On the other hand, a dozen players (mostly reserves) are entering the transfer portal. That's more an issue with the program not the bowl per se but if the team were really fired up about the game they'd by playing. Any year Alabama doesn't make the Playoff is a bad year, so this year is even worse than last year (which was a bad year because they didn't win a national title). K-State's expectations are much lower so getting to a New Year's Eve Bowl is a big deal after a 7-5 season, and they haven't been to a bowl this big in a decade. They'll definitely be more motivated, even if Alabama isn't exactly sulking.
Momentum: Both teams won their last 3 at the end of the season. Kansas State beat TCU for a conference title, something Alabama doesn't have. The end of the season was a bit anti-climactic for the Tide as they watched themselves finish just outside the Playoff group.

Kansas State should be up for the game like crazy, playing Alabama. The only motivation Alabama will really feel is if they think they should be favored by a lot more, and want to prove they deserved to be in the Playoff.

Final analysis

Kansas State has a rare problem—two very good quarterbacks. Many teams this bowl season as losing their only good QB to opting out or transferring. K-State can really use this to their advantage as each has different skills. Managing this correctly might be the key to beating Alabama.

The Tide of course have their QB and he's very good, in fact the whole offense is. And they've managed to avoid the transfer portal for their key players, which is remarkable. But deeper in the lineup there's not a lot of enthusiasm for sticking around for the bowl game as 12 players have opted for the portal. That might be the way things are going to be from now on.

Alabama has had worse years of being unmotivated in the post-season, especially in the BCS years when they'd finish outside the top two and underperform in a bowl. Examples are 2008, where an undefeated Alabama was bumped from the BCS title game by Florida then lost to Utah 31-17 in the Sugar Bowl. Or 2013, also undefeated but then knocked off by Auburn (the "kick six"), and losing 45-31 to Oklahoma in the Sugar Bowl. In the Playoff era they've only missed the Playoff once: at 10-2 in 2019 they played 9-3 Michigan and won 35-16. So it isn't always true that being bounced from national title competition makes Alabama underperform.

But I like K-State here, not just for being motivated but, for right at the moment, actually being the better team. Early in the season I think Alabama would have beaten them soundly; now, I think they beat the Tide by wearing them down over the course of 4 quarters, as their depth proves to be greater.

Prediction: Kansas State 30, Alabama 24

More previews, odds, and predictions: View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule.

December 13, 2022 at 08:53 PM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

2022 Music City Bowl Preview, Odds, & Prediction: Iowa vs. Kentucky

View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule here

Music City Bowl in Nashville, TN
When: Saturday, December 31 at 12:00 noon ET
TV: ABC

Iowa Hawkeyes (7-5) vs. Kentucky Wildcats (7-5)

What happens when two teams who have no offense to speak of both lose their starting quarterbacks before a bowl game?

Vegas line/spread: Iowa by 3 (over/under 31.5)

The over/under says it all, and it might be generous. The line for Iowa is up from 2.

Strength power rating: #34 Iowa 11, #40 Kentucky 10

Best/Worst removed: Iowa 11-10

Turnover corrected: Kentucky 10-10

We're serious, that's the score the Strength power rating expects. 11 to 10. Knowing Iowa, that might be a field goal and four safeties. Iowa gets a lot of turnovers and when we correct for their influence, Kentucky becomes a 1-point winner, or it might end in a 10-10 tie.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -2 Spread
Iowa	50%	44.4%
Kentucky	50%	55.6%

Though Iowa wins the average game by just over 1 point, when the game ratings are mapped out and cross-compared each team wins 72 of the 144 trials. When spotted 2 points, Kentucky wins a slim majority.

When Iowa has the ball

Iowa scoring offense(adj): #77	Kentucky scoring defense(adj): #10
Iowa rushing offense(raw): #122	Kentucky rushing defense(raw): #60
Iowa passing offense(raw): #123	Kentucky passing defense(raw): #7

Here we get to the crux of the matter, and Iowa's offense doesn't rank nearly as badly as their reputation. What gives? The most important thing is to note that Iowa ranks #123 in raw scoring, so they really don't score much. The correction to #77 is for their schedule strength—in particular, the strength of the offenses they face. And also keep this in mind: scoring offense encompasses more than offense. It ends up incorporating the play of the defense, either due to pick sixes and safeties, and also turnovers that set up good field position, and also the entirety of special teams. Iowa has a top ten defense and special teams, and that helps their offense score more points than it would left to its own devices. Finally, Iowa is #114 on offense in our All-Division power rating, which includes their FBS game which was their worst performance. So maybe that's closer to the truth.

Anyway, they're up against Kentucky's top ten defense, and QB Spencer Petras (1,725 yards, 5 TDs, 5 Int) is injured and will miss the game. Given his number you might say that's not a big deal, but backup Alex Padilla (173 yds, 1:2) has entered the transfer portal (don't all grab at once!). And no other Iowa QB has thrown a pass this year—or even taken a snap. But Iowa can run the ball right? Yes, if you ignore those raw rushing numbers and assume, like the scoring offense, it's about #77. Kaleb Johnson leads Iowa with 762 yards.

When Kentucky has the ball

Kentucky scoring offense(adj): #75	Iowa scoring defense(adj): #6
Kentucky rushing offense(raw): #109	Iowa rushing defense(raw): #13
Kentucky passing offense(raw): #88	Iowa passing defense(raw): #9

This looks like a mirror image of the box above, or rather, it looks like the same thing. Kentucky's offense is pretty bad, especially for a Power Five school, and Iowa defense is pretty lockdown. And of course, Kentucky's starting quarterback Will Levis (2,406 yds, 19:10) is opting out of the bowl. And not only that, but UK's top two running backs Chris Rodriguez (904 yards) and Kavosiey Smoke (277) are both opting/transferring.

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): Iowa: #7 Kentucky: #121

This is one of the biggest discrepancies of the bowl season in terms of special teams. In a pretty even matchup this might be how the winner is decided. Iowa isn't the best in any category but they're in the top 1/3 in about everything. Meanwhile Kentucky ranks in the triple digits in a lot of categories: punting average, punt returns, field goal %, and punt coverage.

Iowa's season (7-5) • SOS: #29

Non-conf losses: 1 • Home losses: 3
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 3-3
Record vs. top 25 teams: 1-1

South Dakota St 7-3
Iowa St 7-10
Nevada 27-0
@Rutgers 27-10
#2 Michigan 14-27
@Illinois 6-9
@#4 Ohio State 10-54
Northwestern 33-13
@Purdue 24-3
Wisconsin 24-10
@Minnesota 13-10
Nebraska 17-24

Game one is what made Iowa famous this football season: the infamous 7-3 win over South Dakota State. In and of itself, beating South Dakota State by 4 points is not bad—note that the Jackrabbits are in the "final four" of the FCS playoff. But Iowa beat them not by scoring a touchdown but by kicking a field goal and getting 2 safeties. That's why the offense barely registers for that game on the smaller chart.

Iowa played a little better each game, win or lose, for the first half of the season but still scored just 7 on Iowa State and 6 at Illinois. Finally in the Ohio State game even the defense played terribly. After that Iowa had sort of a renaissance in offense, scoring a moderate amount in three games and letting the defense do its thing to win four in a row.

The last game of the year was their worst since Ohio State, and they lost at home to Nebraska, a sad effort on both offense and defense. The defense played well in 10 games and had two brain farts, while the offense had maybe one good game—Northwestern, where it scored a whopping 33 points.

Kentucky's season (7-5) • SOS: #21

Non-conf losses: 0 • Home losses: 3
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 5-4
Record vs. top 25 teams: 1-3

Miami OH 37-13
@Florida 26-16
Youngstown St 31-0
Northern Illinois 31-23
@Mississippi 19-22
#19 South Carolina 14-24
#22 Mississippi St 27-17
@#6 Tennessee 6-44
@Missouri 21-17
Vanderbilt 21-24
#1 Georgia 6-16
Louisville 26-13

Kentucky's high total on offense came right away with 37 against Miami of Ohio. The inset chart says the 27 scored on Mississippi State and the 26 on Louisville are better performances, but it's got to be disheartening when you top 30 points 3 of your first 4 games and never again.

The defense showed up almost every game though, even in their first two losses to Ole Miss (22-19) and South Carolina (24-14). The D was critical in the Mississippi State win, the Missouri win, and almost helped them pull off an upset for the ages against Georgia. But the offense was so bad in that game, and against Vanderbilt, that Kentucky never won two games in a row after that initial 4-game run.

For all their ups and downs, the two best overall performances the Wildcats had in a row were the last two games: the 16-6 loss to Georgia and the 26-13 win over Louisville. What are the odds they can play three good games in a row?

Key Injuries / opt-outs

For Iowa: QB Spencer Petras is injured and won't play; backup Alex Padilla has entered the transfer portal. Also Iowa's #3 RB Gavin Williams and #4 receiver Arland Bruce have entered the portal.

For Kentucky: QB Will Levis is opting out along with #1 RB Chris Rodriguez while #2 RB Kavosiey Smoke is transferring. On defense, starting LB DeAndre Square is opting out.

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: Iowa is a slim favorite due to having less attrition
Location: It's almost an in-state game for Kentucky, being in Tennessee, but Iowa travels well and will be represented equally there if not more.
Coaching: No change (Iowa never changes coaches, of course).
Motivation: It's unlikely either team is motivated to cap this season off with a win for history's sake. Last year Iowa had 10 wins and Kentucky 9 wins before bowl season. And Kentucky beat Iowa to get their 10th win. Will Kentucky be motivated to "beat Iowa again"? It's doubtful. Maybe Iowa will get some motivation to get revenge for that bowl loss. Remember the Citrus!
Momentum: There's not much here. Kentucky never put together a decent win streak all season, and while Iowa did, it ended with a terrible loss to Nebraska. At least Kentucky finished with a strong win, so they check the box here.

Iowa's last game was a serious downer. Kentucky beat rival Louisville solidly. If those emotions carry forward, Kentucky has the emotional edge. I seriously doubt Iowa is champing at the bit to get revenge for last year's bowl loss.

Final analysis

This has got to be the least anticipated bowl game between two Power Five teams this bowl season. Obviously the clear lack of offense is not going to appeal to anyone, but it's also a repeat of last year's Citrus Bowl where Kentucky beat Iowa 20-17. How sad is that?

Both teams are losing their quarterback(s). Iowa is at least keeping their leading rusher, in fact their top two rushers while Kentucky is losing both of theirs. Probably why Iowa is a slight favorite—they're losing less from their terrible offense than Kentucky is. The quarterback situation is terrible for both. Kentucky loses more with Levis gone but at least his backup has thrown passes. Iowa started worse at the position and will remain worse, with essentially a scout team player taking over.

It's true that if it comes down to special teams Iowa will win. If the teams keep punting the ball back and forth after 3-and-outs, eventually Iowa will be close enough to the end zone to kick a field goal, or pin Kentucky close enough to the goal line to get a safety. There is a real possibility that the game will play out like this; it's how the Iowa vs. South Dakota State game went, basically.

Both teams last games tell a story. For Iowa, the defense finally broke as it was getting zero support from the offense. Meanwhile for Kentucky the defense held against Georgia, and helped get the win against Louisville. Will that carry over to the bowl game? It doesn't seem either team is fired up for this rematch.

But I do think both offenses get bogged down and it's a punt fest. That favors Iowa, as does a field goal battle. I changed my mind on this once already and may do so again—when there are this few points it's anyone's game at any time. Makes it exciting right?

Prediction: Iowa 11, Kentucky 6

More previews, odds, and predictions: View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule.

December 13, 2022 at 05:00 AM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

2022 Orange Bowl Preview, Odds, & Prediction: #6 Tennessee vs. #7 Clemson

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Orange Bowl in Miami Gardens, FL
When: Friday, December 30 at 8:00 pm ET
TV: ESPN

#6 Tennessee Volunteers (10-2) vs. #7 Clemson Tigers (11-2)

A key injury to Tennessee changes the complexion of what should have been a great game—and still might be.

Vegas line/spread: Clemson by 4 1/2 (over/under 61)

Obviously Clemson wouldn't be a touchdown favorite if Tennessee were at full strength, but here we are. The line held pretty steady (down to 6 from 6 1/2) while the over/under has notched down from 64. On game day the line dropped to 4 1/2, while the o/u fell from 63.5 to 61.

Strength power rating: #5 Tennessee 41, #16 Clemson 29

Best/Worst removed: Tennessee 42-28

Turnover corrected: Tennessee 39-30

Our Strength power rating doesn't know what injuries are, just scores. So it picks Tennessee to win by 12 points, blissfully unaware that Tennessee has changed. Note how different the over/under of 64 is from our total of 70.

Removing the extreme games for every team helps Tennessee more as it gets rid of the South Carolina loss, but correcting for turnovers hurts Tennessee as the Vols have benefitted greatly from turnover margin. It's still a 9 point win though.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -6.5 Spread
Clemson	27.6%	20%
Tennessee	72.4%	80%

When the teams are full strength our game-comparison system takes Tennessee almost 3/4 of the time, and 80% of the time against the healthy spread.

When Tennessee has the ball

Tennessee scoring offense(adj): #1	Clemson scoring defense(adj): #20
Tennessee rushing offense(raw): #19	Clemson rushing defense(raw): #10
Tennessee passing offense(raw): #3	Clemson passing defense(raw): #77

Tennessee has the best offense in the nation, at least they do when Hendon Hooker (3,135 yards, 27:2) is healthy. Unfortunately that's not the case right now so Joe Milton III (720 yards, 7:0) will fill in. He did ok in the Vanderbilt game, completing 11 of 21 for 147 yards and 1 TD, but mostly he handed the ball off where Tennessee has a strong running game, too (though it's also 430 yards weaker without Hooker). He'll do a lot of handing off now that top WR Jalin Hyatt is opting out. Clemson's defense is sound as always but falls short of its top five national-championship level it reached in the past. The pass defense is particularly suspect, though on a per-attempt basis they rank about #35. And they're not facing Hooker, either.

When Clemson has the ball

Clemson scoring offense(adj): #26	Tennessee scoring defense(adj): #33
Clemson rushing offense(raw): #46	Tennessee rushing defense(raw): #19
Clemson passing offense(raw): #74	Tennessee passing defense(raw): #127

Clemson has a solid offense but again it's well short of the quality of the offenses during their Playoff stretch just a few years back. DJ Ulagalelei was QB (2,521 yards, 22:7) the whole year until getting replaced by Cade Klubnik after the South Carolina loss. Klubnik went 20 of 24, 1 TD and rushed for 30 yards and another TD in the big 39-10 win. Ulagalelei quickly entered the transfer portal. And most Clemson fans yawned. Klubnik on paper has a great opportunity against Tennessee's #127 pass defense, but that's illusory as many "raw" figures are: the Vols rush defense is so good that teams take to the air a lot. On a per-attempt basis Tennessee improves to #70. Still not great but Clemson fans should stop salivating.

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): Tennessee: #13 Clemson: #59

The Vols have an edge here in total, but between individual units there's a lot of variance; for example, Tennessee is a bad punting team but defends kickoffs very well. In the end, that's a great trade-off for a team that rarely punts but kicks the ball off a lot.

Tennessee's season (10-2) • SOS: #22

Non-conf losses: 0 • Home losses: 0
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 6-2
Record vs. top 25 teams: 2-2

Ball St 59-10
@Pittsburgh 34-27 OT
Akron 63-6
Florida 38-33
@#17 LSU 40-13
#5 Alabama 52-49
Tennessee-Martin 65-24
Kentucky 44-6
@#1 Georgia 13-27
Missouri 66-24
@#19 South Carolina 38-63
@Vanderbilt 56-0

Tennessee's chart doesn't look real. It looks like a cartoon, like it's not made up of straight lines. It's a weird chart, with two separate arrays of lines increasing in height. It looks like something Escher would like, if he were into football performance charts. How Tennessee managed to alternate—almost perfectly—between great games and good games, with each becoming a bit better within its own set—is beyond me. Until of course, the outlier on the downside in the South Carolina game. And then, amazingly, the high series reached a new peak even without starting QB Hooker. That's the craziest part yet.

The peak prior to that wasn't the Alabama win but the 40-13 win at LSU. The Alabama game is outside either series I guess, a "pause" in the brutalist monument. Even the loss to Georgia was a new high on the lower series. It's clear from this there are two Tennessee efforts, the good and the great. Somehow the great happened without Hooker in their last game. They're due, i guess, for another peak in the "good" series assuming we can ignore South Carolina. That puts them at about the level of Clemson's last game, maybe.

Clemson (11-2) • SOS: #55

Non-conf losses: 2 • Home losses: 1
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 6-2
Record vs. top 25 teams: 2-2

@Georgia Tech 41-10
Furman 35-12
Louisiana Tech 48-20
@Wake Forest 51-45 2OT
#23 North Carolina St 30-20
@Boston College 31-3
@#13 Florida St 34-28
Syracuse 27-21
@#21 Notre Dame 14-35
Louisville 31-16
Miami FL 40-10
#19 South Carolina 30-31
=North Carolina 39-10

Clemson played solid and consistent football all year without wowing anyone, and did just enough to play themselves out of a Playoff spot. Is DJ Ulagalelei the reason they couldn't get over the hump? Hard to say, also hard to say whether Klubnik is the savior the fans think he is. He did start in their best game, the win vs. North Carolina for the ACC title, played in Charlotte, NC so partially a road game. But then again, Tennessee had their best game without Hendon Hooker, does that mean Milton is better?

Being a better defensive than offensive team is why they didn't wow anyone—there were no blowouts. Instead they beat teams like Wake Forest in double overtime, NC State 30-20, FSU 34-28, Syracuse 27-21, and Louisville 31-16. Their only blowout of a bowl team happened against North Carolina. Not sure if it proves anything but it seems like a good sign.

Key Injuries / opt-outs / transfer portal

Tennessee QB Hendon Hooker is out with a knee injury. Tennessee's #1 receiver Jalin Hyatt (1,267 yards, 15 TDs) is opting out, as is #4 receiver Cedric Tillman (417 yards).

Clemson QB DJ Ulagalelei entered the transfer portal, as did #4 receiver Beaux Collins (373 yards). On defense, starting defensive end Myles Murphy, starting LB Trenton Simpson, and a few backups on defense are transferring.

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: Clemson is the favorite largely due to Hendon Hooker's absence. The Tigers are unlikely to be overconfident as they know how good the rest of Tennessee's team is. The Vols might have something to prove, that it wasn't just one guy.
Location: Miami is pretty neutral for two teams outside of Florida but still in the South.
Coaching: No changes.
Motivation: Clemson is having a better year than last year but their standards are sky-high; missing the playoff is still not really acceptable, though the Orange Bowl is a pretty big deal. For Tennessee this is where the program has been trying to get back to for decades—their first 10-win regular season since 2003.
Momentum: The teams followed the same trajectory all season: lots of wins, a loss that was just a bump in the road, then a killer loss to South Carolina, and a big rebound win.

There's a big difference between Hooker being hurt and if he had gone to the transfer portal in terms of his teammates. Now they can conceivably try to rally around him and win the game for him—and the defense knows it has to carry more of the load than ever. Clemson will just be rallying around a new kid starting at quarterback, and the guy who was starting all year is gone.

And overall the motivational edge has to go to Tennessee. Clemson has been here so often and it's not the Playoff. Tennessee hated missing the Playoff obviously but if you'd told both teams at the beginning of the year they'd be in the Orange Bowl and not the Playoff? Clemson would be disappointed and Tennessee ecstatic.

Final analysis

Tennessee played their best against Vanderbilt without Hooker. How did they do it? By running the ball. The Vols had 362 yards on the ground. That will be tough to do against Clemson, the #10 (raw) rushing defense in the nation. Vanderbilt is #95 (though to be fair they were around #73 before that game). They didn't throw the ball much against Vandy despite the Commodores having the #128 pass defense (and it was #131 before the game). That's a red flag. Or at least an indication that Tennessee can't throw on Clemson either, especially without WR Jalin Hyatt.

It looks like Cade Klubnik will be as good and possibly much better than Ulagalelei. But it's based on a sample of one game, and the general feeling of fans that Klubnik should have started all year. While he may do just as well in the bowl as he did against UNC, it would undoubtedly be better if Ulagalelei were there as an option if Klubnik fizzles. So it does matter that Clemson's starting QB is gone, though obviously it's a very different situation than Tennessee's. Klubnik is clearly the X factor in the game.

And speaking of Tennessee, what do we make of their blowout win over Vanderbilt at the end of the year? No letdown in confidence at all without Hooker. Meanwhile Clemson was better than ever, too, against North Carolina. Here we have two teams with great seasons that just barely missed the playoff because of South Carolina and lots of players on both teams are jumping into the portal...and they might both be peaking!

The biggest mystery of all is Tennessee's defense going from giving up 63 to South Carolina to shutting out Vanderbilt. And it was really Clemson's defense, not the offense, that outperformed in their win over North Carolina. I'm bucking the trend and picking a very low-scoring, defensive affair. After all, both teams lost their quarterback. Tennessee showed their defense can really shine if they are motivated and I think they are. And Clemson can stop the run and won't have nearly as much to worry about through the air. It should still be very close but I'll take the Vols.

Prediction: Tennessee 24, Clemson 22

More previews, odds, and predictions: View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule.

December 13, 2022 at 02:30 AM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

2022 Arizona Bowl Preview, Odds, & Prediction: Ohio vs. Wyoming

View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule here

Arizona Bowl in Tucson, AZ
When: Friday, December 30 at 4:30 pm ET
TV: ESPN

Ohio Bobcats (9-4) vs. Wyoming Cowboys (7-5)

According to the oddsmakers this game is just about as even as it gets.

Vegas line/spread: Ohio by 2 1/2 (over/under 41.5)

This one's a rare pick'em. Gotta love not caring about the spread and just see who wins! Apparently the line started at -3 Ohio and quickly moved toward Wyoming...why? It's also very low-scoring at 43 over/under. Some books list Ohio as a 1 point favorite, some have Wyoming -0.5 even. On game day Ohio was a 2 1/2 point favorite, however. Post-game: Before kickoff Ohio was back to the original 3 point favorite.

Update: A favorite has been chosen, and pretty clearly. A day before game day and Ohio is now a fairly solid favorite, and the o/u is down about 1.5 points.

Strength power rating: #86 Ohio 30, #120 Wyoming 23

Best/Worst removed: Ohio 30-22

Turnover corrected: Ohio 28-25

The betting public is torn but the Strength power rating picks a clear winner and it's Ohio by a touchdown. That expands to 8 points when we trim the high and low ratings, and falls to three points when we adjust for turnovers. This result is important because it's often the basis for oddsmakers spreads, and that's where things opened before quickly moving toward zero. Not sure where they're getting the low over/under though.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -2.5 Spread
Ohio	71%	61.5%
Wyoming	29%	38.5%

Since the spread started at zero, there's of course no difference between win% and covering the spread %. It's pretty certain the line will move one way or another before kickoff. Update: We've changed this to reflect the recent spread, since a spread of 0 doesn't give any new info!

When Ohio has the ball

Ohio scoring offense(adj): #63	Wyoming scoring defense(adj): #79
Ohio rushing offense(raw): #84	Wyoming rushing defense(raw): #65
Ohio passing offense(raw): #18	Wyoming passing defense(raw): #62

Ohio has a decent offense, and Wyoming's defense isn't terrible. The raw numbers are probably usable since the team's SOS are about the same. Regardless, Ohio like to pass the ball. Kurtis Rourke had 3,256 yards and a 25:4 ratio, but he's been out since mid-November, leaving CJ Harris (393, 1:1) in charge. Four receivers have over 500 yards led by Sam Wiglusz with 850 (11 TDs).

When Wyoming has the ball

Wyoming scoring offense(adj): #113	Ohio scoring defense(adj): #93
Wyoming rushing offense(raw): #37	Ohio rushing defense(raw): #56
Wyoming passing offense(raw): #125	Ohio passing defense(raw): #130

Wyoming's horrible offense squares off against Ohio's not-much-better defense. The passing numbers are the worst—Wyoming can't throw the ball but Ohio can't defend it, something has to give. Wyoming wants to run the ball, which is Ohio's (relative) strength on defense. But nothing is easy these days—leading rusher Titus Swen (1,039 yards) has hit the transfer portal. The next two RBs have good averages but there's obviously a reason Swen had twice as many attempts as both of them combined.

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): Ohio: #48 Wyoming: #11

Wyoming needs an edge and special teams might give it, though Ohio isn't terrible here.

Ohio's season (9-4) • SOS: #89

Non-conf losses: 2 • Home losses: 0
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 3-2
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-1

Florida Atlantic 41-38
@#11 Penn State 10-46
@Iowa St 10-43
Fordham 59-52
@Kent St 24-31 OT
Akron 55-34
@Western Michigan 33-14
Northern Illinois 24-17
Buffalo 45-24
@Miami OH 37-21
@Ball St 32-18
Bowling Green 38-14
=Toledo 7-17

Ohio got off to a rough start; that'll happen when you schedule Penn State and Iowa State (the best 5-7 team) back to back. Not that Ohio was much more impressive in its wins over Florida Atlantic and Fordham. But after starting 2-3 the Bobcats started winning and didn't look back, winning 7 straight games and getting to the MAC championship game where they laid an egg like it was the early season again. Note that they didn't lose any games at home: three on the road, and one on neutral territory.

With Kurtis Rourke out from an ACL injury after the Ball State game, CJ Harris (393 yards, 1:1) took over and led the Bobcats to a solid win and a bad loss. Harris can run but his accuracy (50%) is dismal thus far.

Wyoming's season (7-5) • SOS: #95

Non-conf losses: 2 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 2-5
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-0

@Illinois 6-38
Tulsa 40-37 2OT
Northern Colorado 33-10
Air Force 17-14
@Brigham Young 24-38
San Jose St 16-33
@New Mexico 27-14
Utah St 28-14
@Hawai`i 27-20
@Colorado St 14-13
Boise St 17-20
@Fresno St 0-30

Wyoming lost its opener to Illinois but won three straight after that including a win over 9-3 Air Force. They couldn't handle BYU or San Jose State but three of their next four foes were 3-9 or worse. They played well against Boise State, losing just 20-17, but didn't show up against Fresno, a 30-0 loss.

It's hard to point to a game and say "that's a performance that would win a bowl game" but then again, sometimes inexplicably a team comes up with its first flash of greatness in bowl season. The dismal season ender wouldn't suggest it, though.

Key Injuries / opt-outs / transfer portal

Wyoming's Titus Swen (1,039 rushing yards) is in the portal.

Ohio's QB Kurtis Rourke was hurt a few games ago; it was an ACL tear and he was declared out for the season.

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: Neither is favored, though Ohio is listed in many places as the 1 point favorite. Update: Ohio is back to being the favorite.
Location: Tucson is pretty far from Athens, Ohio: well over 24 hours if you drive. But it's not that close to Laramie, Wyoming, either; that's a 15 hour drive, or about half as far. It is in the same time zone, while Athens is two time zones away. This is mostly tiebreaker type of info—something that could be a factor in a very close game, like this one!
Coaching: No changes.
Motivation: Wyoming was 6-6 last year at this time, so they showed some improvement. Ohio was just 3-9 so they flipped that over (not counting the last game) to 9-3.
Momentum: Both teams kinda killed their momentum with a bad game at the end. But Ohio is the only team that had any real momentum during the season. They were playing a lot better for a lot longer than Wyoming, then Kurtis Rourke's injury threw a wrench in their plans.

No one's talking about Ohio flipping their season from 3-9 to 9-4. That's gotta be on their minds, plus the idea of having at 10-win season if they can win the bowl game? That's pretty motivating. And Wyoming might be somewhat motivated too but their best player just bailed on them.

Final analysis

It's interesting that the line started at the turnover-corrected Strength power rating spread of Ohio -3, then for some reason the public quickly knocked it down to Ohio -1 or to even. Strange, too, when it's Wyoming that's missing a key player. What does the wisdom of the crowds know that we don't? And why is the over/under so much lower? We're showing 53 points and it's at 43, you'd think the forecast was for a windstorm on that exact day. It can't be Ohio's loss of Kurtis Rourke since that happened in mid-November and everyone betting on the game had to know he wasn't playing.

Some people chart line moves and pick their winners based on that and, if that works for you, more power to you. I'm trying to analyze a game, not watch betting lines. The game analysis drives the betting moves anyway, and that's the more interesting side for me. But dammit I hate hidden information!

Both teams laid an egg in their final game, but Wyoming's was ostrich-sized. And how can we believe they're motivated when their star player is in the transfer portal? Ohio seems like they should have all the motivation in the world after last year's 3-9 season. The team didn't do very well in two games under CJ Harris but they were still a lot better than Wyoming.

So if you want to track spreads and conclude Wyoming should win because that's the direction the line is moving, it's probably valid a greater than 50% chance [update: and now that same method would make you pick Ohio i guess]. In this case though I see no compelling reason that the line is moving in the first place, so unless there's a rumor, it's just that people like Wyoming to win. And I don't see it. They look plainly worse than Ohio, less motivated, star player bolting, had an atrocious final game, never played well during the entire season...I think that sums it up. These are the kind of teams that make you pull your hair out if they win.

But that usually happens when they have a motivational edge. And as far as I can tell, that's in Ohio's direction. We'll use the low over/under as our guide, maybe they're onto something! Post-mortem: Though technically we beat the first spread (pick 'em) and the last spread (Ohio -2.5) that I saw, the line did finish at Ohio -3 before kickoff and that's how it will go down in the books so we'll count it as a push. If I'd bet on this game at any time I would have won, but I want to get a representative tally vs. the final spread and this is the only way to do it.

Prediction: Ohio 27, Wyoming 16

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December 13, 2022 at 12:26 AM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

December 12, 2022

2022 Sun Bowl Preview, Odds, and Prediction: #18 UCLA vs. Pittsburgh

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Sun Bowl in El Paso, TX
When: Friday, December 30 at 2:00 pm ET
TV: CBS

#18 UCLA Bruins (9-3) vs. Pittsburgh Panthers (8-4)

It's the Bruins vs. the Panthers, oh my!

Vegas line/spread: UCLA by 9 (over/under 54.5)

UCLA opened as the standard near-touchdown favorite. The odds held steady for a while but by game day it had moved up by 3 points, with the o/u down 3 points.

Strength power rating: #31 UCLA 35, #43 Pittsburgh 32

Best/Worst removed: UCLA 35-33

Turnover corrected: UCLA 34-33

Our power rating's spread is a bit tighter at 3 points, and it decreases either to 2 points (when excluding extreme game outcomes) or to just 1 if we correct for turnovers.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -6 Spread
UCLA	55.6%	41%
Pitt	44.4%	59%

UCLA wins most comparison straight up but Pitt wins a larger majority vs. the initial spread.

When UCLA has the ball

UCLA scoring offense(adj): #14	Pitt scoring defense(adj): #36
UCLA rushing offense(raw): #4	Pitt rushing defense(raw): #7
UCLA passing offense(raw): #39	Pitt passing defense(raw): #67

UCLA has a great offense and a poor defense; on this side of the ball they should do well, though Pitt's D is no slouch. The Bruins love the running game behind dynamic RB Zach Charbonnet who has 1,359 yards and 14 TDs. QB Dorian Thompson-Robinson adds 631 yards on the ground to go with his nearly 3,000 passing yards. Pitt's rushing defense is great—at least in raw numbers (uncorrected for opponents) and since they play an average schedule comparable to UCLA's we can probably say there's a great contest here between the offense and defense on the ground. Pitt will be missing a starting DT who has opted out.

When Pitt has the ball

Pitt scoring offense(adj): #40	UCLA scoring defense(adj): #71
Pitt rushing offense(raw): #44	UCLA rushing defense(raw): #30
Pitt passing offense(raw): #81	UCLA passing defense(raw): #120

Pitt's offense can't compete with UCLA's but they don't have to; they only have to able to beat UCLA's defense and that shouldn't be too hard as the Bruins are below-average for all of the FBS on defense. Their raw rush defense numbers aren't bad and that's Pitt's stronger area, but they're bad against the pass. Pitt's top RB Israel Abanikanda has 1,431 yards and a whopping 20 TDs, setting up a great running back battle (update: until Abanikanda opted out; 2nd leading rusher Rodney Hammond Jr has just 366 yards and a 4.4 per-carry average to Abanikanda's 6.0 ypc).

And that may be pretty much what Pitt will have to offer on offense as QB Kedon Slovis has entered the transfer portal. Nick Patti (9 of 20 for 79 yards, 1 TD this year) replaced Kenny Pickett last year and broke his collar bone in the game. No word on who the starter will officially be yet (update: it's Patti again), but he will have a go-to receiver in Jared Wayne (1,012 yards) and UCLA's defense is a good one to be up against in this situation.

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): UCLA: #110 Pitt: #92

Neither is very good overall in the special teams areas per ESPN's FPI.

UCLA's season (9-3) • SOS: #58

Non-conf losses: 0 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 4-2
Record vs. top 25 teams: 2-2

Bowling Green 45-17
Alabama St 45-7
South Alabama 32-31
@Colorado 45-17
#12 Washington 40-32
#8 Utah 42-32
@#15 Oregon 30-45
Stanford 38-13
@Arizona St 50-36
Arizona 28-34
#10 Southern Cal 45-48
@California 35-28

UCLA started a bit slow and by the time they edged South Alabama 32-31 at home most had written them off. But the Jaguars finished 10-2 so that was a solid win, and the Bruins were soon 6-0 with wins over 10-2 Washington and Pac-12 champ Utah, while playing better than ever. Oregon swamped them, but they controlled their own destiny to the Pac-12 title and beyond until they lost at home to Arizona. Maybe they were looking ahead to the USC game? They lost that too in a shootout heartbreaker. After that debacle they barely had the energy to beat Cal, but in many ways its impressive they got that road win.

Pitt's season (8-4) • SOS: #62

Non-conf losses: 1 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 2-3
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-1

West Virginia 38-31
#6 Tennessee 27-34 OT
@Western Michigan 34-13
Rhode Island 45-24
Georgia Tech 21-26
Virginia Tech 45-29
@Louisville 10-24
@North Carolina 24-42
Syracuse 19-9
@Virginia 37-7
Duke 28-26
@Miami FL 42-16

Pitt only played one bowl-bound team in their first six games but it was a big one, and the Panthers almost knocked off #6 Tennessee before the Vols could even establish themselves as a Playoff threat. The Panthers played dismal football after that, falling to Georgia Tech and losing to Louisville and North Carolina to sit at 4-4 on the year. Their last four games are pretty solid all around, however—two wins over bowl teams and two road wins by 30 and 26 points.

Key Injuries / opt-outs

Pitt QB Kedon Slovis has entered the transfer portal, and Pitt starting defensive tackle Calijah Kancey has opted out of the game. Update: Pitt's #1 RB Israel Abanikanda (1,431 yards, 20 TDs) has opted out, as has starting d-back Brandon Hill.

Still no opt-outs from UCLA.

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: UCLA is probably favored by about what the teams expected, I would say. And it moved up as Pitt players dropped out, as it should.
Location: We didn't give any HFA consideration in our power rating numbers, but UCLA has a much shorter distance to travel to El Paso, and just one time zone instead of two.
Coaching: No change.
Motivation: Pitt's season was a bit of a downer compared to last year anyway, going from 11 wins and an ACC title to 8 and never being much in the conversation. For UCLA they went 9-3 after last year's 8-4, but their bowl game was cancelled so this will be their first bowl since 2017, a pretty big deal.
Momentum: Pitt might actually have some momentum going into the bowl game after winning their last four in pretty convincing fashion. Meanwhile UCLA lost two of their last three games including the heartbreaking USC home loss.

Pitt's in a rough spot without their QB for the 2nd straight year, which can't be good for team morale. Their end-of-season momentum might have just been nipped in the bud by that announcement, along with the other opt-outs, but maybe the rest of the team can rally.

Meanwhile almost no one on UCLA's team has been to a bowl even though they qualified last year. Hopefully for them that sinks in and overcomes their poor finish.

Final analysis

The low ranking of UCLA in power ratings may surprise some people, and it makes for a close game—closer than the spread. But then you start to add in the missing Panther players, including—for the 2nd straight year—their starting QB. And you have to expand the margin until it ends up somewhere around the spread after all.

Losing Kedon Slovis won't have anywhere near the impact of losing Kenny Pickett, who led a pass-first offense with over 4,000 yards and a ridiculous 42:7 ratio. Slovis's numbers pale in comparison: 2,397 yards, 10 TDs, 9 interceptions. So there won't be the near two-touchdown decrease in scoring we saw last year. But it's not good. And more than anything it takes away their offensive leader, and probably reflects an attitude that the players don't care much about the bowl game.

In terms of enthusiasm, there are two things working against each other. Under normal circumstances Pitt would have the wind at its back after 4 straight wins, ready to throttle a UCLA team that stumbled to the finish line. But in the time between the regular season and the bowl game, the focus will probably shift. For UCLA it will be playing in their first bowl game since 2017—so forget how the season ended. And for Pitt, they'll wonder if can keep their late-season momentum alive without Slovis. They can, but his departure may be a symptom of deeper malaise.

Any and all of this could change if some of UCLA's key players decide to opt out, like Charbonnet or Thompson-Robinson (as a Final Update, Charbonnet didn't play but that wasn't known until kickoff basically). Until then, we see a close UCLA win. Pitt was playing really well at the end and some of that has to carry over—now that they've got experience playing without their starting QB. And their defense is still going to be solid, even if they can't quite hold UCLA back. Update: Pitt's offense is further hurt by their top RB opting out, and the D by another d-back too. This increases the odds of a UCLA blowout win quite a bit, but we'll stick with our original assessment as the blowouts seem to not be manifesting this bowl season.

Prediction: UCLA 34, Pitt 31

More previews, odds, and predictions: View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule.

December 12, 2022 at 02:53 AM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

2022 Duke's Mayo Bowl Preview, Odds, and Prediction: #23 NC State vs. Maryland

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Duke's Mayo Bowl in Charlotte, NC
When: Friday, December 30 at 12 noon ET
TV: ESPN

#23 NC State Wolfpack (8-4) vs. Maryland Terrapins (7-5)

Former ACC-mates clash in Charlotte; the all-time series is actually tied at 33-33-4.

Vegas line/spread: NC State by 2 (over/under 45.5)

Another surprise line, it seems I've lost track of some of these teams and didn't realize how low North Carolina State actually ranks in power ratings despite their #23 designation by the Committee. The over/under started at 48 and has dropped quite a bit, while the line has flipped from Maryland to NC State and on game day was 2 points.

Strength power rating: #33 Maryland 21, #49 NC State 19

Best/Worst removed: Maryland 21-19

Turnover corrected: Maryland 22-18

We are giving NC State partial home field for the in-state game (not much since it's not too far from Maryland either) and it pretty much makes our line match the oddsmakers' line. Yes, NC State only ranks #49 in our All-Division power rating, I was surprised too. Turnover correction expands the forecast to 4 points for the Terps.

Note that we're showing a very low scoring game, even lower than the already low over/under.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -1.5 Spread
Maryland	53.5%	50.7%
NC State	46.5%	49.3%

Maryland barely wins half the contests, and spotting NC State the initial spread makes it almost even, but not quite. With the updated spread which favors NC State, the Terps cover about 55% of the time.

When NC State has the ball

NC State scoring offense(adj): #87	Maryland scoring defense(adj): #27
NC State rushing offense(raw): #107	Maryland rushing defense(raw): #52
NC State passing offense(raw): #77	Maryland passing defense(raw): #60

North Carolina State isn't know for its offensive production, and the Wolfpack's adjusted scoring offense bears this out. Their rushing and passing aren't quite as bad as their raw numbers make them look but it's close. Meanwhile Maryland has a borderline top 25 defense and they defend the run and pass well enough to greatly slow down the Wolfpack. North Carolina State's leading passer has 1,265 yards and he's entering the transfer portal. Their leading rusher has 530 yards. One Maryland d-back is opting out so that might help things slightly in the passing game.

When Maryland has the ball

Maryland scoring offense(adj): #41	NC State scoring defense(adj): #18
Maryland rushing offense(raw): #70	NC State rushing defense(raw): #11
Maryland passing offense(raw): #40	NC State passing defense(raw): #65

Maryland's offense isn't the greatest but compared to NC State's it's more than adequate. The Wolfpack defense, however, is pretty stout and the Terrapins will not have an easy time. It's no wonder the over/under is low for this game—and why our power rating has it even lower, at 40 points. Making matters a bit worse, Maryland is losing their #2, #4 and #8 receivers who are opting out of the bowl game. They still have plenty of targets for QB Taulia Tagovailoa (2,878 yards, 17:6) but that's cutting it a bit thin.

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): NC State: #3 Maryland: #64

North Carolina State has the FPI's #3 rated special teams unit while Maryland is just average. This encompasses a lot but areas where NC State excels includes kickoff returns (#11) and field goal percentage (#10), both of which mean they need to gain fewer yards on offense (their weakness) per point scored.

NC State's season (8-4) • SOS: #52

Non-conf losses: 0 • Home losses: 1
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 6-3
Record vs. top 25 teams: 1-1

@East Carolina 21-20
Charleston Southern 55-3
Texas Tech 27-14
Connecticut 41-10
@#7 Clemson 20-30
#13 Florida St 19-17
@Syracuse 9-24
Virginia Tech 22-21
Wake Forest 30-21
Boston College 20-21
@Louisville 10-25
@North Carolina 30-27 2OT

North Carolina State played great in their first six games, beating four bowl teams (yes, UConn made it), and losing only to #7 Clemson on the road by 10 points. But starting QB Devon Leary got hurt in the FSU win and the Wolfpack had to use a hodgepodge assembly of three quarterbacks to replace him game by game. With no consistency on offense for the rest of the season NC State dropped three more games, including a home loss to Boston College. They managed to hit their previous heights just twice: beating Wake Forest and beating North Carolina on the road in double overtime.

Maryland's season (7-5) • SOS: #32

Non-conf losses: 0 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 2-5
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-3

Buffalo 31-10
@UNC-Charlotte 56-21
SMU 34-27
@#2 Michigan 27-34
Michigan St 27-13
Purdue 29-31
@Indiana 38-33
Northwestern 31-24
@Wisconsin 10-23
@#11 Penn State 0-30
#4 Ohio State 30-43
Rutgers 37-0

Like NC State, Maryland played a great first half of the season, or at least, first five games. The Terps beat two bowl teams, played great at #2 Michigan losing by just a touchdown, and handled Michigan State pretty easily. Then they took a step down after the heartbreaking Purdue loss where a missed 2-point conversion was the difference at the end. They barely beat Indiana and Northwestern and were crushed by Wisconsin. The low point was the shutout loss to Penn State. Following that, the Ohio State loss was a huge improvement, and they ended the year with a shutout of their own, 37-0 over Rutgers.

Key Injuries / opt-outs

For NC State, QB Devin Leary (1,265 yards, 11:4) is in the transfer portal; they have played three other QBs during the season.

For Maryland: Opting out are DB Deonte Banks (38 tackles, 1 int), and WR Jacob Copeland, #4 in yardage with 376. #2 WR Rakim Jarrett (471 yds) has now opted out as well after being listed as questionable earlier. And also WR Dontay Demus (#8 w/233 yds).

Questionable: NC State #2 RB Demie Sumo-Karngbaye; and #2 QB MJ Morris.

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: #23 NC State clearly has the better "résumé" at 8-4 and six wins over bowl teams to Maryland's 2, so it's probably annoying to the Wolfpack that unranked Maryland is the favorite. That's often a good source of motivation.
Location: Charlotte is 2-3 hours from NC State's campus and in-state, which is usually an edge. We have applied it here but they're not too much closer than Maryland's campus 6 hours away, really. It will make a difference for fan support, though.
Coaching: No change.
Motivation: Neither side has had an exodus of players to the portal, just a few here and there. NC State was 9-3 last year but the Holiday Bowl was cancelled. Maryland was 6-6 last year and did go bowling.
Momentum: Both teams have a bit of negative and positive momentum. NC State lost 3 of the last 4, Maryland 2 of 3, but both got a win at the end. For NC State it was a bigger win over rival UNC, but at the same time winning a rivalry game is often a bigger deal than the bowl game that follows.

For NC State, the fact that last year's bowl was cancelled should make them happy to go to a bowl game, but it's not quite the same as getting there from improving; they actually were one win better last season. Still, they could put all their bowl enthusiasm into this trip instead. Maryland improved by a game which is not that much of a boost in emotion.

I wonder if NC State is a bit pissed at Maryland being the favorite? If they do end up winning this game, I'm sure you'll hear the players say they knew they were better and wanted to prove it. But if they lose of course, they won't say that.

Final analysis

This looks like a really low scoring game, so it could remain within reach for the entire 60 minutes. The offenses are bad enough even before the missing players; we're assuming the questionable ones will play (they almost always do) otherwise we might be in the single digits given how solid the defenses are in comparison.

Maryland has the edge because they have a functional offense, led by an actual quarterback. NC State's quarterback brigade has battled injuries all season and now the #1 is transferring while #2 might still be injured, meaning #3—Ben Finley, who had been demoted to running the scout team—might get the start for the bowl. He was bad against Louisville but solid against North Carolina. He had them almost playing as well as they did with Leary in the first half of the season...but can the team get as hyped to play Maryland as they did to play their in-state rival Tar Heels? Very doubtful.

NC State does have a decided advantage in special teams, so if the game is close and they play the field position game it could lead to a win. In a defensive battle with few points, punting and fielding can make a huge difference. It's probably the Wolfpack's best strategy, really, as Maryland seems to be a little better everywhere else.

Both teams played well early, faded, then recovered. Maryland faded less and recovered more, and they've got their house in order on offense compared to the Wolfpack. We are cutting a few points off Maryland for losing so many receivers, but still take them to win. Update: The line has moved to make NC State the favorite so this is now an upset pick.

Prediction: Maryland 21, NC State 17

More previews, odds, and predictions: View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule.

December 12, 2022 at 01:33 AM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

December 11, 2022

2022 Cheez-It Bowl Preview, Odds, and Prediction: #13 Florida State vs. Oklahoma

View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule here

Cheez-It Bowl in Orlando, FL
When: Thursday, December 29 at 5:30 pm ET
TV: ESPN

#13 Florida State Seminoles (9-3) vs. Oklahoma Sooners (6-6)

A matchup of college football royalty, one on an upswing the other having a down year.

Vegas line/spread: Florida State by 9 1/2 (over/under 65)

Not a surprise here that FSU is favored by around a touchdown (now 9 1/2 before game day). The game should be higher scoring than normal. The line has moved up 2 points while the o/u is down a point.

Strength power rating: #13 Florida St 36, #23 Oklahoma 30

Best/Worst removed: Florida St 35-30

Turnover corrected: Florida St 37-29

Florida State is #13 in the Strength power rating as well as the Committee rankings. We give them partial home field advantage here for playing in-state and much closer than Oklahoma, and our spread is still short of the Vegas line. That spread tightens when we remove the extreme games (taking away Oklahoma's 49-0 loss to Texas) and widens when we correct for the outsize influence of turnovers.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -7.5 Spread
Florida St	61%	42%
Oklahoma	39%	58%

FSU wins most of the game-comparisons straight up but doesn't cover most of the time.

When Florida St has the ball

Florida St scoring offense(adj): #13	Oklahoma scoring defense(adj): #54
Florida St rushing offense(raw): #12	Oklahoma rushing defense(raw): #108
Florida St passing offense(raw): #42	Oklahoma passing defense(raw): #108

FSU has a strong offense while Oklahoma's defense let it down again this year. Note that the raw figures for the Sooner defense are pretty ridiculous, as they play in the Big Twelve which plays very fast. The actual quality of their rushing and passing defense is likely about the same as their scoring defense—poor for a Power Five school, but not atrocious. Either way, FSU should be able to move the ball under QB Jordan Travis (2, 796 yards, 22:4). Oklahoma is missing a defensive lineman to the transfer portal, too.

When Oklahoma has the ball

Oklahoma scoring offense(adj): #18	Florida St scoring defense(adj): #29
Oklahoma rushing offense(raw): #13	Florida St rushing defense(raw): #61
Oklahoma passing offense(raw): #45	Florida St passing defense(raw): #3

Oklahoma's offense is a match for FSU's but they're playing a tougher defense. The Seminoles rank particularly well against the pass, so QB Dillon Gabriel (2,925, 24:6) will have a tough time winning the QB duel. He may be forced to throw if their preferred running game stalls due to the loss of NFL-bound Eric Gray, leader with 1,364 yards, as well as two starters on the offensive line. That raises pass protection issues, too, and FSU has 34 sacks on the season. In short, there are many more problems here for Oklahoma than FSU faces when they have the ball, when under normal circumstances they are comparable.

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): Florida St: #71 Oklahoma: #78

No major difference here.

Florida St's season (9-3) • SOS: #53

Non-conf losses: 0 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 5-3
Record vs. top 25 teams: 1-2

Duquesne 47-7
@#17 LSU 24-23
@Louisville 35-31
Boston College 44-14
Wake Forest 21-31
@#23 North Carolina St 17-19
#7 Clemson 28-34
Georgia Tech 41-16
@Miami FL 45-3
@Syracuse 38-3
Louisiana-Lafayette 49-17
Florida 45-38

Florida State was a wild card coming into 2022, supposed to be good this year but we've heard that before right? The win over LSU wasn't a big deal because it was seen at the time as proof LSU wasn't very good. At 4-0 they were a team waiting to be exposed, and Wake Forest did it, sort of. They didn't get embarrassed by the Deacons, and they played NC State really close, and they even gave Clemson a scare. But they were 4-3 now and out of the Playoff picture and the ACC title picture halfway through the season. Under the radar now they built up a solid résumé with 5 straight wins, the first four by an average of 33.5 points. They seemed to get better every week, something the chart reflects visually. The Seminoles ended up #12 in the Committee rankings, pretty good for a team that went 5-7 last year.

Oklahoma's season (6-6) • SOS: #18

Non-conf losses: 0 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 2-5
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-3

UTEP 45-13
Kent St 33-3
@Nebraska 49-14
#9 Kansas St 34-41
@#3 TCU 24-55
=#20 Texas 0-49
Kansas 52-42
@Iowa St 27-13
Baylor 35-38
@West Virginia 20-23
Oklahoma St 28-13
@Texas Tech 48-51

There wasn't much hint that Oklahoma's season was about to collapse. The Sooners won easily two to open the year and then lambasted former Big 8 rival Nebraska 49-14 in Lincoln. Not much resistance was expected at home vs. Kansas State, but who knew then that the Wildcats would be Big 12 champs? After that loss they faced TCU—future Playoff team TCU—and got beat bad, 55-24. They tried to regroup for Texas but they hit bottom, losing 49-0. It looked very possible the Sooners would lose every remaining game based on their trajectory, but they came back with two solid wins and though they finished 1-3 they played pretty well overall and managed to beat rival Oklahoma State. The Sooner went from way overrated to way underrated pretty quickly but made it to a bowl game—probably not the one they envisioned at the season's start.

Key Injuries / opt-outs

Oklahoma starting defensive lineman Jalen Redmond is in the transfer portal; on offense, running back Eric Gray (1,364 yards) is in the portal along with starting O-linemen Anton Harrison and Wanya Morris. #4 wide receiver Theo Wease is now listed as well. No major players from FSU are in the portal.

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: FSU is the favorite; that seems reasonable, but it seems low given everything about Oklahoma's transfer portal and probable attitude toward this game. Do the oddsmakers/sharps know something that is mitigating the spread? It's possible that they're sticking pretty close to actual power ratings, as ours gives 6 points. It seems like a lot of people are picking this game big for Florida State so it's a bit surprising the line isn't moving up. Update: Now it has moved up, to the point the Sooners might feel disrespected or FSU get overconfident.
Location: Orlando is several hours from Tallahassee but it's in-state and a lot closer than Oklahoma, whose fans might sit this one out. We have given FSU partial home field consideration in our power rating spread.
Coaching: No change.
Motivation: Oklahoma didn't think they would be in the Cheez-It Bowl at the beginning of the season, but mid-season they might not have expected any bowl. Still has to be a letdown from their recent level of success. FSU on the other hand is back bowling after a sizable drought and their strongest season in years.
Momentum: Both teams had an early 3-game skid and rebounded from it—Oklahoma a little bit, FSU a lot. Florida State closed with five straight wins and if momentum is real, they carry it.

FSU clearly has the edge here, with a big rebound season while Oklahoma has its worst year in almost a quarter century.

Final analysis

Even under normal circumstances this looks like an FSU win. And the Sooners haven't played bad at all the last six games, even though they lost three of them. Two things make them a much worse underdog though.

One is speculative: their motivation. It might seem obvious that they're not psyched about going 6-6, but we don't know for sure. And there are even some narratives that maybe they're going to be inspired by playing FSU and represent the school and its history by making sure they don't have a losing record, which would be the first since 1998. That could happen.

But the other factor is more concrete: the amount of players they are losing to the transfer portal. Not only will this materially impact their performance, but it's also more evidence of the above point: that they really aren't crazy about how their season went and don't really want to be here.

And even if it were just that, you could say the effect won't be too great, but you have to add in Florida State's surge this year from last year's 5-7. They've looked better and better as the season went on, and they get to play a big name opponent.

With all of that in the mix, I foresee a good old-fashioned Florida State beatdown being delivered. I have the feeling it's going to look like the 90s again for one night.

Prediction: Florida State 41, Oklahoma 17

More previews, odds, and predictions: View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule.

December 11, 2022 at 09:44 PM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

2022 Pinstripe Bowl Preview, Odds, and Prediction: Syracuse vs. Minnesota

View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule here

Pinstripe Bowl in New York, NY
When: Thursday, December 29 at 2:00 pm ET
TV: ESPN

Syracuse Orange (7-5) vs. Minnesota Golden Gophers (8-4)

Well it's not a 6-6 vs. 6-6 bowl, maybe those are finally over?

Vegas line/spread: Minnesota by 11 (over/under 44)

We're a little surprised that the Gophers are favored at all, let alone by around a touchdown. Not shocked, just surprised. The line has moved steadily from 7 1/2 to 11, with the over up 2 points.

Strength power rating: #22 Minnesota 25, #54 Syracuse 19

Best/Worst removed: Minnesota 25-19

Turnover corrected: Minnesota 26-19

We give Syracuse partial home field advantage for playing in-state and a lot closer than Minnesota, so we end up with the game a touch tighter than the spread, but it's still pretty close, Minnesota being the favorite. Now that we look at our power rating and see Minnesota in the top 25 and Syracuse outside the top 50, it's apparent why the Gophers are favored.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -7.5 Spread
Minnesota	63%	48%
Syracuse	37%	52%

Minnesota doesn't quite cover the spread most of the time, which makes sense given our power rating's 6-point spread.

When Syracuse has the ball

Syracuse scoring offense(adj): #57	Minnesota scoring defense(adj): #9
Syracuse rushing offense(raw): #78	Minnesota rushing defense(raw): #15
Syracuse passing offense(raw): #76	Minnesota passing defense(raw): #8

Here's why the Gophers are favored: defense. They have a top ten scoring defense when adjusted for their opponents, and Syracuse has a pretty average offense for the FBS. It's going to be hard for the Orange to score and possibly to even move the ball, though the rush/pass numbers aren't adjusted for opponents and could be misleading. They're better for seeing the focus of an offense, and it shows the Orange are pretty balanced, but also that the Gophers don't really have a weakness in the D. They will be missing a D-back and a linebacker to the transfer portal, however. But Syracuse is missing their top RB and an OL starter, so maybe it evens out.

When Minnesota has the ball

Minnesota scoring offense(adj): #55	Syracuse scoring defense(adj): #37
Minnesota rushing offense(raw): #11	Syracuse rushing defense(raw): #68
Minnesota passing offense(raw): #114	Syracuse passing defense(raw): #19

Minnesota's offense is very similar in quality to Syracuse's, and they're facing a weaker Orange defense. The matchup is favorable for the Gophers too, as they like to run the ball while Syracuse is better against the pass. QB Tanner Morgan (1,324 yards, 7:5) is injured and didn't play in the last three games; he's listed as questionable which 9 times out of 10 means the guy plays and is fine, but this time might be the 1 in 10. But even if he doesn't play, backup Athan Kaliakmanis (866, 3:4) has done well enough in his place that it shouldn't matter in a run-based offense.

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): Syracuse: #76 Minnesota: #120

Neither team has great special teams but Minnesota is particularly poor. Their punting game, including fielding, is particularly poor so what Syracuse can't do on offense they can maybe do with field position.

Syracuse's season (7-5) • SOS: #47

Non-conf losses: 1 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 4-5
Record vs. top 25 teams: 1-3

Louisville 31-7
@Connecticut 48-14
Purdue 32-29
Virginia 22-20
Wagner 59-0
#23 North Carolina St 24-9
@#7 Clemson 21-27
#21 Notre Dame 24-41
@Pittsburgh 9-19
#13 Florida St 3-38
@Wake Forest 35-45
@Boston College 32-23

Syracuse played a fairly tough schedule with 9 bowl teams and 4 in the Committee top 25. They started with a suprisingly easy win over Louisville which still ranks as their best game, then beat UConn who actually made a bowl too. They upset Purdue—something Minnesota couldn't do—and after beating #23 NC State they were 6-0 and seriously in the ACC title race. They fought hard at #7 Clemson and fell just 27-21, and after that they seemed deflated, losing their next four before recoving with a tepid win at Boston College. Their slump wasn't just due to emotion but also due to playing six straight bowl teams, three on the road, and four of them ranked in the Committee top 25 at year's end. So sheer physical exhaustion might have been part of it, something the time off might help with.

Minnesota's season (8-4) • SOS: #54

Non-conf losses: 0 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 2-4
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-1

New Mexico St 38-0
Western Illinois 62-10
Colorado 49-7
@Michigan St 34-7
Purdue 10-20
@Illinois 14-26
@#11 Penn State 17-45
Rutgers 31-0
@Nebraska 20-13
Northwestern 31-3
Iowa 10-13
@Wisconsin 23-16

For a brief time Minnesota looked like a Playoff team. It was after four games that the Gophers dominated 183-24, and were coming off a 34-7 domination of Michigan State in East Lansing. Of course the Spartans ended up 5-7, Colorado was 1-11, Western Illinois is an FCS team and New Mexico State actually made a bowl game but at that point was still New Mexico State. The Gophers subsequently lost three games in a row ended their hype in an instant. Now forgotten, Minnesota quietly won four of their last five games to finish 8-4, playing almost as well as they did at the beginning of the year.

Key Injuries / opt-outs

Minnesota QB Tanner Morgan hasn't played in several games and is very questionable for the bowl. Also for Minnesota d-back Michael Dixon (28 tackles) is in the transfer portal, as well as LB Braelen Oliver (33 tackles).

For Syracuse, 5th-leading receiver Courtney Jackson is in the portal as well.

Update: the transfers and opt-outs have kept adding up for the Orange: #1 RB Sean Tucker (1,060 yards, 11 TDs); O-line starter Matt Bergeron; and starting safety Ja'had Carter.

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: Minnesota is a fairly strong favorite, something that might not seem right at first glance, but people have been sleeping on Minnesota since their mid-season collapse (guilty as charged).
Location: Yankee Stadium in the Bronx. We've been giving Syracuse partial credit for playing in their home state, but it's arguable that upstate New York counts. Minnesota is a lot farther away though.
Coaching: No changes.
Motivation: Syracuse hasn't been to a bowl since 2018 and just missed last year at 5-7, so the 2nd half of the season is less important due to that. Minnesota has been bowling regularly lately save 2020, and last year was the same 8-4 as this year. They probably have less motivation but ended the season well.
Momentum: Here it's hard to know what to make of Syracuse. They started 6-0 and ended 1-5 which is bad, but as I've mentioned before when 6-6 teams go 5-1 and 1-5 it's inexplicably a good thing for bowl performance. Here it's hard to tell but it's clear they have no momentum per sé. Minnesota won four of their last five including their last game so they have it, I suppose.

Syracuse is playing fairly close to home for what that's worth, but the main thing is they're back to a bowl game and can probably forget about the last half of the season. Minnesota probably isn't psyched but also probably isn't disappointed. Neither team had players opting out in significant numbers, a good sign these days.

Final analysis

Both of these teams played their best football early in the season; this looked like a New Year's Day matchup from the vantage point of late September. Minnesota probably did it right, slumping in the middle of the season and recovering while Syracuse slumped for the 2nd half of the season.

If we could quantify exhaustion, and how much recovery helps, we might test it on Syracuse, who played 6 tough teams in a row without a week off. If we tracked all injuries we might see something usable but the noise in the system would probably outweigh the data. Let's just say that if Syracuse comes in fired up and looks fast and strong and wins easily, I might have to look into this theory. Certainly time off to recover and heal helps, but it helps the other team, too; identifying the special cases where it does the most good might be useful.

However we look at Syracuse's late season slump, the bottom line is they played worse; it wasn't just that they played the same and had a tougher schedule. Post-Clemson, they never played as well again as they had in 5 of the first 7 games. In other words, post-Clemson they played their 6th best, 8th best, 9th best, and their 11th and 12th best games of the season.

We use the mean and sometimes the median a lot in football analytics but you rarely see the mode, which is the most common score or rating. Here we see four of Syracuse's ratings almost exactly alike, and also 4 by Minnesota. Three times each they appear in the last five games for each team. If there's a "most common performance level" this is it for both teams. Since I think Minnesota is going to overcome any advantage the Orange have for being bowl-enthused (just a hunch), then it's fairly likely both teams play like they did late in the season. We have up to a 75% chance Syracuse will play like they did against Pitt, Wake, and BC, and a 60% chance Minnesota will play as in the Rutgers, Northwestern, and Wisconsin wins. The bad news for the Orange is they played 20 points worse than the Gophers on those occasions. We'll still spot them a few points for playing in-state, maybe a few for being enthused and better special teams, but we come out with a solid Minnesota win.

The Vegas line has moved heavily toward our spread too but isn't quite there as of game day. And the portal/injury losses for both teams have mounted but I'll stick with the original score pick.

Prediction: Minnesota 30, Syracuse 14

More previews, odds, and predictions: View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule.

December 11, 2022 at 04:23 PM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

2022 Texas Bowl Preview, Odds, and Prediction: Texas Tech vs. Mississippi

View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule here

Texas Bowl in Houston, TX
When: Wednesday, December 28 at 9:00 pm ET
TV: ESPN

Texas Tech Red Raiders (7-5) vs. Mississippi Rebels (8-4)

Lubbock, Texas vs. Jackson, Mississippi, can we just call this the Bubba Bowl?

Vegas line/spread: Mississippi by 4 1/2 (over/under 71.5)

Ole Miss is a fairly slim favorite to win what is expected to be a high-scoring game. By game day the over was up 1 1/2 points since open but the line held steady until moving up a point on game day.

Strength power rating: #20 Mississippi 34, #26 Texas Tech 32

Best/Worst removed: Mississippi 34-31

Turnover corrected: Texas Tech 33-33

Ole Miss is a 2 point favorite straight up on Strength and by three points if we exclude each team's extreme games. Interestingly though if we remove the influence of turnovers Texas Tech improves quite a bit and it's essentially a tie, or an overtime win for the Raiders (it would be their 4th of the year). Tech QB's have thrown 17 picks this year so of course they'd like to remove that influence.

Interestingly our forecast doesn't call for too high scoring of a game, roughly 66 points compared to the over/under of around 70.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -3.5 Spread
Mississippi	56%	46.5%
Texas Tech	44%	53.5%

Ole Miss wins most of the game comparisons straight up, but falls short against the spread, which makes sense as our power rating projection is a 2 point win for the Rebels.

When Texas Tech has the ball

Texas Tech scoring offense(adj): #21	Mississippi scoring defense(adj): #46
Texas Tech rushing offense(raw): #67	Mississippi rushing defense(raw): #82
Texas Tech passing offense(raw): #13	Mississippi passing defense(raw): #57

Texas Tech's offense should score more than average on Mississippi's defense. Tech is a passing team and that's where their focus will lie. They have three QBs with over 1,000 yards each, an unusual situation certainly but it worked as they combined for 3,684 yards and 25 TDs. They also threw 17 interceptions which is a problem. Tech even has plays where all three are on the field at the same time, that's some kind of commitment to the QB position. But lately it's been Tyler Shough doing most of the work, and he led them to their last three wins throwing only 1 interception. QB Donovan Smith recently announced he's entering the transfer portal.

When Mississippi has the ball

Mississippi scoring offense(adj): #19	Texas Tech scoring defense(adj): #47
Mississippi rushing offense(raw): #3	Texas Tech rushing defense(raw): #90
Mississippi passing offense(raw): #66	Texas Tech passing defense(raw): #97

Ole Miss has almost the exact level of scoring offense as Texas Tech, who has almost the exact scoring defense as the Rebels. The difference is focus, as the Rebels want to run the ball a lot, and they have three players over 500 yards led by Quinshon Judkins with 1,476 yards. Texas Tech's rushing and passing defense are obviously not as bad as these raw figures indicate, but they'll have trouble stopping the run for sure.

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): Texas Tech: #77 Mississippi: #70

Nothing much to see here.

Texas Tech's season (7-5) • SOS: #12

Non-conf losses: 1 • Home losses: 1
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 4-5
Record vs. top 25 teams: 1-3

Murray St 63-10
Houston 33-30 2OT
@#23 North Carolina St 14-27
#20 Texas 37-34 OT
@#9 Kansas St 28-37
@Oklahoma St 31-41
West Virginia 48-10
Baylor 17-45
@#3 TCU 24-34
Kansas 43-28
@Iowa St 14-10
Oklahoma 51-48 OT

Texas Tech just barely made it to a bowl game. They really had no leeway at 4-5 plus three overtime games; assuming they split those that puts them at 5-6 with another 50/50 game. Instead though, they got lucky and won all three, beating Houston, Texas, and Oklahoma by a field goal each.

Tech's QB situation was in flux all year with three starters sometimes sharing the field. Donovan Smith started the first five games, then Behren Morton started until injured during the TCU game and Tyler Shough took over for the last three.

Mississippi's season (8-4) • SOS: #45

Non-conf losses: 0 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 2-4
Record vs. top 25 teams: 1-3

#24 Troy 28-10
Central Arkansas 59-3
@Georgia Tech 42-0
Tulsa 35-27
Kentucky 22-19
@Vanderbilt 52-28
Auburn 48-34
@#17 LSU 20-45
@Texas A&M 31-28
#5 Alabama 24-30
@Arkansas 27-42
#22 Mississippi St 22-24

Despite playing the SEC Ole Miss didn't play a very tough schedule, with only six bowl teams on their slate. They played their best football early, beating #24 Troy solidly and crushing their next two foes 101-3. The Rebels were 7-0 but 4 of their next 5 opponents were bowl teams, and they lost to all four of them. That included a tight home loss to Alabama and another to rival Mississippi State at home.

Key Injuries / opt-outs

For Texas Tech co-starting QB Donovan Smith has entered the portal. He hasn't been starting since mid-season and they have two other starting QBs as well. QB Behren Mortons is questionable for the game, which would leave them with Tyler Shough, who has been starting lately. On defense the Raiders will be without starting D-back Reggie Pearson (#6 w/55 tackles).

Mississippi will be without corner Miles Battle and backup QB Luke Altmyer (125 yds, 2:1).

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: Ole Miss is a slight favorite, will Texas Tech feel slighted? Probably not too much. Nor will the Rebels be overconfident.
Location: Although it's the Texas Bowl so Texas Tech is playing in-state, Jackson, Mississippi is actually a few hours closer to Houston than Lubbock is, so this game resembles something more like the Texas-Oklahoma games in Dallas and should probably be considered a fully neutral field.
Coaching: No change. But speculation about Lane Kiffin might have contributed to Ole Miss's poor play down the stretch.
Motivation: The year ended pretty badly for Ole Miss, as their Playoff dreams then their SEC title dreams fell with the losses to LSU and Alabama and they finished with 3 losses, down from 10-2 last year. Texas Tech improved a bit from 6-6 and won their last three.
Momentum: As mentioned just above, Ole Miss lost their last 3 and Texas Tech won their last three, including an overtime thriller over Oklahoma.

Clearly psychology seems to be on Texas Tech's side. They won their last three, the last one in overtime, and probably played their best and most consistent in that stretch. Mississippi lost a heartbreaker to Alabama, pissed away the Arkansas game, and couldn't even get motivated to beat rival Mississippi State on their own home field.

Final analysis

By comparing offensive and defensive strength these teams could hardly be more similar. Each has a top 25 offense and a barely top 50 defense, which should lead to plenty of scoring. The focus of the offenses is very different, though. The oddsmakers have Ole Miss as a fairly high favorite considering how close it seems on paper—probably because Mississippi plays in the SEC which gets lots of respect while the Big Twelve doesn't. There's the idea that an SEC team necessarily has played a tough schedule, but Texas Tech's schedule is a lot tougher than Mississippi's; they played 9 bowl teams to Ole Miss's 6, for example.

When teams are pretty close in Strength, we also have to look at psychology (and make some guesses there, let's face it). Texas Tech won their last three games while Ole Miss lost their last three. Just that alone raises some flags. And the Red Raiders have played very well recently compared to the Rebels.

Texas Tech had a big interception problem in 2022 but that might be solved with Tyler Shough at the helm. After throwing 16 picks in 9 games they have only 1 in the last three games. The INT rate went from 3.8% (16 in 424 attempt) to 1% (1 in 105).

Maybe Lane Kiffin can get the team motivated; maybe the fact that he didn't bolt for Auburn will help. It's a good sign that players aren't heading for the transfer portal (other than a few non-starters). So I don't think Mississippi's situation will be dire. They just haven't played their best lately and that may carry into the bowl game.

I still think it will be a close game, but with the Raiders on the winning side. Maybe in regulation, or possibly in the Raiders' 4th overtime game.

Prediction: Texas Tech 34, Mississippi 31

More previews, odds, and predictions: View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule.

December 11, 2022 at 02:37 PM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

December 10, 2022

2022 Liberty Bowl Preview, Odds, and Prediction: Kansas vs. Arkansas

View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule here

Liberty Bowl in Memphis, TN
When: Wednesday, December 28 at 5:30 pm ET
TV: ESPN

Kansas Jayhawks (6-6) vs. Arkansas Razorbacks (6-6)

Yes, it's yet another 6-6 bowl, but it's the best kind of 6-6 bowl—two very evenly matched Power Five teams with a good comeback/scrappy underdog storyline.

Vegas line/spread: Arkansas by 2 1/2* (over/under 69.5)

Arkansas is a slim favorite, probably because no one can believe Kansas is back in a bowl game. The line has held pretty steady, down a bit from 3 points and the over/under staying the same for weeks before edging up 1/2 point on game day. *Apparently right before kickoff the line moved to -1.5 for Arkansas. The last line I saw was 2.5 so by that, a bet placed on Kansas would have won, but since the closing line would make that a loss, I'll split the difference and call a push.

Strength power rating: #36 Kansas 36, #38 Arkansas 35

Best/Worst removed: Kansas 36-35

Turnover corrected: Arkansas 36-35

The Strength power rating favors Kansas here, but not by much. In fact if we correct for turnovers it flips back to Arkansas by a point. We see this as anybody's game.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -3 Spread
Arkansas	50%	41%
Kansas	50%	59%

These teams rank so close in Strength that the game-comparison system deadlocks 72 to 72; naturally against the spread the oddsmakers favorite in this case is going to fall short.

When Kansas has the ball

Kansas scoring offense(adj): #20	Arkansas scoring defense(adj): #55
Kansas rushing offense(raw): #34	Arkansas rushing defense(raw): #104
Kansas passing offense(raw): #64	Arkansas passing defense(raw): #118

Kansas has a great offense, there's no doubt about that. And Arkansas will have their hands full because they give up quite a few points. Their defense isn't nearly as bad as their rush/pass yardages suggest (since these are raw figures and Arkansas plays in the SEC). But Kansas will be able to move the ball on offense, especially since Arkansas' two top tacklers, linebackers Drew Sanders and Bumper Pool, are in the transfer pool, and their defensive coordinator was hired away.

When Arkansas has the ball

Arkansas scoring offense(adj): #23	Kansas scoring defense(adj): #78
Arkansas rushing offense(raw): #9	Kansas rushing defense(raw): #116
Arkansas passing offense(raw): #64	Kansas passing defense(raw): #103

Arkansas has an offense every bit as good as Kansas does, and Kansas has a weaker defense, with similarly poor rushing and passing defense numbers for the Razorbacks to exploit, particularly with their running game. They'll need to focus even more on running the ball since Jadon Haselwood, their #2 receiver, is in the transfer portal.

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): Kansas: #109 Arkansas: #50

Arkansas ranks about average in special teams, while Kansas is pretty weak.

Kansas's season (6-6) • SOS: #8

Non-conf losses: 0 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 3-6
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-3

Tennessee Tech 56-10
@West Virginia 55-42 OT
@Houston 48-30
Duke 35-27
Iowa St 14-11
#3 TCU 31-38
@Oklahoma 42-52
@Baylor 23-35
Oklahoma St 37-16
@Texas Tech 28-43
#20 Texas 14-55
@#9 Kansas St 27-47

Kansas' first game was a shock to everyone as they dominated Tennessee Tech 56-10. True, they beat an FCS team, but that magnitude of win for Kansas was unheard of since the Mark Mangino days. Even more shocking? Back to back road wins over West Virginia (with an overtime TD + pick 6) and Houston. Wins over Duke and Iowa State put them at 5-0 and they were dreaming.

The dream almost came true against TCU but the Horned Frogs prevailed 38-10. In all the Jayhawks lost six of their last 7 games (all 7 games against bowl teams) but their 37-16 win over Oklahoma State gave them the magic 6th win an a bowl berth, their first since 2008.

Arkansas's season (6-6) • SOS: #30

Non-conf losses: 1 • Home losses: 3
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 4-5
Record vs. top 25 teams: 1-3

Cincinnati 31-24
#19 South Carolina 44-30
Missouri St 38-27
=Texas A&M 21-23
#5 Alabama 26-49
@#22 Mississippi St 17-40
@Brigham Young 52-35
@Auburn 41-27
Liberty 19-21
#17 LSU 10-13
Mississippi 42-27
@Missouri 27-29

Arkansas beat Cincinnati in the opener, a good litmus test for how good they could be. Two more wins didn't add anything to their argument however, especially the 38-27 win over Missouri State. The Razorbacks lost to rival Texas A&M, to Alabama, and Mississippi State and fell to 3-3. They pulled back to 5-3 but lost to Liberty and LSU. Beating Ole Miss gave them a 6th win but by that point the season was mediocre at best and they fell to Missouri, meaning they lost 3 of their last 4 games.

Key Injuries / opt-outs

Arkansas' portal transfers: #2 WR Jadon Haselwood (702 yards); #1 tackler LB Drew Sanders (103 tackles, 9.5 sacks); #2 tackler Bumper Pool (92 tackles); backup QB Malik Hornsby (1:2); backup DB Myles Slusher

Kansas' only transfers are a few players who didn't contribute much this season. On the injury front, #1 tackler safety Kenny Logan (96 tackles) has a foot injury and is unlikely to play. They also have a few players few questionable on the O-line and kicker Jacob Borcila. RB Daniel Hishaw (#3 w/259 yards) has been out since October and was rumored to be returning for the bowl game but will not.

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: Not surprising that Arkansas is favored over Kansas, who has no bowl experience in the last 15 years and lost 6 of their last 7 games.
Location: Memphis Tennessee, neutral site
Coaching: No changes at head coach but Arkansas' DC Barry Odom was hired away to be head coach of UNLV
Motivation: Kansas is obviously motivated for their first bowl game in 15 years. Arkansas? They went 8-4 last year but had four losing season before that, so a bowl is not assumed. Still, the amount of players entering the portal and not playing in the bowl suggests the team isn't too keyed up.
Momentum: Neither team has anything resembling momentum, and Kansas has negative momentum if anything after losing 6 of their last seven.

Arkansas has no momentum and probably no motivation. Kansas has tons of motivation but no momentum. First of all, motivation outweighs momentum 10 to 1. Second...it's weird. Kansas almost has so much negative momentum that they it can go back to positive. Not literally, but for years I saw 6-6 teams enter the bowl season after starting 5-1 or 4-2 and finishing 1-5 or 2-4. And I always picked these teams to lose because that means their season went to shit, right? How can that team possibly do anything but lose?

Yet time and time again, these awful-momentum 6-6 teams would inexplicably win, even against 9-3 teams. It's either a different psychological thing, that they decide they have nothing to lose and might as well give it their all one last time, or their opponent keeps hearing "they've dropped 5 of their last 6 games" over and over and takes them lightly.

Why wouldn't Arkansas take Kansas lightly? They're a flash in the pan that hasn't been winning since the current Arkansas players were 6 years old. Kansas doesn't win! And they've lost 6 of 7. Arkansas is probably insulted that they are only a 3 point favorite, it will be easy.

Final analysis

If the Kansas of the first half of the season could show up, they'd win easily. But Kansas hasn't been the same, especially over the last three games, and it's mainly the defense which has been worse. Arkansas is up and down, played well at the end but still lost 3 of 4.

Arkansas is missing a lot of players, enough to make a difference. On offense a receiver which probably doesn't hurt them much, but on defense their two top tacklers are gone along with their defensive coordinator. According to one article, Arkansas is down to 48 scholarship players—25 fewer than normal. That opens a lot of doors for Kansas, who has only 6 portal transfers on the entire squad though they will miss a few more due to injury.

Kansas will be happy to take whatever they can. They're going to come in fired up, with a complete squad, and I wouldn't be surprised at all if win in a shootout, from a combination of enthusiasm and facing a less-than-motivated and heavily depleted Arkansas team. Scoring will be pretty high, as they'll give up a lot of points, too, as it's mainly their defense that suffered late in the year, but they won't give up if they get behind, whereas I think Arkansas will.

Prediction: Kansas 42, Arkansas 35

More previews, odds, and predictions: View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule.

December 10, 2022 at 10:49 PM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

2022 Military Bowl Preview, Odds, and Prediction: Duke vs. UCF

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Military Bowl in Annapolis, MD
When: Wednesday, December 28 at 2:00 pm ET
TV: ESPN

Duke Blue Devils (8-4) vs. UCF Knights (9-4)

A Military Bowl with no armed forces teams since Navy didn't qualify.

Vegas line/spread: Duke by 3 (over/under 62.5)

Duke began as a 1 point favorite but by game day was about a field goal favorite. The over has remained very consistent.

Strength power rating: #35 UCF 33, #51 Duke 29

Best/Worst removed: UCF 33-29

Turnover corrected: UFC 35-26

Though the oddsmakers pick Duke, our Strength power rating takes the Knights by around 4 points. What's more, if we remove the influence of turnovers Duke's rating goes down a lot, making it a 9 point win for the Knights.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -1 Spread
Duke	44%	40%
UCF	56%	60%

Since Strength favors UCF straight up, it's clear the game-comparison system is not going to favor Duke at -1. But the Blue Devils still cover in 2 out of 5 comparisons, so it's not cut and dried.

When Duke has the ball

Duke scoring offense(adj): #38	UCF scoring defense(adj): #43
Duke rushing offense(raw): #40	UCF rushing defense(raw): #76
Duke passing offense(raw): #60	UCF passing defense(raw): #73

It's a pretty even game when Duke has the ball. With fairly even schedules, the rush/pass numbers are workable, and Duke should have a way to move the ball through the air or on the ground, though neither will be easy. Duke QB Riley Leonard does a bit of both, passing for 2,794 yards (20:6) and running for 636. UCF will be missing a starting linebacker, too.

When UCF has the ball

UCF scoring offense(adj): #29	Duke scoring defense(adj): #56
UCF rushing offense(raw): #8	Duke rushing defense(raw): #24
UCF passing offense(raw): #55	Duke passing defense(raw): #108

Central Florida's offense is nearly top 25 while Duke's D is barely above average. The key matchup will be in the running game where both sides excel. Again it's the QB, John Rhys Plumlee, throwing for 2,404 yards (14:7) and being the team's #1 rusher with 841 yards, though they also have two backs above 750 each. They'd like to exploit Duke's passing defense too but #2 receiver Ryan O'Keefe (726 yards) is "in the portal" as they say, and Plumlee has a hamstring injury that shouldn't keep him out of the game but might limit him in the running game.

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): Duke: #25 UCF: #38

Both teams have decent special teams squads.

Duke's season (8-4) • SOS: #91

Non-conf losses: 1 • Home losses: 1
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 1-3
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-0

Temple 30-0
@Northwestern 31-23
North Carolina A&T 49-20
@Kansas 27-35
Virginia 38-17
@Georgia Tech 20-23 OT
North Carolina 35-38
@Miami FL 45-21
@Boston College 38-31
Virginia Tech 24-7
@Pittsburgh 26-28
Wake Forest 34-31

Duke was just about the most consistent team around. Their opening 30-0 win over Temple might have been as good as they got, unless it was their 45-21 win at Miami. Other than that, they played about the same each time out, dipping a bit in the overtime loss at Georgia Tech maybe. But which is better a 34-31 win over Wake Forest or a 28-26 loss at Pitt? Those were their last two games, and they were just as good or better than the rest of the season. The Blue Devils won 4 of their first 5 and 4 of their last 5.

UCF's season (9-4) • SOS: #69

Non-conf losses: 1 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 3-3
Record vs. top 25 teams: 1-1

South Carolina St 56-10
Louisville 14-20
@Florida Atlantic 40-14
Georgia Tech 27-10
SMU 41-19
Temple 70-13
@East Carolina 13-34
Cincinnati 25-21
@Memphis 35-28
@#16 Tulane 38-31
Navy 14-17
@South Florida 46-39
@#16 Tulane 28-45

UCF lost early at home to Louisville and looked like another Group of Five bust. But the next four games painted the team as a powerhouse on its way to a 12-1 season as American Conference champs, especially the gaudy 70-13 win over Temple (compare to Duke's 30-0 win over the Owls) and 27-10 win over Georgia Tech (who beat the Blue Devils in overtime). But the East Carolina loss rocked them, and though they won three more after—including a win over #16 Tulane—they played poorly in their last three games—including a return loss at Tulane for the AAC title. The Knights were 3-3 against bowl teams and 1-1 against the top 25—splitting 2 games at #16 Tulane.

Key Injuries / opt-outs

UCF #2 WR Ryan O'Keefe has entered the transfer portal, as has backup QB Mikey Keene (647, 6:1) who started a few games in mid-season. On defense starting LB Jeremiah Jean-Baptiste is portal-bound too.

In addition, QB John Rhys Plumlee has a hamstring injury and probably won't be 100% for the bowl. The team did get two weeks off during which time his injury healed quite a bit.

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: Duke is perhaps a surprise favorite, since it's so rare Duke is even in a bowl game
Location: Annapolis, MD. Neutral though Duke is closer, but the football team doesn't have the basketball team's rabid fans.
Coaching: No changes.
Motivation: Central Florida is at the point in their program where this season was a bit disappointing. Duke hasn't been bowling since 2018 and went 5-7, 2-9, and 3-9 since then, so they'll be psyched to be at a bowl game, especially the seniors who have waited 4 years for this.
Momentum: UCF played poorly in losing 2 of their last three games, while Duke played well in all three, going 2-1.

Duke has more momentum, and much more motivation. The existence and significance of the former is questioned, but the latter is pretty much everything during bowl season.

Final analysis

UCF is the better team for the full season, at full strength. But they're missing a few key players while Duke hasn't been bitten by the tranfer-portal bug. And the Blue Devils played stronger down the stretch. So it's understandable that the Blue Devils are favored.

Not only that but they have a reason to be psyched up for the game. Central Florida is almost have a down year for the program, or at least it's not good enough for several key players to want to play.

Between the losses UCF has to the portal, Duke's motivation, and the Blue Devils much better play down the stretch while UCF stalled, we take Duke to win in Annapolis.

Prediction: Duke 34, UCF 24

More previews, odds, and predictions: View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule.

December 10, 2022 at 08:47 PM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

2022 Guaranteed Rate Bowl Preview, Odds, and Prediction: Oklahoma State vs. Wisconsin

View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule here

Guaranteed Rate Bowl in Phoenix, AZ
When: Tuesday, December 27 at 10:15 pm ET
TV: ESPN

Oklahoma State Cowboys (7-5) vs. Wisconsin Badgers (6-6)

Two Power Five title hopefuls that fell way short. It's unclear if either team wants to win this bowl game.

Vegas line/spread: Wisconsin by 3 1/2 (over/under 44.5)

Most games involving Wisconsin have low totals, but this is extra low—possibly because both offenses have been sucked into the transfer portal. The line and expected score have been pretty steady, up from 3 and 43 early.

Strength power rating: #28 Wisconsin 28, #39 Oklahoma St 25

Best/Worst removed: Wisconsin 27-26

Turnover corrected: Wisconsin 27-27

Strength agrees with Vegas—almost. It's really about 2.5 points and it rounds to 3 to make a proper score. When the best and worst game ratings are tossed, it narrows to a point, and if we correct for turnovers it also contracts, this time to about a half a point. Call it a Wisconsin overtime win. Either way we can see with some adjustments that the game becomes a tossup.

What we don't have is the really low total, probably a consequence of players on offense missing the bowl. We'll take a look.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -3 Spread
Wisconsin	54%	46.5%
Oklahoma St	46%	53.5%

Although the Strength power rating favors the Badgers by 3, matching the oddsmakers, they don't win the majority of game-comparisons against a 3 point spread—Oklahoma State does. Normally you'd expect this situation to end up 50/50, but in this case the teams have outliers that make the game comparisons stray from the mean. Here the 50/50 split mark is at 1.5 points or 2 points, not 3.

When Oklahoma St has the ball

Oklahoma St scoring offense(adj): #34	Wisconsin scoring defense(adj): #23
Oklahoma St rushing offense(raw): #93	Wisconsin rushing defense(raw): #12
Oklahoma St passing offense(raw): #20	Wisconsin passing defense(raw): #29

A good matchup here with borderline top 25 offense and defense. Oklahoma State's schedule was a bit tougher so the run/pass matchups are better on their side than they would seem, but overall they won't have much luck running the ball but should have decent success passing. That's without the transfer/opt-out players, so all bets are off for what really happens.

Oklahoma State QB Spencer Sanders (2,642 yards, 17:9, #2 w/391 rush) has entered the transfer portal, along with leading rusher Dominic Richardson (543 yards). That means their top two rushers and #1 QB are gone. Sanders' backups had 729 yards and a 5:7 ratio. Starting to see why the game is so low scoring?

When Wisconsin has the ball

Wisconsin scoring offense(adj): #46	Oklahoma St scoring defense(adj): #44
Wisconsin rushing offense(raw): #53	Oklahoma St rushing defense(raw): #96
Wisconsin passing offense(raw): #112	Oklahoma St passing defense(raw): #113

It's pretty even on this side, though Wisconsin's running game could exploit the Cowboys a bit here. But once again let's take a look at the transfer portal: QB Graham Mertz (2,136 yards, 19:10) is gone, along with a trio of part-time starters on the offensive line. Mertz's backups combine for around 100 yards and 1 touchdown. With the passing game shot and the running game in danger due to the offensive line, the Badger offense is in trouble, though no actual OL starters or RBs have opted out yet (top RB Braelon Allen is questionable, which usually means they'll play). Update: Allen will play.

There is some good news for Wisconsin though—some defensive players for the Cowboys have opted out, too, including leading tackler Mason Cobb (LB).

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): Oklahoma St: #15 Wisconsin: #113

Oklahoma State's special teams outclasses Wisconsin's by quite a bit. In a game where starters on offense and defense are dropping like flies into the transfer portal, maybe the untouches special teams units will carry the day.

Oklahoma St's season (7-5) • SOS: #13

Non-conf losses: 0 • Home losses: 1
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 3-4
Record vs. top 25 teams: 1-2

Central Michigan 58-44
Arizona St 34-17
Arkansas-Pine Bluff 63-7
@Baylor 36-25
Texas Tech 41-31
@#3 TCU 40-43 2OT
#20 Texas 41-34
@#9 Kansas St 0-48
@Kansas 16-37
Iowa St 20-14
@Oklahoma 13-28
West Virginia 19-24

Oklahoma State had hopes at 5-0 and even at 6-1 for a national title or at least a Big Twelve title. Losing four of their last five put an end to that and the player exodus started. Losing in double-overtime to Playoff-bound TCU was no shame, but falling 48-0 at Kansas State—even if they did win the Big Twelve—was an embarrassment that hung over to the Kansas loss. They barely edged Iowa State before losing to Oklahoma and West Virginia to just get things over.

Are they still there, at the let's-just-get-this-over-with stage? Judging by the players leaving, they couldn't even wait for that stage.

Wisconsin's season (6-6) • SOS: #35

Non-conf losses: 1 • Home losses: 3
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 3-5
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-1

Illinois St 38-0
Washington St 14-17
New Mexico St 66-7
@#4 Ohio State 21-52
Illinois 10-34
@Northwestern 42-7
@Michigan St 34-28 2OT
Purdue 35-24
Maryland 23-10
@Iowa 10-24
@Nebraska 15-14
Minnesota 16-23

Wisconsin's big dreams ended well before Oklahoma State's, but they still had a shot at the Big Ten title all the way to near the end. The Badgers defense shined in their 38-0 opener but when they faced a real team their offense didn't work. The New Mexico State win looks better in retrospect but big losses to Ohio State (52-21) and Illinois (34-10) sealed the fate of Paul Chryst, even if it was a shock that Wisconsin would take action mid-season. Play improved—or the schedule got easier for a while—and Wisconsin was in the run for the Big Ten West (of course, everyone is always in the run for the Big Ten West) but the Badgers lost two of their last three, a 1-point win over Nebraska being the win that made them bowl eligible.

The Badgers' player exodus started earlier, just after the Paul Chryst firing, and the bowl opt-outs accumulated.

Key Injuries / opt-outs

There are a lot. For Wisconsin:

Starting QB Graham Mertz has entered the transfer portal
part-time starting OLs Logan Brown and Michael Furtney are transferring, and Tyler Beach is probably opting out Update: Beach is playing
Starting RB Braelon Allen is questionable Update: Allen is playing

For Oklahoma State:

Starting QB Spencer Sanders is transferring
Leading rusher Dominic Richardson, transfer
Starting LB and leading tackler Mason Cobb, transfer
Starting DE Tyler Lacy, opt-out

There are others but those are the important parts.

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: Wisconsin is the favorite. Seems pretty random at this point though.
Location: Phoenix Arizona is a neutral location, closer to Oklahoma State but Wisconsin travels notoriously well. Will they this time when the players won't even show up?
Coaching: Wisconsin's Paul Chryst was fired, but that seems like ancient history now. But it does leave Wisconsin with an interim coach Jim Leonard leading them against Mike Gundy who is in his 18th season.
Motivation: Is there any for either team? That's the real question. Wisconsin was 8-4 last year and had high expectations this season. Ditto for Ok State who was 11-2 last year.
Momentum: Both teams lost momentum; for Wisconsin it was early, for Oklahoma State it was late.

It's a sad sad situation, to quote Elton John. Neither team wants to be here, all their players are bolting, their seasons are both in a shambles, and it's the Guaranteed Rate Bowl, ffs.

Final analysis

The reason Wisconsin is the favorite? Because losing their QB hurts them a lot less since they have a ground game, though they do lose some pieces of their offensive line. Oklahoma State also loses their top LB and another starter on defense which helps the Badgers. This game is really coming down to attrition, and who has the best pieces left.

This is another game where all the power ratings and analysis end up meaningless, unless you track individual players and their contribution to the team like in basketball. Wisconsin should have as close to their starting O-line as they normally have, and they'll find a QB to hand off the ball. What will Oklahoma State find? We saw before that when a pass-centric team loses their QB before the bowl game it's about a 16 1/2 point swing (from the power rating estimate). This year will provide a few examples of non-pass-centric teams losing their QB, such as Florida and now Wisconsin. But we think the effect will be much less, maybe half or smaller.

Braelon Allen is playing, though he may have given Oklahoma State some bulletin board material with his assertion that game film show Oklahoma State's run defense is bad and susceptible to long runs. The Badgers are missing two starting offensive lineman, but Oklahoma State is missing two key defensive starters, so maybe he's right. If the Cowboys weren't stumbling into the bowl game I think they'd take that as a challenge; as it is, they might not have the fight in them to take offense.

So Wisconsin can field a ground game against Oklahoma State's depleted defense, while the Cowboys can try out their backup QBs to face Wisconsin defense, which is quite good against the pass anyway. On paper it like the Badgers are on their way to a win.

At least as far as we can guess. And at this point, it's really a guess. Your mileage may vary. But let's face it Oklahoma State was a pretty bad team over the last five games [Update] and recent developments (more attrition on Oklahoma State's side, and Wisconsin keeping more of their O-line and RB squad intact) favor Wisconsin even more. I won't modify the pick but that reinforces it.

Prediction: Wisconsin 24, Oklahoma State 13

More previews, odds, and predictions: View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule.

December 10, 2022 at 06:29 PM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

2022 Holiday Bowl Preview, Odds, and Prediction: Oregon vs. North Carolina

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Holiday Bowl in San Diego, Ca
When: Wednesday, December 28 at 8:00 pm ET
TV: Fox

#15 Oregon Ducks (9-3) vs. North Carolina Tar Heels (9-4)

Powre Five football, Pac-12 vs. the ACC.

Vegas line/spread: Oregon by 13 (over/under 75.5)

Oregon is the biggest favorite in the bowl season by quite a bit, will they live up to it? So far the line has held pretty steady, down a bit from two touchdowns early, while the over/under has steadily moved up a total of 5 1/2 points by game day. Seems the public senses a lot of scoring from these offenses.

Strength power rating: #14 Oregon 46, #59 North Carolina 33

Best/Worst removed: Oregon 47-32

Turnover corrected: Oregon 44-34

Our Strength power rating concurs with the oddsmakers, as it normally does but in this case it's pretty much on the dot—or very close, it's closer to 13 points than 14 but we could round the scores either way. When each teams high and low game rating is thrown out Oregon is a 15 point favorite (due to dumping the opener against Georgia). In a different "correction" we remove the random influence of turnovers which have benefitted Oregon a lot; this narrows the spread to 10 points.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -14 Spread
Oregon	83%	51.3%
North Carolina	17%	48.7%

It all comes down to the distribution of game scores. Our game-comparison system heavily favors Oregon, of course, since it's based on the Strength power rating. Against the 14 point spread, if games had no real outliers, you'd expect Oregon to fall a bit short since Strength has Oregon by 13. Instead, the tipping point is 15 points for a 50/50 split and they cover in a majority—barely—against a two-touchdown spread. A lot of this is due to the Georgia game, the big outlier in Oregon's season.

When Oregon has the ball

Oregon scoring offense(adj): #9	North Carolina scoring defense(adj): #98
Oregon rushing offense(raw): #14	North Carolina rushing defense(raw): #83
Oregon passing offense(raw): #15	North Carolina passing defense(raw): #121

Oregon's offense has a huge edge here as a top ten offense going up against a defense that is barely in the top 100. The Ducks are pretty balanced. Bo Nix has been a success for the Ducks, with 3,389 yards and 27 TDs with just 6 picks. He's also run for over 500 net yards. UNC's defense leaves a lot to be desired and they'll have their hands full, though they're used to that as the UNC offense runs at breakneck speed, leaving the defense to fend for themselves.

Worse, the Tar Heels will be without three starting defensive backs. You can't get much worse than #121 but they definitely will be approaching #131 on bowl day.

When North Carolina has the ball

North Carolina scoring offense(adj): #27	Oregon scoring defense(adj): #42
North Carolina rushing offense(raw): #63	Oregon rushing defense(raw): #32
North Carolina passing offense(raw): #9	Oregon passing defense(raw): #106

North Carolina's offense is solid but not great; they score a lot because they run fast, creating a lot of drives per game. Oregon's defense is middling for the Power Five, so the Tar Heels will be able to score. UNC is a pass-centric team under QB Drake Maye (4,115 yards, 35: 7). Like Nix he's a runner, with over 650 net yards on the ground (#1 on the team).

The Ducks have a pass defense problem that the Tar Heels can exploit for sure, and on top of that three defensive starters are opting out of the bowl game or transferring, making things even worse.

On the other hand, UNC top receiver Josh Downs has over 1,000 yards but he's opting out of the bowl game himself; Maye has several other targets but Downs has twice as many catches as the next guy.

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): Oregon: #95 North Carolina: #22

North Carolina's special teams outrank Oregons which could help them close the gap.

Oregon's season (9-3) • SOS: #34

Non-conf losses: 1 • Home losses: 1
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 4-3
Record vs. top 25 teams: 2-3

@#1 Georgia 3-49
Eastern Washington 70-14
Brigham Young 41-20
@Washington St 44-41
Stanford 45-27
@Arizona 49-22
#18 UCLA 45-30
@California 42-24
@Colorado 49-10
#12 Washington 34-37
#8 Utah 20-17
@#14 Oregon St 34-38

Oregon's season started in the worst possible way, a 49-3 beatdown vs. Georgia in Atlanta. They took out their frustrations on Eastern Washington and didn't look back, racking up 8 straight wins before a stunning home loss to Washington broke the streak. After beating top ten Utah they had the path to the Pac-12 title game clear but fell to rival Oregon State. In all they played 5 top 25 teams and went 2-3, and were 4-3 against the bowl field. Other than the first game they didn't have a terrible outing, but the 1-2 finish is a concern.

North Carolina's season (9-4) • SOS: #67

Non-conf losses: 1 • Home losses: 3
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 4-3
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-3

Florida A&M 56-24
@Appalachian St 63-61
@Georgia St 35-28
#21 Notre Dame 32-45
Virginia Tech 41-10
@Miami FL 27-24
@Duke 38-35
Pittsburgh 42-24
@Virginia 31-28
@Wake Forest 36-34
Georgia Tech 17-21
#23 North Carolina St 27-30 2OT
=#7 Clemson 10-39

North Carolina was a team that snuck up on people this year. The only news they made with their first three tepid wins was the 63-61 shootout with Appalachian State, and the loss to Notre Dame took them off the radar. The Tar Heels quietly assembled a 6-game winning streak though and were 9-1 with Playoff hopes still alive. The shocking Georgia Tech home loss took care of that, and they lost in two overtimes to rival NC State. Clemson added the injury to the insult with a 39-10 drubbing. A great season, no doubt, but even when they were winning it was clear the defense was a problem that would catch up to them.

Key Injuries / opt-outs

This game is another one filled to the brim with opt-outs and transfer portal players. I list only the major players (starters and key backups). First UNC:

Leading receiver Josh Downs (1,042 yards, 11 TDs)
Starting CB Storm Duck (3 INT)
Starting CB Tony Grimes
Starting DB Cam'Ron Kelly

And for the Ducks:

#4 receiver Dont'e Thornton (366 yds)
Starting DB Christian Gonzales (4 int)
Starting LB Noah Sewell
Starting LB DJ Johnson
backup LB Justin Flowe
backup LB Jackson LaDuke

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: Oregon has become a huge favorite, probably due to the opt-out situation which hit UNC harder. But even before that the Ducks were about a 10 point favorite. Will they get overconfident? Will UNC feel disrespected? Who knows what goes on in players minds when much of their team is entering the transfer portal or opting out.
Location: San Diego is obviously a neutral field location but Oregon is at least in the same time zone wheres North Carolina is three time zones away. I'd use this as a tiebreaker in a dead even game maybe, nothing more.
Coaching: No head coach changes, though Oregon's OC Kenny Dillingham was hired as ASU's head coach. And speaking of coaching, doesn't it seems more likely that Mack Brown knows how to motivate a team in a bowl game than first-year Oregon coach Dan Lanning? Or is Lanning's youth a positive here?
Motivation: Oregon was 10-2 at this point last year but played for the Pac-12 title. Whenever players bolt, you have to question the overall team's commitment to the bowl game. For North Carolina, they improved greatly on their 6-6 season last year but they have even more players bolting.
Momentum: Neither team has momentum and that's adding to the lack of motivation. Both not long ago were thinking of bigger things than the Holiday Bowl but late losses scrubbed those plans.

North Carolina played worse than Oregon and lost all three games, but Oregon's general expectations are higher so losing two of the three at the end—taking them out of the national title picture, then the Pac-12 title picture—hits harder. A win over Oregon might mean something for North Carolina but the converse means nothing to Oregon.

Final analysis

Oregon's offense should do well both running and passing the ball. North Carolina's offense has to pass, partly because that's what they're good at but also it's what Oregon isn't good at defending. That does leave Oregon a chance to bottle up that opening, if they can get a sustained pass rush and disrupt UNC QB Drake Maye. North Carolina does give up around 3 sacks per game, mostly because they pass so often but it's still a lot. Unfortunately for the Ducks they're #123 in sacks so it's unlikely they can use the pressure route to cripple the Tar Heel passing game.

Who got the worst of the opt-outs and transfers? Probably North Carolina, as they lost their leading receiver and three defensive starters, while Oregon lost their #4 receiver and two (now three) defensive starters (plus a few more backups we didn't list). The list might still grow so we'll update as needed, but right now it looks like the offenses might get a boost. Both teams will still be pass-happy, maybe both missing a target, but also with defenders missing on the other side. Oregon's LB situation looks pretty dim now with two starters and two 2nd-stringers out.

So what we end up with is a shootout. North Carolina thrives on shootouts. With neither team getting many stops it could be whoever has the ball last. North Carolina will try to play very fast and Oregon's defense will tire. North Carolina's defense always plays tired. Oregon's defense is a lot better, the whole team is a lot better, but they stepped down from the Playoff to the Pac-12 title to the Holiday Bowl against North Carolina, a team more famous for basketball, and they're about two-touchdown favorites and they're thinking this is going to be easy even without all their players opting out. North Carolina will just play its game, and all their players are opting out too which results in enough chaos for a North Carolina upset win.

Prediction: North Carolina 45, Oregon 42

More previews, odds, and predictions: View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule.

December 10, 2022 at 05:37 PM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

2022 Birmingham Bowl Preview, Odds, and Prediction: East Carolina vs. Coastal Carolina

View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule here

Birmingham Bowl in Birmingham, AL
When: Tuesday, December 27 at 6:45 pm ET
TV: ESPN

East Carolina Pirates (7-5) vs. Coastal Carolina Chanticleers (9-3)

The two lesser-known Carolinas clash (East Carolina is in North Carolina; Coastal Carolina is in South Carolina). For the record a Chanticleer is either a rooster or a musical ensemble. In Coastal Carolina's case it refers to Chaucer, specifically the tale of the Chanticleer and the Fox, so a rooster it is.

Vegas line/spread: East Carolina by 7 (over/under 65.5)

Another big double-digit point spread, let's see if its justified. Update: the line has fallen from 10 1/2 to 7 before game day, the o/u way up from 59.5

Strength power rating: #60 East Carolina 34, #102 Coastal Carolina 25

Best/Worst removed: East Carolina 34-25

Turnover corrected: East Carolina 33-25

Via our Strength power rating we get close to 10 points but not quite there. Still, it's very close, though it narrows if we change the sample to eliminate the extremes, or if we correct for random turnovers.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -10.5 Spread
East Carolina	69%	44.4%
Coastal Carolina	31%	55.6%

The Strength power rating favors East Carolina by 9, so it makes sense that the game-comparisons fall to their favor, but not quite against a 10 1/2 point spread.

When East Carolina has the ball

E Carolina scoring offense(adj): #59	Coastal Carolina scoring defense(adj): #110
E Carolina rushing offense(raw): #55	Coastal Carolina rushing defense(raw): #38
E Carolina passing offense(raw): #16	Coastal Carolina pass defense(raw): #124

Here's why the Pirates are a big favorite: Coastal Carolina sucks on defense. East Carolina is only average for the FBS but that should be enough to handle the Chanticleer defense. The run/pass breakdowns aren't too relevant because the teams play a very disparate schedule, but they show the focus of each team. That is, East Carolina is a passing team, and Coastal Carolina gives up a ton of passing yards. That makes things look even worse for Coastal. Pirate QB Holton Ahlers has 3,408 yards and a solid 23:5 ratio, with 1,000 yard receiver Isaiah Winstead his top target. They're missing their #3 receiver but probably can get by against the Chanticleer pass D.

When Coastal Carolina has the ball

Coastal Carolina scoring offense(adj): #65	E Carolina scoring defense(adj): #65
Coastal Carolina rushing offense(raw): #59	E Carolina rushing defense(raw): #18
Coastal Carolina passing offense(raw): #52	E Carolina pass defense(raw): #131

This matchup is dead even when corrected for schedule strength. The breakdown for East Carolina's defense on rushing and passing yards gives Coastal Carolina a good idea of where to apply their balanced offense—passing the ball against arguably the worst passing defense in the country. QB Grayson McCall has 2,633 yards and a great 24:2 ratio. He missed the Southern Miss and James Madison games and the team scored just 26 and 7 points in those, but he's back now.

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): East Carolina: #122 Coastal Carolina: #103

Neither teams plays great special teams according to the FPI's numbers.

East Carolina's season (7-5) • SOS: #75

Non-conf losses: 1 • Home losses: 3
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 3-4
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-2

#23 North Carolina St 20-21
Old Dominion 39-21
Campbell 49-10
Navy 20-23 2OT
@South Florida 48-28
@#16 Tulane 9-24
Memphis 47-45 4OT
Central Florida 34-13
@Brigham Young 27-24
@Cincinnati 25-27
Houston 3-42
@Temple 49-46

East Carolina played good, consistent football win or lose—until the Houston game where the team fell apart, losing 42-3. They rebounded to outlast Temple but where did that big loss come from? Just one of those things I guess, and possibly due more to Houston than the Pirates. Their Temple win was their 2nd worst performance but it wasn't close to as bad and they needed a win to end the season, to get rid of the stench of the Houston game.

Coastal Carolina's season (9-3) • SOS: #127

Non-conf losses: 0 • Home losses: 1
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 5-2
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-1

Army 38-28
Gardner-Webb 31-27
Buffalo 38-26
@Georgia St 41-24
Georgia Southern 34-30
@Louisiana-Monroe 28-21
Old Dominion 21-49
@Marshall 24-13
Appalachian St 35-28
Southern Miss 26-23
@James Madison 7-47
@#24 Troy 26-45

Coastal Carolina rushed to six wins and looked like the potential Group of Five New Year's Day rep—but then they ran into Old Dominion and lost at home 49-21. The Monarchs didn't even turn out to be a good team, going 3-9. How does this sort of thing happen? Somehow QB Grayson McCall went 26 of 34 and 3:0 for an 80.8 QBR and they still lost by 35 points. The next three games were fine, all big wins over bowl teams, but they they hit the skids again against James Madison. This time McCall was out and the offense was as much to blame as the defense. You can't really blame a loss to Committee-ranked Troy but it wasn't a great effort either, even with McCall back as he was still hobbled by injury. So you can blame his injury for the last two losses, but not the Old Dominion loss where he played his best game.

Key Injuries / opt-outs

Tight end Ryan Jones (#3 receiver with 413 yards) is out for East Carolina. For Coastal Carolina, star center Willie Lampkin is in the transfer portal. So is QB Grayson McCall, but he's playing in the bowl game.

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: East Carolina a heavy favorite, could they get overconfident? Probably not to a 9-3 team. If anything Coastal might feel a bit insulted.
Location: Birmingham is about the same distance from both teams.
Coaching: Coastal Carolina coach Jamey Chadwell resigned to take the job at Liberty. Is that really an upgrade?
Motivation: Coaching aside, Coastal Carolina did about the same as last year, 9-3 instead of 10-2, while East Carolina remained 7-5 but didn't play in a bowl last year. Slight advantage East Carolina.
Momentum: Neither team has much momentum after losing two of three (East) and their last two (Coastal). At least the Pirates got the bad taste of losing out of their mouths.

If I were Coastal Carolina I'd be pissed that the coach left for Liberty. Not Auburn, not Nebraska—Liberty. That's a lateral move at best. DC Chad Staggs will coach the team in the bowl game. Really their defensive coordinator? This is a bad development in every way.

Final analysis

It's interesting that both these teams had one abysmal game; it shows why it can happen in a bowl game, too, after a season of consistency. Particularly for East Carolina, all their other games were at least decent. Hopefully neither team repeats that performance in the bowl, and we're not counting on anything like that happening for our forecast.

It's looking pretty straightforward really. The numbers say the spread is about right, and that's without accounting for Coastal Carolina losing their coach to an football team with no conference (Liberty is moving to C-USA next year). Also their center was a star of the team and he won't be playing.

There's no way I'm taking the Chanticleers to win this game, but they can keep it close by scoring on East Carolina's awful pass defense. The players aren't bolting for the exits so far, so maybe they'll try to win it for themselves. I don't have great confidence in their defensive coordinator as bowl coach, however, and one way or another they lose. But big or small? The spread seems about right on this one for two teams limping into the bowl season. I see a lot of scoring on each team's defensive weaknesses all game long.

Update: With the line dropping from ECU -10.5 to ECU -8, they've matched our initial spread of ECU 45-37. So to get it off the line I'm moving to the 9-point spread forecast by our power rating. Update: Now it's down to 7, so our original pick is ok but we'll leave it as is since the line might move again. Basically we agree with the line, taking ECar but not by a huge amount. The range that the line has moved is exactly where I expect the game to be, 7-10 points, making this a tough call vs. the spread.

Prediction: East Carolina 46, Coastal Carolina 37

More previews, odds, and predictions: View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule.

December 10, 2022 at 01:29 PM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

2022 First Responder Bowl Preview, Odds, and Prediction: Memphis vs. Utah State

View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule here

First Responder Bowl in Dallas, TX
When: Tuesday, December 27 at 3:15 pm ET
TV: ESPN

Memphis Tigers (6-6) vs. Utah State Aggies (6-6)

Yet another 6-6 bowl game, how many of these are there anyway? (Answer: 5 that are strictly between two 6-6 teams).

Vegas line/spread: Memphis by 7 (over/under 57.5)

Memphis is a pretty clear favorite, breaking the touchdown barrier in the early line but down to 7 lately. The over/under is down from 62.5 early.

Strength power rating: #50 Memphis 39, #139 Utah State 19

Best/Worst removed: Memphis 39-19

Turnover corrected: Memphis 37-21

A pretty huge spread from the Strength power rating, 20 points, dwarfing the oddsmakers one-touchdown call. It narrows a bit when corrected for the oversized influence of turnovers (down to 16 points) but is still huge. Obviously this discrepancy requires further investigation.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -7.5 Spread
Memphis	92%	83%
Utah St	8%	17%

There's no two ways about it, our power rating really likes Memphis here, giving them the win over 90% of the time and beating the spread 5 out of 6 game comparisons. This is the biggest blowout on paper of the bowl season—before looking at other factors, of course. There's probably a reason the oddsmakers aren't quite as sure about this game.

When Memphis has the ball

Memphis scoring offense(adj): #47	Utah St scoring defense(adj): #116
Memphis rushing offense(raw): #81	Utah St rushing defense(raw): #119
Memphis passing offense(raw): #22	Utah St passing defense(raw): #25

Here's a big reason that our power rating favors Memphis so heavily: Utah State's terrible defense. Memphis has a decent offense but they should fire on all cylinders against the Aggies' paper defense. Utah State's rush defense is so bad that the pass-centric Tigers can probably have success there. As for the passing game, Utah State's top 25 ranking is unadjusted, of course, and just reflects the fact that teams don't pass on them since running the ball is so easy. Memphis QB Seth Henigan has 3,287 yards and a 19:8 ratio. The Aggies do have a couple of safeties with multiple interceptions, so it's not like the pass defense is actually bad, just not tested as often as their rush D.

When Utah St has the ball

Utah St scoring offense(adj): #84	Memphis scoring defense(adj): #64
Utah St rushing offense(raw): #58	Memphis rushing defense(raw): #26
Utah St passing offense(raw): #105	Memphis passing defense(raw): #98

Utah State's offense isn't terrible and Memphis' defense isn't great, but the Tigers will clearly slow the Aggies down a lot more than the other way around. When it comes to comparing rush/pass offense and defense, the teams have about the same level of schedule and the numbers line up with the adjusted scoring numbers. So we can say that Memphis has a solid rush defense, probably capable of handling Utah State's run game why Calvin Tyler Jr has over 1,000 yards for the season. The Aggies don't pass much which is fine with Memphis.

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): Memphis: #73 Utah St: #14

If Utah State needs a tactic to keep things close, special teams play can help. Safety Ike Larsen has blocked three kicks this season.

Memphis's season (6-6) • SOS: #72

Non-conf losses: 1 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 1-6
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-2

@#22 Mississippi St 23-49
@Navy 37-13
Arkansas St 44-32
North Texas 44-34
Temple 24- 3
Houston 32-33
@East Carolina 45-47 4OT
@#16 Tulane 28-38
Central Florida 28-35
Tulsa 26-10
North Alabama 59-0
@SMU 31-34

Memphis looks like one of the best 6-6 teams around—certainly one of the most consistent. Is there any difference in play between their four-game win streak and the following 4-game losing streak? In fact all of their losses except maybe Mississippi State in the opener were worthy efforts, and all to bowl teams. In fact they won all their games by at least 10 points and had 4 losses within a touchdown...this 6-6 team is a few ball bounces away from 10-2.

Utah St's season (6-6) • SOS: #81

Non-conf losses: 3 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 3-4
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-1

Connecticut 31-20
@#5 Alabama 0-55
Weber St 7-35
UNLV 24-34
@Brigham Young 26-38
Air Force 34-27
@Colorado St 17-13
@Wyoming 14-28
New Mexico 27-10
@Hawai`i 41-34
San Jose St 35-31
@Boise St 23-42

Utah State was pretty consistently bad but still managed to beat three bowl teams, a good demonstration of how bad many bowl teams are in the 40+ bowl game era. UConn, for example, made a bowl this year. Good for them, but they aren't a good team. Utah State beat them and then lost four straight, ranging from the completely understandable (at Alabama) to embarrassing (Weber State at home, 35-7). Air Force went 9-3 but Utah State beat them, now that's a legit win. The Aggies finished with 5 wins in their last 7 which is admirable. But really, they played one good game the whole year, and they'll need to replicate that performance to have a chance.

Key Injuries / opt-outs

No new injures or opt-outs for either team. A receivers are questionable for Memphis, none among the leaders by yardage

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: Memphis is a solid favorite but maybe they think the line should be higher? At 6-6, it's doubtful they are worried about the line being too low.
Location: Dallas is a pretty neutral field, even if Utah State has 3x as far to go and is a time zone away.
Coaching: No change.
Motivation: Memphis went 6-6 last year and didn't play in a bowl game, so they should be at least a bit excited. They probably want to finish with a winning record since they lost so many close ones. Meanwhile Utah State was 10-3 last year and played Oregon State and won; this year they're 6-6. The season didn't live up to their hopes for sure.
Momentum: Neither team won their last game but both played well at the end, Memphis winning 2 of 3 and Utah State taking 3 of 4. Maybe more relief than momentum.

We don't really see much to go on here. Neither Memphis nor Utah State would seem to be extremely hyped, nor terribly disappointed at this point. Sometimes you only hear about this stuff after the fact but for now? No real advantage.

Final analysis

I can't see Memphis laying an egg here as they've played so consistently all season long. But will they play true to form and dominate the game like they really should? We noted the big disparity between Strength and Vegas, and Vegas is usually right or they would go out of business. But we can't really account for the narrow spread. It's not exactly narrow, anything over a touchdown is pretty big—but usually there's a reason when our power rating departs from the spread. And it's not like there aren't several 10-point spreads all over the early bowl games. I'd expect this one to be at least 10 points. Maybe not 20, but 10 seems reasonable.

Utah State will need to get a lot of big plays like turnovers to win this game. Safeties Hunter Reynolds and Ike Larsen combine for 7 picks this year. That's the only way they'll really shut down Memphis through the air. Larsen is also the one who blocked 3 kicks this year, so if the Aggies win he'll probably be the hero. But big plays are heavily random and we can't assume they're going to come through with game-changing momentum. And the Tigers have two players who combine for 7 picks, too, and the turnover game actually favors them—it's when we remove it that their spread falls to 16.

Unless I figure something else out, I'm going with Memphis. I'm impressed by their consistency. They play well win or lose, and the level of their losing games beats almost all of Utah State's winning games. Without a reason to downgrade Memphis or upgrade Utah State, I have to go with the Tigers to take care of business. And as we've seen, when the Tigers win, they win comfortably.

Prediction: Memphis 38, Utah St 20

More previews, odds, and predictions: View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule.

December 10, 2022 at 12:33 PM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

2022 Camellia Bowl Preview, Odds, and Prediction: Georgia Southern vs. Buffalo

View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule here

Camellia Bowl in Montgomery, AL
When: Tuesday, December 27 at 12:00 noon ET
TV: ESPN

Georgia Southern Eagles (6-6) vs. Buffalo Bulls (6-6)

Another in an endless array of 6-6 bowl games.

Vegas line/spread: GA Southern by 5 1/2 (over/under 67)

Georgia Southern is favored, and it's been growing, up from 3 1/2 early. The over/under is down from 67.5.

Strength power rating: #88 GA Southern 35, #109 Buffalo 32

Best/Worst removed: GA Southern 35-31

Turnover corrected: GA Southern 37-30

We give a score of 35-32 which is a 3 point spread but the numbers have to be rounded to make a proper score; the actual spread is 3.55 points, right on the dot of the early line for the game. And if we were forced to pick vs. the spread just by our power rating we would give it to Georgia Southern based on playing closer to home.

That advantage stretches to 7 points if we pull out the undue influence of turnovers on team ratings. Buffalo's worth is inflated by their turnover margin, and Georgia Southern is slightly diminished. When we correct for this, the Eagles are a full touchdown better than the Bulls.

Game-comparisons	win %	vs. -3.5 Spread
GA Southern	63%	55.6%
Buffalo	37%	44.4%

Although the Strength power rating's spread is 3.55 points, spotting Buffalo 3.5 points doesn't bring things to the near 50/50 proposition you would expect; Georgia Southern still covers 56% of the time. That's due to the distribution of game ratings and how they compare to each other. Either the Eagles have some high scores that push their mean rating up, or Buffalo had some dud games that lower their mean. Or both. That's why the average score margin doesn't have to be the 50/50 fulcrum (in math terms, the mean and median aren't the same). The 50/50 fulcrum for the game-comparisons is 5.15 points.

When GA Southern has the ball

GA Southern scoring offense(adj): #52	Buffalo scoring defense(adj): #94
GA Southern rushing offense(raw): #83	Buffalo rushing defense(raw): #100
GA Southern passing offense(raw): #4	Buffalo passing defense(raw): #54

Georgia Southern's offense compares favorably to Buffalo's defense. And in this case it's probably okay to compare the raw numbers, since the teams play a very similar level of schedule. That means Georgia Southern's passing attack, while not really the 4th best in the nation, should be able to have a lot of success against Buffalo's #54 (it's a lot worse than that, but whatever) pass defense. QB Kyle Vantrease has 3,901 yards and 25 TDs and 15 picks. That last number might be a concern as Buffalo has 12 picks this year—led by Marcus Fuqua with 7. Also, two of the Eagles' top receivers are out for the year.

When Buffalo has the ball

Buffalo scoring offense(adj): #82	GA Southern scoring defense(adj): #121
Buffalo rushing offense(raw): #74	GA Southern rushing defense(raw): #129
Buffalo passing offense(raw): #62	GA Southern passing defense(raw): #101

The good news for Buffalo is that Georgia Southern has such a terrible defense it should make the Bulls' sluggish offense look good. Both the run game and pass game should find success.

Special Teams Rank (per ESPN FPI): GA Southern: #24 Buffalo: #94

The Eagles have the special teams edge according to ESPN's FPI.

GA Southern's season (6-6) • SOS: #126

Non-conf losses: 1 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 2-5
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-0

Morgan St 59-7
@Nebraska 45-42
@UAB 21-35
Ball St 34-23
@Coastal Carolina 30-34
@Georgia St 33-41
James Madison 45-38
@Old Dominion 28-23
South Alabama 31-38
@Louisiana-Lafayette 17-36
Marshall 10-23
Appalachian St 51-48 2OT

Georgia Southern started with a bang, following up a 59-7 win over Morgan State with a 45-42 win over Nebraska in Lincoln, and put the final nail in Scott Frost's coaching grave. It turned out Nebraska wasn't good and the wins slowed down a lot, but they had some successes like beating James Madison and the double overtime win over Appalachian State, their only two wins over winning teams.

Buffalo's season (6-6) • SOS: #125

Non-conf losses: 3 • Home losses: 2
Record vs. bowl-eligible teams: 4-3
Record vs. top 25 teams: 0-0

@Maryland 10-31
Holy Cross 31-37
@Coastal Carolina 26-38
@Eastern Michigan 50-31
Miami Ohio 24-20
@Bowling Green 38-7
@Massachusetts 34-7
Toledo 34-27
@Ohio U. 24-45
@Central Michigan 27-31
Kent St 27-30 OT
Akron 23-22

Buffalo lost their first three games; two were completely excusable (Maryland & Coastal Carolina on the road) but one was not (losing to Holy Cross at home). But the Bulls won five straight games with style after that, beating four bowl teams in the process. At this point we projected Buffalo to win out and be MAC champs but they lost their next three, and though they got their final win, beating hapless 2-10 Akron by a point at home to get to a bowl game, I can't think of a more pathetic entry into the bowl world. It's akin to needing to run a 20 minute mile and running 19:55—you did it, but who the fuck is impressed?

Key Injuries / opt-outs

Two receivers for Georgia Southern were lost in mid-November for the season: Derwin Burgess Jr (#2 with 717 yards) and Amare Jones (#4 with 483). Buffalo's 2nd-leading rusher Ron Cook Jr. is questionable for the game.

Psychology/Motivation - Some speculative factors that may come into play during the game:

Favorite: Georgia Southern is a slight favorite.
Location: Montgomery is a lot closer for Georgia Southern, but it's still 5 hours away and in a different time zone. While Georgia Southern will have more fans in the stadium the effect on the game is hard to gauge. We didn't give any home field advantage in our estimates above but this might be something to consider. Normally unless it's in-state, there's no consideration but in this case fan difference could be stark. In fact thinking about it now this has to be worth a point or so, the crowd might be all GS.
Coaching: No change.
Motivation: Georgia Southern improved from 3-9 to 6-6 this year and won in double overtime to make it to the bowl game; that's worth something. Buffalo improved from 4-8 so they should be a bit happy at least, but their win over Akron doesn't inspire confidence.
Momentum: Both teams closed the season in the same way—losing three games and winning the last one to finish 6-6 and get to a bowl game. The final win is important for momentum, too, but although both teams barely won—the Eagles in double overtime and Buffalo by a point—the wins are totally different. Georgia Southern beat an actual good team, Appalachian State, while Buffalo could barely be bothered to beat lowly Akron at home.

Georgia Southern might not be super-hyped for bowl season but it's hard to believe Buffalo really cares. If you're trying to get to a bowl and want to be there, you beat Akron by 50 points.

Final analysis

This game has really got me thinking about home field advantage and when and how much it applies. In general these are the "rules":

Playing in your own home stadium: full home field advantage (normally 3.5 points in the FBS, this year is showing lower)
Playing in your own home state, other team is very far away: partial HFA (maybe 2 points)
Playing much closer to home than your opponent: maybe 1 point

For in-state games the opponent should be far away, like when Georgia played Oregon in Atlanta, you can't tell me that wasn't a near-home field experience. And if it's in a large state like Texas, it might not apply if you're playing LSU or a team that might physically be closer. The last category is the toughest, you aren't in-state but just are a lot closer. That's what this game is, and it's not just the 5 hour vs. 14 hour driving distance. It's the fact that the location is clearly "in the South" and so is Georgia Southern. Statesboro and Montgomery are on the exact same lattitude line, while Buffalo is definitely in the North. Home field advantage is though to be very "territorial" which is why the home stadium is important, but also home state, and in this case, home region. Are fans coming from Buffalo at all? Who knows, but Georgia Southern fans could easily make the drive and might make for a one-sided experience.

Another area to explore: Do you believe in turnovers or not? Clearly they change the game, but should their effect be subtracted out to get a better idea of what is more likely to happen in the future? This game's forecast could swing on thats. Georgia Southern's QB has thrown 15 picks this year—does that mean he's destined to throw 1 this game? Somewhere between 0 and 2? Or better just left out of the forecast since there's so much randomness? On Buffalo's side, they have 12 picks on the year, so certainly the they'll have one against a pick-prone QB right? And how can picks be random when Bulls safety Marcus Fuqua has 7 interceptions this season? Doesn't seem random to me. But everyone says that forecasts are notably better when the past effect of turnovers is removed and they are assumed to be random, unpredictable events going forward. It turns our 3.5 point forecast into a 7 point forecast for Georgia Southern, so we have to decide what to do.

Both teams are coming in with some disadvantages. Georgia Southern is down 2 of their top 4 receivers, which can't help but affect their passing game. Buffalo on the other hand either didn't want to go bowling and tried to lose against Akron, or tried to win and they're in such a terrible slump that they really suck now. Either way, not a good look for the Bulls.

Everything I look at points to the same thing—about a touchdown for Georgia Southern. Whether the turnover-subtraction score, or the teams' play over the last four games where each slumped and got a final win, I see 7 points, or 6.5 points, and I'll add one for the very partial home field, too.

Prediction: Georgia Southern 38, Buffalo 30

More previews, odds, and predictions: View the complete 2022-2023 bowl game schedule.

December 10, 2022 at 02:10 AM in game previews/results | Permalink | Comments (0)

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