Welcome back, oh great and patient college football fans to our 499th episode on this platform. I suppose many of you, like us, see the days of August go by so incredibly slowly as our anticipation grows towards the initial kickoff. Just three more sleeps before the Dublin Ireland game kicks off (noon Eastern on Saturday).
…..
Over the last few months, we’ve taken a look at all 25 FBS and FCS conferences from least challenged (Ivy) to most (Big Ten). If you missed an episode, want to re-read one, or check out our history, you can find all of them online, for free and ad free, at our website bit.ly//2019GCR. If you’d like to subscribe, just input your email address and every post will come to you. We never share or sell that data. You can also find us on Facebook at Gettys Computer Ranking – College Football and now on LinkedIn at G Robert Gettys.
…..
After finishing up the conference-by-conference episodes, I was finalizing the necessary pre-season work within the GCR and discovered that we have another new team in the FCS. A late entry similar to one that happened a couple of seasons ago, the Northeast Conference added the New Haven Chargers to play a slightly shortened season this year, with full assimilation next season. At 8-3 last season, they made the Division II playoffs, losing in the first game. Welcome the Division I, New Haven, located in West Haven, CT.
…..
JoJo and I were looking for an episode for today and landed on a summary, of sorts. I don’t expect the readers to dig into the rankings the way I do (mainly because I assume the readers have a life of some sort outside of the GCR), so I put together a few tables to help transition to the new season. First up, is three Top 25s from last season. The first column is the overall GCR Top 25 at the end of last season. The second column is the Top 25 just for the Group of 5 (American, Conference-USA, FBS Independents not named Notre Dame, the MAC, Mountain West, Pac-(1)2, and Sun Belt), and the final column is the Top 25 FCS teams last year. As a reminder, the GCR beta-tested a new and improved mathematical construct for the rankings and last year was the final year of the old method.
| 2024 Final GCR Rank | Overall | Group of 5 (overall rank) | FCS (overall rank) |
| 1 | Ohio St | Boise St (13) | Montana St (98) |
| 2 | Notre Dame | Army (16) | Jackson St (122) |
| 3 | Oregon | Memphis (25) | South Dakota St (127) |
| 4 | Texas | UNLV (29) | South Dakota (132) |
| 5 | Indiana | Navy (30) | North Dakota St (133) |
| 6 | Penn St | Marshall (46) | Mercer (137) |
| 7 | Georgia | Ohio (48) | Incarnate Word (139) |
| 8 | BYU | Tulane (52) | Delaware (140) |
| 9 | SMU | Sam Houston (61) | Richmond (143) |
| 10 | Tennessee | Louisiana (66) | UC Davis (144) |
| 11 | Arizona St | James Madison (67) | Harvard (145) |
| 12 | Iowa St | Buffalo (68) | Butler (146) |
| 13 | Boise St | Miami OH (69) | South Carolina St (147) |
| 14 | Illinois | Jacksonville St (77) | Rhode Island (148) |
| 15 | Mississippi | N Illinois (78) | Dartmouth (149) |
| 16 | Army | UCONN (79) | Idaho (150) |
| 17 | Miami FL | Ga Southern (80) | Illinois St (151) |
| 18 | Alabama | Texas St (83) | Duquesne (152) |
| 19 | Michigan | Liberty (85) | San Diego (153) |
| 20 | Louisville | Toledo (86) | Lehigh (154) |
| 21 | Clemson | East Carolina (87) | Drake (155) |
| 22 | South Carolina | Washington St (88) | SEMO (156) |
| 23 | Kansas St | Arkansas St (89) | NC Central (157) |
| 24 | Syracuse | W Kentucky (91) | Tennessee St (158) |
| 25 | Memphis | Colorado St (92) | Tennessee Martin (159) |
…..
The preseason work has been all about Strength of Schedule (SOS), however, so we thought it would be a good idea to sum up the most difficult schedules for 2025 estimated by the GCR. The table reads the same as the one above, but is focused on SOS.
| PS SOS Rank | Overall | Group of 5 | FCS |
| 1 | Syracuse | Air Force | Idaho St |
| 2 | Wisconsin | Texas St | Weber St |
| 3 | Arkansas | Old Dominion | Gardner Webb |
| 4 | TCU | South Florida | Indiana St |
| 5 | Rutgers | Ohio | Albany |
| 6 | UCLA | Troy | Charleston So |
| 7 | Kentucky | Georgia St | Idaho |
| 8 | Texas A&M | Miami OH | N Colorado |
| 9 | Stanford | Louisiana | W Illinois |
| 10 | Purdue | UAB | E Washington |
| 11 | Mississippi St | W Michigan | Montana St |
| 12 | Northwestern | E Michigan | Long Island |
| 13 | West Virginia | Oregon St | Villanova |
| 14 | Southern Cal | Southern Miss | Portland St |
| 15 | Iowa | Charlotte | Lindenwood |
| 16 | Duke | Delaware | N Arizona |
| 17 | Boston College | Washington St | Northwestern St |
| 18 | Air Force | UTSA | Holy Cross |
| 19 | LSU | Tulane | Bethune |
| 20 | Michigan St | Rice | E Kentucky |
| 21 | Iowa St | FIU | Grambling St |
| 22 | Florida | Ga Southern | Maine |
| 23 | Penn St | Nevada | Murray St |
| 24 | South Carolina | New Mexico | Colgate |
| 25 | Texas St | Ball St | Samford |
…..
The 25 most difficult Group of 5 SOS teams are all in the top 78 overall (see table below). The FCS ranks are 137-161 consecutively, overall. Then we thought, what about the teams planning to skate this season? While we didn’t compile a Bottom 25, we did put together a simpler walk of shame Bottom 5. There are 68 Core 4 teams and 136 FBS (Core 4 and Group of 5 teams) as part of the 265 teams in Division I.
| Bottom 5 | Core 4 (rank) | Group of 5 (rank) | FCS (rank) |
| Easiest | Wake Forest (127) | Memphis (136) | New Haven (265) |
| Next | Tennessee (118) | Jacksonville St (135) | Morehead St (264) |
| Next | Texas Tech (117) | San Jose St (134) | Butler (263) |
| Next | Missouri (116) | Liberty (133) | Jackson St (262) |
| Next | Virginia Tech (113) | Middle Tennessee (132) | Prairie View (261) |
…..
That’s it for today. Tune in Friday for a discussion of every game this Saturday that is Week 0. Thank you for reading and especially sharing with others. We need your help to grow. See you in a couple of days, G
