Happy Tuesday everyone! So I took a break earlier today (yes, I have a day job and there’s a lot going on right now) to watch a little of the Eastern Michigan (117)/Akron (254) and the Western Michigan (136)/Ohio (77) games. Both are being played in Ohio and this arctic snap was causing some snow in Akron (didn’t see as much in Athens, but for those not familiar with Ohio geography – ok, I googled it – Athens is one of the more southern points of the state). There’s something about bone-chilling cold and football. It’s a sign that fall (or early winter) is here. The fans and coaches are bundled up for the Iditarod and the offensive linemen are wearing nothing under their jerseys. Plumes of smoke come from the breath of the players as the referees finally have a reason to miss calls since their entire faces are covered with that black handkerchief thing they all wear. What is that anyway? Does it really do anything to keep them warm? Questions that maybe even google can’t answer.
For the record, I have E. Michigan beating Akron 75.1% (currently 35-7), and Ohio beating W. Michigan 70.1% (currently 14-10). Tomorrow, Miami of Ohio will beat Bowling Green (77.6%) and Toledo will top Northern Illinois (71.1%). All of these are in agreement with Vegas, except the game in Athens tonight is a pick ’em.
As I looked back over the blogs, this is the 49th one so far, I realized I hadn’t done the always controversial ranking of the conferences. First let’s look at the FCS:
| Conference | Non Conference Record (Pct) | Best Team | Worst Team |
| Patriot | 10-28 (.263) | Holy Cross (179/55) | Bucknell (242/113) |
| Pioneer | 14-21 (.400) | San Diego (141/26) | Valparaiso (253/124) |
| SWAC | 14-23 (.378) | Alcorn St (139/24) | Texas Southern (256/126) |
| FCS Ind | 9-9 (.500) | North Dakota (182/57) | Merrimack (218/89) |
| Northeast | 12-21 (.364) | Central Conn (89/4) | Bryant (251/122) |
| Big South | 17-20 (.459) | Monmouth (104/9) | Presbyterian (244/115) |
| Big Sky | 22-28 (.440) | Montana (100/8) | Southern Utah (241/112) |
| MEAC | 11-19 (.367) | Florida A&M (83/3) | Howard (252/123) |
| SoCon | 11-18 (.379) | Wofford (92/5) | W Carolina (246/117) |
| Ohio Valley | 16-19 (.457) | UT Martin (105/10) | E Illinois (249/120) |
| Southland | 14-17 (.452) | C Arkansas (115/13) | Houston Baptist (228/99) |
| Colonial | 25-20 (.556) | James Madison (80/2) | Rhode Island (236/107) |
| Ivy | 16-8 (.667) | Dartmouth (62/1) | Brown (255/125) |
| Mizz Valley | 21-18 (.538) | N Dakota St (96/6) | W Illinois (233/104) |
The first thing you may have noticed is there are two rankings. More on that in a moment. The order of the conferences is from worst to first based on the mean Total Score (comprised on both SOS Score and Performance Score). The Patriot league is just…awful. They have the absolute worst out of conference record of any in Division I. Holy Cross and Georgetown (189/64) are the only schools with .500 records and are a combined 10-9. Now, the 2 rankings. The first is the overall out of 256 Division I teams, the second is the ranking within either the FBS (130 teams) or in this case, the FCS (126 teams). When we see 9-1 Central Connecticut is 89th it’s easy to think they are a mediocre team. After all, Tennessee is 88th (85th in the FBS) at 5-5 and Central Michigan (90/86) is 6-4. But when we see that they are 4th in the FCS we start to see they are a really good team that plays in a lower league. So, I will start putting both numbers, if they are different. I won’t put LSU (1/1) because that’s kind of silly – if there’s 1 number, it’s going to be for both overall and FBS. North Dakota State at 96/6 is the defending champion. Dartmouth (62/1) is an interesting top dog since the Ivy League doesn’t play for the FCS Championship.
But now the FBS, and you’ll see it falls in line with Group of 5/Power 5. The G5 is getting stronger as a whole – the Sun Belt in particular has moved to the second best conference and the American will probably have the G5 New Year’s Six spot again this season. Here’s the list:
| Conference | Non Conference Record (Pct) | Best Team | Worst Team |
| MAC | 18-30 (.375) | Miami of Ohio (58) | Akron (254/130) |
| C-USA | 23-31 (.426) | Louisiana Tech (50) | UTEP (203/128) |
| FBS Ind | 19-30 (.388) | Notre Dame (17) | Massachusetts (208/129) |
| Mtn West | 29-18 (.617) | Boise St (29) | UNLV (181/125) |
| Sun | 22-18 (.550) | App State (33) | S Alabama (176/124) |
| American | 33-13 (.717) | Cincinnati (14) | Connecticut (194/127) |
| Pac 12 | 24-11 (.686) | Oregon (12) | Stanford (95/90) |
| ACC | 31-14 (.689) | Clemson (3) | Georgia Tech (109/99) |
| Big 12 | 24-6 (.800) | Baylor (5) | TCU (110/100) |
| SEC | 34-13 (.723) | LSU (1) | Arkansas (161/119) |
| Big 10 | 33-8 (.805) | Ohio State (2) | Northwestern (132/112) |
Interestingly, all of the FBS best teams are better than the #1 FCS team. Since this is the first year I’ve ranked the FCS, I don’t know if that’s normal or not, but it did stick out. The Big 10 is currently the best conference in football top to bottom (even with Maryland and Rutgers). The SEC has 5 tremendous teams and Texas A&M (27) knocking at the door, but nearly half of the conference would have to have 2 numbers to show their ranking.
Hope you had fun with this – let me know what you think about the dual numbers. Did they help? Does it give newfound respect for those good FCS teams? Or is it just confusing? As always, any comments/questions are welcome as they always make me think – and often add to the analysis in future blogs. Thank you for sharing with friends and please continue to do so – we are growing and want to do so even faster, and I need your help to do it – so thank you again.
By the way, while I was doing this research, E Michigan (117/103) did defeat Akron (254/130) 42-14. W Michigan (136/114) eked out an OT victory at Ohio (77/76) 37-34. Have a great week and I’ll see you Thursday night with G’s Expectations.
Thanks, G
