2022 Adjusted Pythagorean Record: Conference USA

Two weeks ago we looked at how Conference USA teams fared in terms of yards per play. his week, we turn our attention to how the season played out in terms of the Adjusted Pythagorean Record, or APR. For an in-depth look at APR, click here. If you didn’t feel like clicking, here is the Reader’s Digest version. APR looks at how well a team scores and prevents touchdowns. Non-offensive touchdowns, field goals, extra points, and safeties are excluded. The ratio of offensive touchdowns to touchdowns allowed is converted into a winning percentage. Pretty simple actually.

Once again, here are the 2022 Conference USA standings.

And here are the APR standings with conference rank in offensive touchdowns, touchdowns allowed, and APR in parentheses. This includes conference games only with the championship game excluded.

Finally, Conference USA teams are sorted by the difference between their actual number of wins and their expected number of wins according to APR.

UTSA was the only Conference USA team that saw their APR differ significantly from their actual record. The Roadrunners also overachieved relative to their Yards Per Play numbers and we went over some reasons for that last week. 

Best Debuts

The Conference USA standings will look a bit different in 2023 and not just because of the usual year to year variance in team performance. Six teams are joining the AAC (Charlotte, Florida Atlantic, North Texas, Rice, UAB, and UTSA) and the league is adding a quartet of reinforcements (Jacksonville State, Liberty, New Mexico State, and Sam Houston State). This got me thinking about conference newcomers and how those teams have performed in their first year in the new league. Which teams have performed the best in their debut season? Read on to find out. 

I limited my analysis to non-BCS/Group of Five conferences since 1998 (what I consider the modern era of college football). We'll start with teams that finished with unblemished records in their first year.

After finishing with a 5-6 record in their final season in Conference USA in 2004, TCU jumped to the Mountain West and finished 8-0 in league play. The Horned Frogs won tight games against BYU, San Diego State, and Utah, but dominated their other five league opponents en route to a final ranking of eleventh in the AP Poll. Georgia Southern finished in a three-way tie atop the Southern Conference in 2012, but were a disappointing 4-4 in Southern Conference action in 2013, their final season of play as an FCS team. Head coach Jeff Monken took the Army job and Willie Fritz was hired to lead the team in their maiden voyage as an FBS program in the Sun Belt. The Eagles lost tight games to NC State and Georgia Tech in non-conference play, but with their funky triple option offense, they sliced through the Sun Belt. In their first six conference games, the Eagles averaged over 42 points per game. The offense hit a rut in November managing 50 total points in their final two league games, but the Eagles won both to finish with an unbeaten league record. 

While TCU and Georgia Southern were the only teams to finish with unbeaten league records, two other teams manged to finish with one loss and at least a share of a conference title in their new league. 

Louisiana Tech finished 3-9 as an Independent in 2000. They joined the WAC in 2001 and nothing was expected of them. The Bulldogs won their WAC opener against SMU, but lost to national darling and top ten ranked Fresno State. After the loss to the Bulldogs from Fresno, the Bulldogs from Ruston won their final six league games, including one against fellow WAC newcomer Boise State. Fresno State lost back to back games to Boise and Hawaii in midseason and Louisiana Tech ended up as the outright WAC champ. A little more than a decade later, Fresno State moved from the dying WAC to the Mountain West. The Bulldogs were a disappointing 4-9 in 2011, but they returned to their previous level of play in 2012 and finished in a three-way tied atop the Mountain West with Boise State and San Diego State. 

Finally, there are three other debuts I want to spotlight. One team finished 6-2, but won their conference. Another finished 7-1, but lost the division due to a head to head tiebreaker, and another won their division, but wasn't allowed to participate in their conference title game. 

Tulsa struggled through a 4-8 season in 2004, their last in the WAC. In their first season in Conference USA, the Golden Hurricane finished 6-2 in league play. Tulsa enjoyed a nice bounceback season, and thanks to UTEP dropping their final two games of the regular season, they won the West Division in the first year of divisional play in Conference USA. In the title game, they beat UCF on the road. Navy joined a conference for the first time in 2015. They opened AAC play 7-0, winning each of their first seven games by at least ten points. In the regular season finale, they traveled to Houston with the AAC West title on the line. The Cougars rolled up 52 points on their way to clinching the division and keeping the Midshipmen out of the conference title game. James Madison won their first five games as an FBS program in 2022 and were able to climb into the lower reaches of the AP Poll. They subsequently lost three games in a row, but only two of them were in Sun Belt play. Then in their regular season finale, they pounded the eventual Sun Belt East representative, Coastal Carolina, by forty points. The victory technically made the Dukes the East Division champion, but they were barred from playing in the championship game. 

Can Jacksonville State, Liberty, New Mexico State, or Sam Houston State run roughshod over Conference USA in 2023 and join the elite ranks of the teams mentioned in this space? Only time will tell. 

2023 Bracket Advice: Is Houston a Safe Bet?

Its that time once again where we take a brief respite from reviewing the previous college football season and try to give you free advice to win your March Madness pool. Before we get started, I'll refer you to my magnum opus on the subject from the tourney that didn't happen three years ago (in other words, don't pencil Purdue in for the Final Four). 

Heading into the 2023 NCAA Tournament, Houston has earned a number one seed. This marks the Cougars fifth consecutive tournament appearance with the team having earned a top six seed each time. Considering Houston appeared in one tourney between 1993 and 2017, this is an amazing accomplishment for the program and in particular head coach Kelvin Sampson. His hair may not be long, but Sampson has done some heavy lifting since becoming head coach prior to the 2015 season. This is the second ever top seed for Houston, with the other coming courtesy of the revered 1983 Phi Slama Jama squad. While Houston is slated to join the Big 12 next season, they concluded their run in the AAC in 2023. And that simple fact may bias some college basketball fans against the Cougars when filling out their brackets. Can you really trust a top seed from a 'lesser' conference? As much as you can trust any top seed in March, the answer may surprise you.

To get an idea of what we can expect from Houston in the 2023 NCAA tournament, we first need to look at other top seeds that did not come from power conferences. What do I mean by power conferences? That typically means the Power Five football leagues (ACC, Big 10, Big 12, Pac-12, and SEC) and the Big East. However, throughout college basketball history, you can argue other leagues, like Conference USA, were power conferences at some point. I went through each top seed since 1985. The NCAA began seeding teams in 1979, but 1985 coincides with the expansion of the tournament to 64 teams and other changes shortly thereafter (the adoption of the shot clock in 1986 and the addition of the three point shot to the tournament in 1987) make 1985, in my humble opinion, the beginning of the modern era of college basketball. By my accounting, there have been 14 previous top seeds since 1985 that came from outside the power conferences. They are listed below along with their conference and their tournament run. 

Those 14 teams had a pretty successful March in aggregate. One won the title, three more played for the title, seven made the Final Four, and all but two made it to the second weekend. However, we need context for the success (or lack thereof) for those 14 teams. How do number one seeds typically perform? To get a better idea of how those 14 teams performed, we need to compare them to the other 134 teams to have received one seeds since 1985. 

We'll start with a simple comparison. These are the aggregate tournament winning percentages of each group. 

The 14 mid-majors performed in line with the other one seeds. While those 14 teams finished with a slightly lower overall wining percentage, the difference is not significant. Now we'll dive into the data a little deeper. How do those 14 teams compare with other one seeds in terms of winning in the first and second round? 

Once again, the mid-majors are on par with the other one seeds. All 14 won their first round game and only two were knocked off in the second round. Gonzaga's 2013 loss was a bad look for mid-major apologists like myself, but Wichita State deserved better in 2014 than facing an under-seeded Kentucky team. For the power conference one seeds, Virginia is the lone top seed to ever lose in the first round and the other one seeds have been knocked off in the second round at about the same clip as the mid-major one seeds. Like the first comparison, this is a push. Now lets see see how the two groups of one seeds perform in third and fourth round games. 

Here the 14 mid-majors outshine the power conference top seeds. Nearly 79% of the mid-major one seeds have advanced to the Elite Eight compared to 67% of the power conference one seeds. In addition, fully half of the mid-major one seeds advanced to the Final Four compared to 40% of the power conference one seeds. Finally, how do the mid-major one seeds compare once they get to the Final Four?

This is where the mid-majors fall short. They have advanced to the national championship game at better rates than the power conference one seeds, but they have not been able to close the deal like their power conference brethren. UNLV is the only squad to actually cut down the nets, representing just 7% of mid-major one seeds. Meanwhile, more than double that percentage (17%) of power conference one seeds have won the national title. However, the difference is not as profound as you might think. Since we are dealing with a sample size of 14 teams in the mid-major one seed category, an additional victory could have a dramatic impact on the percentages. What if Mario Chalmers did not make that heroic shot to tie the 2008 championship game with Memphis where Kansas eventually prevailed in overtime? If Memphis wins that game, the mid-majors have two titles which moves their percentage up to 14% and drops the power conference percentage down to 16%. Gonzaga is responsible for the other title game appearances by mid-major one seeds and while they were dominated in their most recent championship appearance, they led North Carolina at the half in 2017 and that game was in doubt until the final minute. 

So what can we conclude? Houston probably won't win the national title in 2023. But you can say that about the other 67 teams in the NCAA Tournament as well. The Cougars are as good a championship selection as any other number one seed, conference pedigree be damned.

2022 Yards Per Play: Conference USA

After six consecutive weeks of Power Five leagues, this week we return to the Group of Five and examine Conference USA.

Here are the 2022 Conference USA 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 Conference USA 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 2022 season, which teams in Conference USA met this threshold? Here are Conference USA teams sorted by performance over what would be expected from their Net YPP numbers.

UTSA significantly overachieved relative to their YPP numbers while UAB underachieved (more on them in a second). UTSA finished their penance in Conference USA by running the table and winning their second consecutive league title. However, the Roadrunners were fortunate to finish with an unblemished record, posting a 4-0 mark in one-score conference games. One of those close victories came against UAB. The Blazers finished 0-4 in one-score conference games, but won their other four league games by a combined 71 points. 

The Best .500 Team

By falling short of their expected record so dramatically, UAB became the best mid-major team ever to finish with precisely a .500 record (at least as measured by Net YPP). UAB's Net YPP of +1.64 significantly outpaced Cincinnati (coached by contemporary asshole and future US Senator Tommy Tuberville) as the best ever at the Group of Five level (since 2005).

The Blazers were not able to top a handful of Power Five teams that also finished with .500 records. 

Arizona State has a giant asterisk as they only played four games in the pandemic shortened 2020 season. Of the teams that played a full conference schedule, UAB finished slightly behind a pair of teams coached by Mike Leach (in back to back seasons no less) and a recent Louisville squad.

Here at Statistically Speaking, we like to provide history lessons, but we also like to learn from history. How did the 'great' .500 teams perform the following season? Its a bit of a mixed bag. We'll start with the Group of Five.

Cincinnati hit rock bottom in Tommy Tuberville's final season and FAU, which closed 2013 by winning their final four games under an interim coach, hired the wrong guy and suffered through a rough three season stretch under the Partridge Family. However, there were a few success stories as well. Houston won Conference USA in 2006 under fourth year head coach and guy has nothing to hide, Art Briles. Hawaii and Utah State nearly won their respective conferences, but lost close games to Boise State that ultimately cost them a shot at the WAC and Mountain West title. Nevada revved up their Pistol attack and improved slightly behind quarterback Colin Kaepernick and Hall of Fame coach Chris Ault. 

At the Power Five level, the follow up results were also quite mixed. 

Arkansas fired Houston Nutt and struggled in their first season under Bobby Petrino. Louisville, Miami, and Texas Tech maintained their .500 records the following season. After actually winning the Big 10 despite a .500 record in 2012, Wisconsin improved the following season under first year head coach Gary Andersen, but were no match for Michigan State and Ohio State who both rolled through the league with unbeaten conference records. After back to back .500 seasons, Texas Tech exploded under Mike Leach and finished in an infamous three-way tie with Oklahoma and Texas for the Big 12 South crown. Finally, Tennessee finished with their best season perhaps in this century just this past year. And for what its worth, Arizona State also improved, but I didn't include them due to the limited schedule they played in 2020. 

Projecting UAB's 2023 season is a real Rorschach Test. UAB played well in 2022, but could not seal the deal in close games. Their head coach retired due to health issues over the summer and they played all season under an inexperienced interim. Of course they are bound for greatness with a full offseason under a new regime and some better close game good fortune! But, they made a weird coaching hire. Not that it can't be successful. It was just odd. The Blazers are also stepping up in weight class as they join the AAC for the 2023 campaign. If UAB were a stock and I were a TV personality who pretended to know what stocks to pick, I'd give the Blazers a 'HOLD' rating. 

2022 Adjusted Pythagorean Record: Big 12

Last week we looked at how Big 12 teams fared in terms of yards per play. his week, we turn our attention to how the season played out in terms of the Adjusted Pythagorean Record, or APR. For an in-depth look at APR, click here. If you didn’t feel like clicking, here is the Reader’s Digest version. APR looks at how well a team scores and prevents touchdowns. Non-offensive touchdowns, field goals, extra points, and safeties are excluded. The ratio of offensive touchdowns to touchdowns allowed is converted into a winning percentage. Pretty simple actually.

Once again, here are the 2022 Big 12 standings.

And here are the APR standings with conference rank in offensive touchdowns, touchdowns allowed, and APR in parentheses. This includes conference games only with the championship game excluded.

Finally, Big 12 teams are sorted by the difference between their actual number of wins and their expected number of wins according to APR.

TCU and Oklahoma State significantly exceeded their APR while Iowa State significantly underachieved. TCU and Iowa State also over and underachieved respectively based on their YPP numbers and we went over some reasons for that last week. Oklahoma State actually played well for the first half of conference play. Through four games, the Cowboys were 3-1 in the league with their lone loss coming in overtime to TCU. However, they staggered home like a criminally over-served tavern patron, losing four of their last five with three of losses coming by at least two touchdowns and their lone victory coming by six points. 

Going Streaking

Brent Venables, regarded as one of the best defensive coordinators in college football, was expected to continue the lineage of elite teams at Oklahoma. The Sooners were the preseason favorite in the Big 12 and were ranked ninth in the preseason AP Poll. Oklahoma opened the season winning their three non-conference games by a combined 97 points culminating with a beatdown of former Big 8 rival Nebraska. Another Big 12 title and a potential CFP bid seemed on the horizon. Then the Sooners dropped their conference opener to Kansas State, lost their starting quarterback to injury against TCU, and without him suffered their worst defeat in Red River history. The Sooners stemmed the tide somewhat midseason, beating both Kansas and Iowa State, but lost three of four down the stretch to finish the regular season 6-6. But more importantly, at least for our purposes, they finished with a losing conference record for the first time since 1998. 

John Blake, a former Oklahoma defensive lineman under Barry Switzer, coached the Sooners for three seasons (1996-1998), neatly coinciding with the beginning of the Big 12. His tenure exacerbated the malaise that began under Gary Gibbs in the late 80's and continued with the forgettable single season of Howard Schnellenberger. The Sooners finished with losing records in each of Blake's three seasons and never finished better than 3-5 in Big 12 play. Venables arrived as an assistant on Bob Stoop's first staff in 1999 and the Sooners did not finish with a losing conference record until Venables returned as head coach in 2022. 

1998 serves as good inflection point in the history of college football. It was not the beginning of the modern era, but it did represent a more regimented segregation between the haves (BCS and later Power Five conferences) and the have-nots (non-BCS and Group of Five conferences). It was also the (theoretical) end of split national titles. So in the spirit of that inflection point, and in honor of Oklahoma's long run, which power conference teams in the BCS and CFP eras have endured the fewest losing conference records? Read on to find out. 

Like Oklahoma, Clemson also finished with a losing conference record in 1998 and fired the responsible party. Despite a losing overall record in 2011, they have not finished with a losing conference record since. Joining Clemson at the top and edging out Ohio State and Oklahoma is Georgia which finished 3-5 in SEC play in 2010, but has not had a losing league record in any other season of the BCS/CFP era. Cincinnati has an asterisk as they were only in a BCS conference for nine seasons (2005-2013). 

What about the other side of the coin? Which power conference teams have posted the most losing conference records? I bet you could guess most of them.

2007 and 2008. Those were the only seasons in the BCS/CFP era when Kansas did not finish with a losing conference record. The other teams that populate this list are a who's who of basement dwellers for the past quarter century. However, I must admit, I am a little shocked at Arizona's place on this list. Even Rich Rodriguez could only manage two winning Pac-12 records over his six seasons in Tucson.

Before we close, lets look at the most consecutive seasons without a losing conference record.

Clemson's streak is still active and baring an unforeseen set of circumstances, the Tigers should see their streak reach a quarter century in 2023.

And finally, the most consecutive seasons with a losing conference record.

Kansas is just a few years away from matching Indiana's streak of futility. Can the Jayhawks end the skid in 2023? Stay tuned to find out. 

2022 Yards Per Play: Big 12

This week we head to another Big conference that managed to produce both a surprise champion and a surprise playoff participant. 

Here are the 2022 Big 12 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 Big 12 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 2022 season, which teams in the Big 12 met this threshold? Here are Big 12 teams sorted by performance over what would be expected from their Net YPP numbers.

TCU and Texas Tech significantly exceeded their expected record based on YPP while Kansas and Iowa State underachieved. TCU and Texas Tech combined to finish 7-0 in one-score Big 12 games, buoying their respective league records. TCU also had the best in-conference turnover margin in Big 12 play (+7) and while Texas Tech was insanely aggressive under first year head coach Joey McGuire (lead nation in fourth down attempts), they managed to convert an unsustainable percentage of their fourth downs (64%). Iowa State finished 0-6 in one-score Big 12 games and also had the worst in-conference turnover margin (-10). Kansas was not unfortunate in close Big 12 games (1-1 record), but their defense could not get off the field in high-leverage situations, allowing Big 12 opponents to covert nearly 73% of their fourth down attempts. 

Closing the Deal

TCU became the first Big 12 team other than Oklahoma to make the College Football Playoff in 2022. They became the first Big 12 team to play for a national championship since Texas in 2009. And they were also the first ever Big 12 team to win a College Football Playoff Game. Tremendous accolades all. However, I derive pleasure from pointing out failure. And did you know that TCU did not even win the Big 12 in 2022? In fact, they joined a longer than expected list of BCS/Power Five teams to finish unbeaten in conference play and lose their conference title game. 

2022 marked the third consecutive year this phenomenon occurred. Despite the setbacks, the three legitimate contenders were still selected by the CFP Committee (Southern Cal was 13th in the penultimate CFP rankings in 2020 and were unlikely to qualify had they beaten Oregon in the Pac-12 Championship Game). 

The list of non-BCS/Group of Five teams to lose their conference title game after rolling through league play with an unblemished record is not much shorter. 

This trend has also happened at the Group of Five level each of the past three seasons, including thrice in the Covid year of 2020. 

We had a little fun at TCU's expense in this post, but I want to congratulate the Horned Frogs on a great season. For my money, the 2014 team was better and just as deserving of a CFP bid. Plus, I would have loved to have seen what the 2009 or 2010 teams could have done in a system that did not exclude non-BCS conference schools. 

2022 Adjusted Pythagorean Record: Big 10

Last week we looked at how Big 10 teams fared in terms of yards per play. his week, we turn our attention to how the season played out in terms of the Adjusted Pythagorean Record, or APR. For an in-depth look at APR, click here. If you didn’t feel like clicking, here is the Reader’s Digest version. APR looks at how well a team scores and prevents touchdowns. Non-offensive touchdowns, field goals, extra points, and safeties are excluded. The ratio of offensive touchdowns to touchdowns allowed is converted into a winning percentage. Pretty simple actually.

Once again, here are the 2022 Big 10 standings.

And here are the APR standings with conference rank in offensive touchdowns, touchdowns allowed, and APR in parentheses. This includes conference games only with the championship game excluded.

Finally, Big 10 teams are sorted by the difference between their actual number of wins and their expected number of wins according to APR.

Purdue significantly exceeded their APR while their division mates Illinois and Minnesota underachieved. Purdue also overachieved relative to their YPP numbers and we went over some reasons for that last week. Illinois was probably the best team in the Big 10 West, but they finished 1-4 in one-score conference games. If Illinois was not the best team in the Big 10 West, Minnesota may have been. The Gophers actually had a winning record in one-score conference games (2-1), but they were absurdly dominant in their other three league wins (won by a combined 86 points) which boosted their APR. 

Purdue's Historical Season

Purdue became the ninth Big 10 team to play in the conference's title game in 2022 (Illinois, Indiana, Maryland, Minnesota, and Rutgers are the five still waiting for their first appearance) and in the process became just the fourth BCS/Power Five conference title game participant to allow more touchdowns than they scored in league play. 

Purdue was unable to join Virginia Tech and actually capture their conference's crown despite allowing more touchdowns than they scored. 

We try not to give short shrift to the Group of Five around these parts, so I would be remiss if I left out the non-BCS/Group of Five teams that qualified for their conference's championship game despite allowing more touchdowns than they scored. 

It's a small sample, but the Group of Five teams that allowed more touchdowns than they scored actually won two of three league title games. 

How did the other six teams that accomplished this feat before Purdue perform the next season? It's a mixed bag, but a few of the teams enjoyed continue success.

East Carolina and Bowling Green actually won Conference USA and the MAC the following season while UCLA once again qualified for the Pac-12 Championship Game. Northern Illinois and Tennessee fell on hard times, but Purdue fans can take solace their team is not doomed to tumble in the Big 10 standings next season. 

2022 Yards Per Play: Big 10

Two conferences down, eight to go. We head to the midwest this week and examine the Big 10, home of two playoff participants (and zero playoff wins) in 2022. 

Here are the 2022 Big 10 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 Big 10 team. This includes conference play only, with the championship game not included. The teams are sorted by division 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 2022 season, which teams in the Big 10 met this threshold? Here are Big 10 teams sorted by performance over what would be expected from their Net YPP numbers.

Purdue and Michigan were the only Big 10 teams that saw their expected record differ significantly from their actual record. Both the Boilermakers and Wolverines overachieved and whaddaya know, they also happened to play in the Big 10 Championship Game. Michigan was a somewhat fortunate 2-0 on one-score Big 10 games while Purdue was 4-1 in such contests. 

Picture It, Ireland, 2022

Nebraska and Northwestern played one of the first college football games of the 2022 season in Ireland. The Cornhuskers and Wildcats were looking to rebound from disappointing 2021 campaigns. Both schools finished at the bottom of the Big 10 West with identical 1-8 conference records. Northwestern was legitimately bad, but Nebraska was better than their record by almost any statistical measure. The opener was big for both teams. For Northwestern, it was an opportunity for the Wildcats to prove the Covid-delayed 2020 season was not a fluke. The Wildcats finished 6-1 in Big 10 play that season, qualified for the Big 10 Championship Game, and finished tenth in the final AP Poll (their first top ten finish since the historic 1995 season). However, sandwiched around that division title were identical 1-8 Big 10 records in 2019 and 2021. For Nebraska, 2022 was Scott Frost's last chance to succeed at his alma mater. Frost was hired after leading UCF to an undefeated record and dubious national title claim in 2017. However, in his first four seasons in Lincoln, the Cornhuskers lost nearly twice as many games (29) as they won (15). Frost made some staff changes heading into 2022, most notably tabbing Mark Whipple to be his offensive coordinator. The Cornhuskers also bid adieu to enigmatic quarterback Adrian Martinez and replaced him with Texas transfer Casey Thompson. There was a little preseason buzz for Nebraska and the Cornhuskers entered the game against the Wildcats as a double digit favorite. Nebraska built a double digit lead in the third quarter, but faltered in yet another close game, losing 31-28. And Frost, much like Fleishman, was in trouble. But I didn't come here to write any additional epitaphs on Scott Frost's tenure at Nebraska. I want to talk about the team that won the game in Ireland.

After Northwestern upset Nebraska, most Wildcat fans probably thought they were in store for a nice rebound season. After a bye, Northwestern's next three games were all at home against Duke (under a first year coach with low expectations), Southern Illinois (FCS), and Miami of Ohio. A road trip to Penn State immediately followed that homestand and Ohio State was on the schedule in November, but theoretically, Northwestern should have banked enough wins to be in contention for a bowl bid at the end of the season. That was not the case. Northwestern dropped all three of those winnable home games and then proceeded to lose all eight of their remaining conference games. In doing so, they joined a somewhat exclusive club, becoming just the fifteenth BCS/Power Five conference team since 2005 to win their conference opener and lose the rest of their conference games. 

The club gets even more exclusive when considering the fact that Northwestern pulled an upset in their conference opener. Only eight other teams pulled an upset in their conference opener and lost out in league play. 

Like the other eight teams on this list, Northwestern did not fool the betting market. The Wildcats were double digit underdogs in their final eight conference games. 

2022 Adjusted Pythagorean Record: ACC

Happy Candlemas to all who celebrate!

Last week we looked at how ACC teams fared in terms of yards per play. his week, we turn our attention to how the season played out in terms of the Adjusted Pythagorean Record, or APR. For an in-depth look at APR, click here. If you didn’t feel like clicking, here is the Reader’s Digest version. APR looks at how well a team scores and prevents touchdowns. Non-offensive touchdowns, field goals, extra points, and safeties are excluded. The ratio of offensive touchdowns to touchdowns allowed is converted into a winning percentage. Pretty simple actually.

Once again, here are the 2022 ACC standings. 

And here are the APR standings with conference rank in offensive touchdowns, touchdowns allowed, and APR in parentheses. This includes conference games only with the championship game excluded. Also, note Virginia and Virginia Tech's rankings are on a per game basis since they only played seven conference games due to a real world tragedy. 

Finally, ACC teams are sorted by the difference between their actual number of wins and their expected number of wins according to APR.

Georgia Tech (more on them later), Miami, and NC State significantly exceeded their expected APR while Wake Forest, Florida State, and Virginia underachieved. Georgia Tech, Miami, and NC State combined to finish 9-3 in one-score conference games. In addition, those three teams suffered ten double digit conference losses. If they weren't winning close, they were usually getting blown out. Meanwhile, Wake Forest, Florida State, and Virginia were a combined 2-8 in one-score conference games. Virginia was not able to get margin in any of their conference victories, but Wake Forest and Florida State combined to win seven ACC games by ten points or more. The Demon Deacons also finished with the worst in-conference turnover margin (-10) in the ACC which torpedoed their goal of repeating as division champs. 

Did Georgia Tech Improve?

The Geoff Collins era mercifully came to an end in late September after an ugly loss to UCF dropped the Yellow Jackets to 1-3. Under interim coach Brent Key, the team rallied, winning four of their final eight games to finish 5-7, their best record since Paul Johnson retired. Key's performance earned him the full time gig, and he appears to have the Yellow Jackets trending in the right direction. To illustrate this point, let's look at Georgia Tech's conference record under both men.

Under Key, Georgia Tech finished with a winning conference record, while they barely won more than a fourth of their games under Collins. At a minimum, Key should have the Yellow Jackets back in bowl contention over the next few seasons. But, just to be thorough, let's look under the hood. Here is how the Yellow Jackets fared in terms of Yards Per Play in ACC play under both men.

This has to be a misprint. The Yellow Jackets somehow put up a worse YPP Net under Key? Indeed they did. Their defensive improvement was more than offset by an offensive decline. What about my other favorite metric, APR? 

The Yellow Jackets scored and allowed touchdowns in ACC play at about the same ratio under Brent Key as they did under Geoff Collins. Under Collins, the Yellow Jackets won about one fewer conference game than we would expect based on the ratio of their touchdowns scored and allowed. Over 26 games they won seven league games instead of eight. Meanwhile, despite allowing more touchdowns than they scored under Key, the Yellow Jackets won four of the seven conference games he coached. 

How did Georgia Tech pull this off? While the Yellow Jackets did not fare any better under Key than they did under Collins in per play efficiency or scoring and allowing touchdowns, they were markedly improved in the oft ignored area of football: special teams.

The kicking game was a mess under Collins. In three plus seasons, Georgia Tech kickers made less than half their field goals. For comparisons sake, the median team field goal percentage in college football is about 75%. Key turned the kicking responsibilities over to Gavin Stewart after being named interim coach and he converted twelve of his thirteen kicks. Key also apparently allowed his special teams to practice kick and punt protection as the team did not allow any blocked kicks under his watch after allowing 16 under Collins, including four in their first four games of 2022. Did the team even practice special teams under Collins? Probably. That would seem like a pretty big oversight if they didn't, but based on their play, I can't definitively say they did. 

Another area where Georgia Tech improved under Key was turnover margin. 

In 26 ACC games under Collins, the Yellow Jackets finished in the red in the turnover department 14 times. They were 2-12 in those games. In games where they did not lose the turnover margin, Georgia Tech was a respectable 5-7. Under Key, the Yellow Jackets lost the turnover battle once. In the six games where they were even or in the black, they finished 4-2. 

So what do we make of the Brent Key hire? Key's promotion certainly saved the 2022 season (as much as a 5-7 record can qualify as 'saving'). Had the team not fired Collins, its quite possible Georgia Tech would have finished 0-8 or 1-7 in the ACC. The team played hard under Key and although they did not play better on a per play basis, the special teams improved dramatically and the turnover margin reversed course. We should probably give Key credit for identifying the best kicker on the team and for shoring up punt and field goal protection, but turnovers are notoriously fickle. It is highly unlikely that Georgia Tech averages a +1 margin in each conference game going forward under Key. I would like to have seen a bigger swing when it came time to name the full time head coach. I want to stress I am not a journalist or Georgia Tech insider, so I don't know who was a realistic candidate when the school was searching for a head coach. Key is an alum who obviously wanted the job, but an unsustainable turnover margin and a 4-1 record in one-score games made Georgia Tech look better than they were. I wish Key the best, but I think the Yellow Jackets will be in the market for a new head coach by the time the 2025 season kicks off (if not before).