Season
Résumé Rankings After Week 5
1. Alabama 5-0 (1st)
2. Notre Dame 4-0 (3rd)
3. Oregon State 3-0
(NR)
4. South Carolina 5-0
(5th)
5. Texas 4-0 (10th)
6. Georgia 5-0 (2nd)
7. Oregon 5-0 (NR)
8. Ohio State 5-0 (NR)
9. Louisiana Tech 4-0
(7th)
10. Florida 4-0 (8th)
Out:
Rutgers (4th); Kansas State (6th); LSU (9th).
Comments:
Once again I decided to tweak my formula this week in order to include more
teams and improve the rankings. This week all teams with no losses and at least
3 wins against FBS competition were eligible. This meant that just about every
undefeated team would be included in the pool of potential top 10 teams. Of all
the undefeated teams, only Cincinnati and UTSA were unqualified, as Cincinnati
has played only 2 of 3 games against FBS teams and UTSA has played only 2 of 5
games against FBS competition.
With the more relaxed requirements the number of
eligible teams was much larger this week, as a total of 21 teams are undefeated
with at least 3 wins against FBS teams.
I also made adjustments
to the point system this week. Once again I basically threw out results against
FCS teams. Any win of 9 or more points against FCS team would receive zero
points, regardless of location or margin of victory. A win over an FCS opponent
by 8 points or less would be minus-1 point, but none of the eligible teams had
a close win over an FCS team.
For the previous
edition I had eliminated the position in between a “decent” and a “good” team
and I had also made a win over a “great” team twice as valuable as a win over a
“good” team. This was done for the sake of convenience and clarity, but it
ended up making the eventual rankings less legit. This week I went back to separating
opponents into 5 categories and I did not make a win over the highest level of
opponent twice as valuable as a win over a team on the next level down.
For this week, a team
was awarded 0 points for a win over a “poor” team; 1 point for a win over a “decent”
team; 2 points for a win over an “average” team; 3 points for a win over a “good”
team; and 4 points for a win over a “great” team.
The labels may not be
all that descriptive, but they really aren’t that important. A “poor” team
would be one of the weakest in the country; a “decent” team would be a weak
team that isn’t totally awful; an “average” team is what you would think an
average team would be; a “good” team is basically a team ranked in the top 25
but probably not the top 10; a “great” team is one of the best teams in the
country.
The other problem with
the previous week’s formula was that blowouts over weak opponents seemed to be
skewing things a bit. So this week I decided to change the “margin of victory”
scoring system. Once again, a close victory (1 score; or 1-8 points) would be
worth zero points. However, this week the scale moved in increments of half
points. A 2-score victory (9-16 points) would receive 0.5 points; a 3-score
margin of victory (17-24) would receive 1 point; and a win by 4 scores (25+
margin of victory) would be worth 1.5 points.
The “location of
victory” scoring stayed the same, with a home win receiving no points; a win on
a neutral field receiving 1 point; and a road victory being worth 2 points.
Once I had the 21
eligible teams I went through each team’s schedule and placed each opponent on
the “strength of opponent” scale. After that I just had to assign margin of
victory and location of victory points and then go through and add up all the
scores. The result was this week’s top 10.
One last thing to note
is that along with the changes to the formula, my opinion of some opponents
changed this week as there was more evidence to use as a basis. This explains
why there are some slightly puzzling results, such as Georgia falling behind an
idle ND team despite beating Tennessee to get to 5-0.
The combination of the
changes to the formula, the inclusion of more teams, and the results of last
week led to some major changes in the rankings this week. I cannot say that
these rankings have stabilized yet.
9 of 10 spots in the
rankings experienced change this week. The lone team remaining in place was
Alabama at #1. The Tide are my top team for a fifth straight week.
3 teams moved up my
rankings this week, with Texas making the biggest move, climbing 5 spots from
#5 to #10. 3 teams stayed in the top 10 while moving down this week and all 3
teams fell more than 1 spot.
Georgia took the
biggest fall, dropping 4 spots from #2 to #6. 3 teams also fell out of my top
10 this week.
Rutgers took the
biggest tumble out of the rankings, dropping out of the top 10 from #4.
Of the 3 teams jumping
into the rankings Oregon State made the biggest splash, coming in at #3.
These rankings are
becoming more relevant as the year goes on and I feel like my formula has also
improved. The next step will be to make 1-loss teams eligible and figure out
how in the world to judge/grade losses.
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