So, oh wonderful sports fans, I’m back in Columbus again this week and trying to figure out what the upsets and close games mean from this past weekend. I have 3 looks for today. The first one is about the GCR predictions. If you recall, before last week, I retooled (reevaluated the regression for your stat geeks out there) and tried again – it was kind of like having a new QB. So far so good. For the FCS teams (always a challenge), the formula suggested 35.4 right and 19.6 wrong predictions for a pct of .643. The actuals were a reassuring 41-14 .745. FYI, the suggested right/wrong are based on the games percent to win averages. For example, if the GCR predicted 5 games at 55%, 60%, 65%, 70%, and 75% percent, I would expect it to be right 65% (the mean of those 5 number) or 3.25. For the FBS, the GCR expected 37.1 – 14.9 (.674) and the actuals were 40-12 .769. Overall the GCR was 81-26 .757. Much more like it. But how about the 11 predicted upsets? 7 cooperated (Louisiana beat App St, Minnesota beat Nebraska, Oklahoma St beat Texas, C Michigan beat Toledo, UCLA beat Washington, UTEP beat LA Tech, and Air Force beat Boise St). 3 were misses (Fresno St beat Wyoming, NC St beat Boston College, and Ball St beat E Michigan). 1 was a loss, but within the spread so a Vegas win (Army lost to Wisconsin 20-14 with the spread was WISC -14.0). So – 7-4 straight up and 8-3 ATS. But, it’s just one week – let’s see how we do in this week’s G’s Expectations, before we do too much back-patting.
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Now that a significant number of conference games have been played, it’s time to see a comparison of the conferences. I’ve elected to focus on the FBS. I’ll put this in a table from worst to first (ranked by winning percentage), but with the totals at the top for comparison. Note: Notre Dame is included in the Independents.
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| Conference | W-L (CG) | WPCT | Best Team | AVG Rank | AVG SOS | AVG Perf | Best Win | Worst Loss |
| TOTAL | 465-378 (194) | .552 | Georgia (1) | 72 | 67 | 98 | Kentucky (6) | N Arizona (190) |
| C-USA | 41-49 (18) | .456 | UTSA (13) | 101 | 84 | 136 | UNLV (72) | Buffalo (154) |
| MAC | 39-45 (18) | .464 | W Michigan (35) | 111 | 81 | 125 | Pittsburgh (21) | Akron (155) |
| Indies | 22-25 (2) | .468 | Notre Dame (16) | 97 | 82 | 116 | Purdue (28) | Holy Cross (157) |
| Pac 12 | 38-38 (22) | .500 | Oregon (26) | 75 | 66 | 102 | Ohio St (15) | N Arizona (190) |
| American | 36-32 (14) | .529 | Cincinnati (11) | 86 | 84 | 113 | Notre Dame (16) | Marshall (134) |
| Sun Belt | 33-29 (13) | .532 | Coastal Carolina (19) | 100 | 97 | 110 | Liberty (62) | Ga Southern (158) |
| MWC | 44-34 (16) | .564 | San Diego St (17) | 75 | 79 | 95 | Utah (29) | San Jose St (141) |
| ACC | 52-36 (23) | .591 | Wake Forest (5) | 59 | 61 | 83 | Clemson (23) | Jacksonville St (175) |
| Big Ten | 57-33 (24) | .633 | Michigan (3) | 38 | 46 | 73 | Iowa (8) | Bowling Green (149) |
| Big 12 | 41-23 (17) | .641 | Oklahoma St (2) | 32 | 46 | 75 | Baylor (12) | Duke (103) |
| SEC | 62-34 (27) | .646 | Georgia (1) | 38 | 33 | 65 | Kentucky (6) | Memphis (106) |
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Depending on the metric, one could argue the SEC or the Big 12 is the strongest. 2 teams in the top 4 puts the Big Ten in that argument as well. There’s a lot of football left, but there looks to be a Big 3, the ACC/MWC/Notre Dame, and the Group of 6 which includes the Pac 12. In all the years I’ve done this type of analysis, I’ve never seen a Power 5 conference lapped by 3 Group of 5 conferences. I’ve also never seen the American eclipsed by 2 other G5 cousins. Last year was difficult, this year is just…weird.
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I don’t want to leave our FCS friends out of the mix and I know it’s hard to find the better teams in the top 258. So, I decided to list the top 25 FCS teams along with their overall rank. Note: there are 130 FBS schools and the top 20 are all in the top 130 so…
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| FCS/Overall Rank | Team (Conference) | Record |
| 1/70 | E Washington (Big Sky) | 7-0 |
| 2/76 | North Dakota St (Missouri Valley) | 6-0 |
| 3/85 | Princeton (Ivy) | 5-0 |
| 4/87 | Dartmouth (Ivy) | 5-0 |
| 5/88 | Sam Houston (AQ7/WAC Challenge) | 5-0 |
| 6/91 | Harvard (Ivy) | 5-0 |
| 7/98 | S Illinois (Missouri Valley) | 6-1 |
| 8/100 | Montana St (Big Sky) | 6-1 |
| 9/104 | UC Davis (Big Sky) | 6-1 |
| 10/105 | E Tennessee St (Southern Conference) | 6-1 |
| 11/114 | Villanova (Colonial) | 5-1 |
| 12/120 | Incarnate Word (Southland) | 5-1 |
| 13/122 | Jackson St (Southwestern Athletic Conference) | 5-1 |
| 14/123 | James Madison (Colonial) | 5-1 |
| 15/124 | South Dakota St (Missouri Valley) | 5-1 |
| 16/125 | Tennessee Martin (Ohio Valley) | 5-1 |
| 17/127 | SELA (Southland) | 5-1 |
| 18/128 | Kennesaw St (Big South) | 5-1 |
| 19/129 | Rhode Island (Colonial) | 5-1 |
| 20/130 | Prairie View (Southwestern Athletic Conference) | 5-1 |
| 21/131 | Duquesne (Northeast) | 4-1 |
| 22/142 | Columbia (Ivy) | 4-1 |
| 23/143 | VMI (Southern Conference) | 5-2 |
| 24/144 | South Dakota (Missouri Valley) | 4-2 |
| 25/145 | Missouri St (Missouri Valley) | 4-2 |
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That’s it for today. I’m hoping to have this week’s predictions out Tuesday before the week starts on Wednesday. Send questions, comments, complaints. If you like what you see, please share with others. Thanks, G
