Welcome back, college football fans, to episode 674! Today, the last day before the season begins, is focused on how things will look in this year’s GCR. We learned a great deal during March Madness last spring and will be using that approach.
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When we first started posting the games of the week a few years ago, they were hand selected for the G’s Expectation. The next year, we started focusing less on 5-10 games and more on posting every game during the football season. We sorted those by conference (Core 4 first, then Group of 6, then FCS, all alphabetical within the grouping) with non-conference games appearing in the first conference according to the pattern. That worked pretty well, but it was a bit cumbersome to create, and we only posted once a week. The Expectation was published on the first day of the week that had a game: for September, that was usually Thursday, but for October and November, that was often Tuesday. That caused a bit of a problem with us predicting which team would cover the Vegas spread as the odds change during the week. While we do not bet on any sports, using the data for fun rather than putting money at risk, we want the data to be as timely as possible. If you do gamble, please only gamble on reputable sites and only gamble what you can afford to lose. (Tongue in cheek: if you have money to lose, please consider a donation to the GCR instead of casinos). That said, the model during the regular season doesn’t really work after rivalry week, so we switched to a slightly different, simpler model for bowl games and playoffs. Those games were posted the day of the game which lined up the data much better.
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For Men’s and Women’s basketball, we have never had an Expectation during the regular season. The once-a-week model is ineffective because most teams play more than one game in a given week. Not to mention there could be a few hundred in the list. Once the conference playoffs began last season, we modified our football bowl Expectation and ran with that, daily, through the championship games. We were astonished at the tremendous growth in readership during that stretch. We know most of that is the excitement of March Madness, but we think some of it was the posting frequency and immediacy of the information.
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So, we modified that structure and created our new and improved Expectation format. We show it below for the first FCS game (tomorrow evening) and FBS game (Saturday afternoon). We will only show one day at a time once we get started, even if it’s a single matchup. All Times will be in Eastern Time pm unless otherwise stated. The parenthetical values after the team names are (wins-losses/GCR rank). Note: all teams are currently tied for first (or last depending on your viewpoint). The Conferences are listed in the same order as the teams (visitor then home). The Vegas column is the team and spread at the time of posting (morning of the game). NL indicates there is no line given – usually that means the game includes an FCS team. Most games eventually get lines; FCS is later in the week. We are hopeful that our new approach will limit the NLs necessary. The GCR column lists the team that our algorithm picks to win. Because all teams are tied for first, we cannot predict the winner (NPre). This will also be the case when a team plays a non-division I team. The Cover column is the GCR’s prediction of which team will cover the Vegas spread. For example, if the game below was played later in the season, Vegas has TCU winning by 7.5 points. If they win by 8 or more, they cover. If they lose or win by 7 or less, North Carolina covers. NL indicates there is no line to compare and/or a game against a non-division I team. Lastly, we will show the TV network where you can find the game.
| Time (ET) | MMM Day | Conf | Vegas | GCR | Cover | TV |
| 6:00 | Stony Brook (0-0/1) at Delaware St (0-0/1) | CAA/MEAC | NL | NPre | NL | MEAC Network |
| 12:00 | North Carolina (0-0/1) / TCU (0-0/1) (N) | ACC/B12 | TCU-7.5 | NPre | NL | ESPN |
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From a timing perspective, we will have a G’s Expectation every game day, whether there is 1 game or 120. The game will be in kickoff time order, mixing both FBS and FCS games. We think that will eliminate searching difficulty when looking for a particular game. While we have not fully decided (feedback would be wonderful), we are leaning towards having a single G’s Expectation once basketball tips off. That would mean that one post would have every football, Men’s basketball, and Women’s basketball game for that day. Our dearly departed friend Jason told us that if we added basketball, we were insane. You were right, but we’re going to do it anyway. That means from November to early April, with only a day or two off here and there, we will have an Expectation every day.
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But we also have the original purpose of the GCR, the ranking (Top 266 for football, Top 363 for Women’s basketball, Top 365 for Men’s basketball). Except for the Sunday before Labor Day, the Top 266 will be published on Sunday mornings prior to the AP or Coaches’ polls. We will publish Tuesday (9/8) the day after Labor Day to include the SMU/Florida St game. We will publish the Top 363 on Tuesday morning/afternoon once the women begin their season and the Top 365 on Wednesday morning/afternoon once the men get going.
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We may add some Explorations in along the way – rule changes, controversies, significant situations, etc. If we need to address our format or definitions or other business type things, we’ll use an Explanation, like today. These two categories are special case only during the season and should be infrequent.
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We would really enjoy hearing your feedback on the approaches listed above. While we purposefully are not pursuing any revenue from the GCR (don’t get us started on our current subscription nightmare world), we do post so that we can share information with our readers. Please suggest changes, options, ideas, etc., so that we can continue to improve our posts. In a TikTok world, we prefer to use words and tables that generate thought rather than smattering images across a screen which often leaves a mixed feeling of understanding and confusion simultaneously. If we are not thinking about that properly, let us know that. We want to provide our consumers what is meaningful to them. That is the sole reason behind these changes. We thank you in advance for your comments.
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That’s it for today. Tune in tomorrow for the first G’s Expectation of the season. The games are almost here! Thank you for reading, for your suggestions, and for sharing with others to help us grow. Until the first Game Day, JoJo and G.
