Here are the 2024 SEC standings.
So we know what each team achieved, but how did they perform? To answer that, here are the Yards Per Play (YPP), Yards Per Play Allowed (YPA) and Net Yards Per Play (Net) numbers for each SEC team. This includes conference play only, with the championship game not included. The teams are sorted by Net YPP with conference rank in parentheses.
College football teams play either eight or nine conference games. Consequently, their record in such a small sample may not be indicative of their quality of play. A few fortuitous bounces here or there can be the difference between another ho-hum campaign or a special season. Randomness and other factors outside of our perception play a role in determining the standings. It would be fantastic if college football teams played 100 or even 1000 games. Then we could have a better idea about which teams were really the best. Alas, players would miss too much class time, their bodies would be battered beyond recognition, and I would never leave the couch. As it is, we have to make do with the handful of games teams do play. In those games, we can learn a lot from a team’s YPP. Since 2005, I have collected YPP data for every conference. I use conference games only because teams play such divergent non-conference schedules and the teams within a conference tend to be of similar quality. By running a regression analysis between a team’s Net YPP (the difference between their Yards Per Play and Yards Per Play Allowed) and their conference winning percentage, we can see if Net YPP is a decent predictor of a team’s record. Spoiler alert. It is. For the statistically inclined, the correlation coefficient between a team’s Net YPP in conference play and their conference record is around .66. Since Net YPP is a solid predictor of a team’s conference record, we can use it to identify which teams had a significant disparity between their conference record as predicted by Net YPP and their actual conference record. I used a difference of .200 between predicted and actual winning percentage as the threshold for ‘significant’. Why .200? It is a little arbitrary, but .200 corresponds to a difference of 1.6 games over an eight game conference schedule and 1.8 games over a nine game one. Over or under-performing by more than a game and a half in a small sample seems significant to me. In the 2024 season, which teams in the SEC met this threshold? Here are SEC teams sorted by performance over what would be expected from their Net YPP numbers.
Two Tigers, Missouri and Auburn, saw their actual records differ significantly from their expected records based on Yards Per Play. Missouri exceeded their expected record thanks to a 4-1 record in one-score conference games. Missouri was absolutely destroyed in their other two league losses, falling to Texas A&M and Alabama by a combined 65 points while being outgained by more than four yards per play! For Auburn, their underachievement was a combination of several factors. The Tigers from The Plains were 1-2 in one-score conference games, had a slightly negative in-conference turnover margin (-1), and struggled in the kicking game (made eight of seventeen field goal attempts in SEC play). However, their biggest issues was scoring in the red zone. Auburn made 24 red zone trips in their eight SEC games, and scored just eight touchdowns on those trips!
Outliers
Without my cajoling, you probably noticed there seemed to be a large disconnect between the Net YPP numbers and conference record for both Auburn and Missouri. Auburn's Net YPP was greater than 1.00, yet they finished with a losing record. Meanwhile, Missouri's Net YPP was less than -1.00, yet they finished with a winning conference record. Both occurrences are quite rare. Auburn is one of thirteen power conference (BCS/Power 5/4) teams to finish with a .500 or worse conference record despite outgaining their league opponents by at least one yard per play since 2005. Meanwhile, Missouri is one of eleven power conference teams to finish with a .500 or better conference record despite being outgained by their league opponents by at least one yard per play since 2005. Let's look at the company these two teams are keeping, starting with Auburn.
Outside of the pandemic shortened 2020 season, Auburn is one of only five power conference teams to outgain their league opponents by at least one yard per play and finish with a losing conference record.
And now the teams Missouri most closely resembles.
The Tigers, along with their former Big 12 conference rival Kansas State (Wildcats did it twice), are the only power conference teams to be outgained by their league opponents by at least one yard per play and finish with a winning conference record.
Can we learn anything from those other outliers regarding what potentially awaits Auburn and Missouri in 2025? And can we use it make actionable wagers? The table below reveals what happened to the power conference teams that were .500 or worse despite outgaining their conference opponents by at least one yard per play.
In the aggregate, those previous eleven teams improved, though not by as much as I would have expected. Their winning percentage improve by about .081, or a little more than half a win in an eight or nine game conference schedule. Less than half (five of eleven) saw their conference record improve the next season, while three stayed the same, and an additional three actually declined. The three that declined were coached by Ron Zook, Houston Nutt, and Mike Locksley respectively, so you may draw some additional conclusions there. That being said, using history as a guide, improvement is definitely not guaranteed.
Now let's look at the teams in a similar situation to Missouri.
Once again, in the aggregate, the previous ten teams declined. On average, they declined by about .150, or more than a full win. In several cases, those .500 records built on poor per play numbers were portents of looming disaster. Three teams, Auburn, Stanford, and Vanderbilt declined by at least three games the following season. A select few teams did manage to improve, although in total, seventy percent of the teams saw a decline in their conference winning percentage the following season.
So we can reasonably expect modest improvement (though not guaranteed) at Auburn in 2025 and at least modest decline at Missouri. Unfortunately, those expectations are right in line with the market. FanDuel currently has over/under win totals for power conference teams and both Auburn and Missouri have their total set at 7.5. At 6.5 for Auburn, I would happily take the over and at 8.5 for Missouri, I would happily take the under. Since the market seems to be pretty sharp on the win totals, I would instead consider taking a flyer on an Auburn SEC title at 30-1 odds and look for alternative win totals on Missouri (6.5 or 5.5) and take the under at better odds. Modest improvement and modest decline is the most likely result for Auburn and Missouri, but since there was such dissonance between their performance and actual records last season, I think getting longer odds on massive improvement or massive decline is the better betting option in 2025.
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