PiRate College Football Ratings: November 10, 2019

This Week’s PiRate Ratings Spreads

Tuesday	November 12
Home	Visitors	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Ohio	Western Mich.	-2.6	-2.6	-2.0
Akron	Eastern Mich.	-14.9	-15.1	-16.4
Wednesday	November 13
Home	Visitors	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Miami (O)	Bowling Green	17.8	16.7	18.3
Toledo	Northern Illinois	1.1	2.3	1.8
Thursday	November 14
Home	Visitors	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Kent St.	Buffalo	-3.2	-4.0	-4.4
Pittsburgh	North Carolina	3.3	3.2	2.9
Friday	November 15
Home	Visitors	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Marshall	Louisiana Tech	-3.0	-3.9	-2.8
San Diego St.	Fresno St.	4.7	5.3	3.9
Saturday	November 16
Home	Visitors	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Rutgers	Ohio St.	-53.2	-52.7	-55.8
Auburn	Georgia	-1.2	-1.2	-1.7
Utah	UCLA	24.9	24.0	26.0
Nebraska	Wisconsin	-14.0	-13.1	-14.7
Michigan	Michigan St.	14.5	14.1	15.5
Iowa	Minnesota	2.9	1.1	2.9
Oklahoma St.	Kansas	17.6	17.1	17.3
California	USC	-0.6	-1.3	-0.5
Washington St.	Stanford	10.3	10.2	11.1
Oregon St.	Arizona St.	-3.9	-2.1	-4.5
Northwestern	Massachusetts	48.4	45.6	48.4
Mississippi St.	Alabama	-20.2	-20.3	-16.8
Penn St.	Indiana	15.8	15.7	16.1
Missouri	Florida	-11.4	-11.2	-11.7
Texas Tech	TCU	1.3	-1.0	0.3
Temple	Tulane	1.7	0.3	2.0
UAB	UTEP	22.0	19.9	21.8
Notre Dame	Navy	23.0	19.0	21.8
Arkansas St.	Coastal Carolina	7.2	6.2	7.4
Georgia Southern	UL-Monroe	14.1	13.4	14.0
Texas St.	Troy	-7.2	-7.3	-7.0
Clemson	Wake Forest	34.5	33.0	35.4
Kansas St.	West Virginia	15.1	15.4	15.9
Houston	Memphis	-5.9	-5.1	-4.6
Ball St.	Central Mich.	4.8	3.7	4.1
Iowa St.	Texas	8.3	8.5	8.8
Georgia Tech	Virginia Tech	-6.3	-7.8	-6.6
Vanderbilt	Kentucky	-12.3	-12.4	-12.4
Duke	Syracuse	7.7	7.8	8.1
UNLV	Hawaii	-7.5	-7.2	-6.8
Utah St.	Wyoming	2.8	-0.1	2.8
Middle Tennessee	Rice	12.8	11.1	13.6
South Alabama	Louisiana	-24.3	-22.1	-25.2
UTSA	Southern Miss.	-18.5	-15.2	-19.0
Ole Miss	LSU	-21.7	-20.1	-21.7
South Florida	Cincinnati	-13.2	-11.8	-13.4
Colorado St.	Air Force	-15.1	-12.8	-15.3
Baylor	Oklahoma	-6.3	-5.4	-6.4
Texas A&M	South Carolina	8.9	9.0	8.6
North Carolina St.	Louisville	0.5	0.1	0.4
Georgia St.	Appalachian St.	-11.6	-9.3	-11.3
Boise St.	New Mexico	28.6	26.2	29.9
Oregon	Arizona	27.5	27.9	29.2

 

FBS vs.	FCS	PiRate
Florida St.	Alabama St.	39
Army	VMI	31
BYU	Idaho St.	31
New Mexico St.	Incarnate Word	10

 

This Week’s PiRate Ratings

 

PiRate Ratings
#	Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
1	Ohio St.	140.6	139.8	141.9	140.8
2	Clemson	135.9	133.8	137.0	135.6
3	Alabama	134.3	131.1	134.8	133.4
4	L S U	131.5	129.3	131.6	130.8
5	Georgia	127.1	125.3	127.3	126.6
6	Florida	125.3	122.6	124.9	124.2
7	Utah	124.0	122.9	124.8	123.9
8	Penn St.	123.6	122.7	123.7	123.4
9	Michigan	123.3	121.9	123.6	122.9
10	Auburn	122.8	121.1	122.6	122.2
11	Oklahoma	122.4	121.6	121.9	122.0
12	Oregon	121.5	121.6	122.8	122.0
13	Wisconsin	120.4	120.0	120.3	120.2
14	Minnesota	118.9	118.8	118.8	118.8
15	Iowa	118.8	117.0	118.7	118.1
16	Notre Dame	118.3	116.8	118.1	117.7
17	Iowa St.	115.6	116.2	116.0	115.9
18	Texas A&M	116.5	114.9	115.4	115.6
19	Washington	113.8	113.5	114.8	114.0
20	Baylor	113.2	113.2	112.5	113.0
21	Kansas St.	112.2	112.1	112.2	112.2
22	Central Florida	111.5	110.8	112.0	111.4
23	Mississippi St.	111.1	107.8	115.0	111.3
24	Indiana	110.9	109.9	110.6	110.5
25	Oklahoma St.	110.3	111.0	110.0	110.4
26	Texas	110.3	110.6	110.3	110.4
27	Washington St.	110.6	109.7	110.9	110.4
28	Missouri	110.9	108.4	110.2	109.8
29	Michigan St.	110.3	109.4	109.6	109.8
30	South Carolina	110.6	108.9	109.8	109.8
31	Tennessee	109.9	109.7	109.2	109.6
32	Miami (Fla.)	108.3	108.0	109.5	108.6
33	U S C	108.2	108.7	108.7	108.6
34	T C U	107.4	109.9	107.7	108.3
35	Kentucky	108.3	106.9	107.0	107.4
36	Cincinnati	107.3	106.8	107.7	107.3
37	Virginia	107.1	107.0	107.1	107.1
38	Ole Miss	106.8	106.1	106.9	106.6
39	Arizona St.	106.6	105.9	106.9	106.5
40	Memphis	106.2	106.2	107.0	106.5
41	Appalachian St.	106.6	105.6	106.0	106.1
42	Texas Tech	106.2	106.4	105.5	106.0
43	Pittsburgh	106.0	105.6	106.3	106.0
44	North Carolina	105.7	105.5	106.4	105.9
45	Boise St.	105.7	105.7	105.7	105.7
46	SMU	105.2	104.9	105.9	105.3
47	California	104.6	104.3	105.3	104.7
48	Air Force	104.0	105.3	104.8	104.7
49	Virginia Tech	104.4	104.5	105.1	104.7
50	Florida St.	104.4	104.4	104.6	104.5
51	Wake Forest	104.4	103.8	104.7	104.3
52	Illinois	103.8	104.7	103.6	104.1
53	Purdue	103.7	103.5	103.1	103.4
54	Nebraska	103.4	103.9	102.6	103.3
55	Duke	103.5	102.7	103.2	103.1
56	Stanford	103.3	102.5	102.8	102.9
57	BYU	102.6	102.8	102.6	102.7
58	Boston College	102.1	101.7	102.3	102.0
59	U C L A	102.0	101.9	101.8	101.9
60	Louisiana	101.3	101.6	101.4	101.4
61	Northwestern	102.1	101.0	100.7	101.3
62	Tulane	100.0	100.8	100.5	100.4
63	Wyoming	99.3	101.4	100.0	100.2
64	Oregon St.	99.8	100.8	99.5	100.0
65	West Virginia	100.1	99.7	99.3	99.7
66	Navy	98.2	100.8	99.2	99.4
67	Utah St.	99.2	98.4	99.8	99.1
68	Temple	98.6	98.1	99.6	98.8
69	Louisville	98.8	98.5	98.6	98.6
70	Syracuse	98.8	98.0	98.1	98.3
71	Florida Atlantic	97.8	97.8	99.2	98.3
72	Houston	97.3	98.2	99.4	98.3
73	Western Michigan	98.4	97.4	98.1	98.0
74	Louisiana Tech	97.1	97.5	97.6	97.4
75	San Diego St.	96.6	98.2	96.2	97.0
76	Arizona	97.0	96.8	96.5	96.8
77	Georgia Southern	96.9	96.7	96.4	96.7
78	Southern Miss.	96.7	95.3	97.1	96.4
79	Maryland	97.2	96.0	95.6	96.3
80	Kansas	95.8	96.8	95.7	96.1
81	Colorado	96.2	96.0	96.0	96.0
82	North Carolina St.	96.2	95.6	96.0	95.9
83	Fresno St.	94.9	95.9	95.3	95.4
84	Hawaii	94.9	96.2	93.8	95.0
85	Army	94.9	95.1	94.4	94.8
86	Georgia Tech	95.1	93.7	95.5	94.8
87	Tulsa	93.3	94.2	94.6	94.0
88	Buffalo	93.1	93.8	94.6	93.8
89	Vanderbilt	94.5	93.0	93.1	93.5
90	Western Kentucky	92.7	93.6	94.3	93.5
91	Ohio	93.3	92.3	93.6	93.1
92	Georgia St.	92.5	93.8	92.2	92.8
93	South Florida	91.1	92.0	91.3	91.5
94	Troy	91.6	92.1	90.5	91.4
95	Arkansas St.	91.3	91.6	91.2	91.4
96	Marshall	91.0	90.6	91.8	91.1
97	Liberty	90.1	91.2	90.4	90.5
98	Ball St.	90.6	90.2	90.8	90.5
99	Miami (Ohio)	90.1	88.9	90.7	89.9
100	Middle Tennessee	90.0	89.2	90.1	89.8
101	Northern Illinois	89.7	88.9	89.8	89.5
102	Central Michigan	88.4	89.0	89.3	88.9
103	Colorado St.	87.4	91.0	88.0	88.8
104	Toledo	88.4	88.7	89.1	88.7
105	San Jose St.	88.0	89.9	88.2	88.7
106	U A B	87.7	89.5	88.1	88.5
107	Nevada	87.8	89.4	87.3	88.2
108	North Texas	87.8	87.4	88.1	87.8
109	Coastal Carolina	87.2	88.4	86.8	87.5
110	Kent St.	87.4	87.2	87.7	87.4
111	Arkansas	87.1	87.0	86.3	86.8
112	Charlotte	85.8	86.2	86.2	86.1
113	Louisiana-Monroe	85.8	86.4	85.4	85.9
114	Florida Int’l.	85.5	85.2	85.2	85.3
115	Eastern Michigan	84.4	84.5	84.7	84.6
116	East Carolina	83.6	85.0	84.0	84.2
117	Rutgers	84.4	84.1	83.2	83.9
118	U N L V	83.4	85.0	83.0	83.8
119	Texas St.	81.8	82.3	81.0	81.7
120	New Mexico	80.1	82.5	78.8	80.5
121	Rice	79.7	80.6	78.9	79.8
122	Texas-San Antonio	75.7	77.7	75.6	76.3
123	New Mexico St.	75.7	77.5	75.5	76.2
124	South Alabama	74.5	77.0	73.7	75.1
125	Bowling Green	74.3	74.1	74.3	74.3
126	Old Dominion	73.7	74.0	73.8	73.8
127	Connecticut	70.9	73.7	69.9	71.5
128	U T E P	68.8	72.7	69.4	70.3
129	Akron	67.1	66.9	65.8	66.6
130	Massachusetts	56.3	57.9	54.8	56.3

 

Conference Power Ratings
#	League	Average
1	SEC	113.4
2	BTen	111.2
3	B12	109.4
4	P12	107.3
5	ACC	105.0
6	AAC	97.4
7	MWC	93.9
8	SUN	91.0
9	Ind	89.7
10	MAC	87.1
11	CUSA	86.7

 

Our Guess at Top 6
1	LSU
2	Ohio St.
3	Clemson
4	Alabama
5	Georgia
6	Oregon

 

Top 5 Group of 5
1	Cincinnati
2	Memphis
3	Boise St.
4	Navy
5	SMU

PiRate Ratings By Conference

 

American Athletic Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	AAC	Overall
Central Florida	111.5	110.8	112.0	111.4	4-2	7-3
Cincinnati	107.3	106.8	107.7	107.3	5-0	8-1
Temple	98.6	98.1	99.6	98.8	3-2	6-3
South Florida	91.1	92.0	91.3	91.5	2-3	4-5
East Carolina	83.6	85.0	84.0	84.2	0-6	3-7
Connecticut	70.9	73.7	69.9	71.5	0-6	2-8
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	AAC	Overall
Memphis	106.2	106.2	107.0	106.5	4-1	8-1
SMU	105.2	104.9	105.9	105.3	5-1	9-1
Tulane	100.0	100.8	100.5	100.4	3-2	6-3
Navy	98.2	100.8	99.2	99.4	5-1	7-1
Houston	97.3	98.2	99.4	98.3	1-4	3-6
Tulsa	93.3	94.2	94.6	94.0	1-5	3-7
AAC Averages	96.9	97.6	97.6	97.4
Atlantic Coast Conference
Atlantic Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	ACC	Overall
Clemson	135.9	133.8	137.0	135.6	7-0	10-0
Florida St.	104.4	104.4	104.6	104.5	4-4	5-5
Wake Forest	104.4	103.8	104.7	104.3	3-2	7-2
Boston College	102.1	101.7	102.3	102.0	3-4	5-5
Louisville	98.8	98.5	98.6	98.6	3-3	5-4
Syracuse	98.8	98.0	98.1	98.3	0-5	3-6
North Carolina St.	96.2	95.6	96.0	95.9	1-4	4-5
Coastal Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	ACC	Overall
Miami (Fla.)	108.3	108.0	109.5	108.6	4-3	6-4
Virginia	107.1	107.0	107.1	107.1	5-2	7-3
Pittsburgh	106.0	105.6	106.3	106.0	3-2	6-3
North Carolina	105.7	105.5	106.4	105.9	3-3	4-5
Virginia Tech	104.4	104.5	105.1	104.7	4-2	6-3
Duke	103.5	102.7	103.2	103.1	2-4	4-5
Georgia Tech	95.1	93.7	95.5	94.8	1-5	2-7
ACC Averages	105.1	104.5	105.3	105.0
Big 12 Conference
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	B12	Overall
Oklahoma	122.4	121.6	121.9	122.0	5-1	8-1
Iowa St.	115.6	116.2	116.0	115.9	3-3	5-4
Baylor	113.2	113.2	112.5	113.0	6-0	9-0
Kansas St.	112.2	112.1	112.2	112.2	3-3	6-3
Oklahoma St.	110.3	111.0	110.0	110.4	3-3	6-3
Texas	110.3	110.6	110.3	110.4	4-2	6-3
T C U	107.4	109.9	107.7	108.3	2-4	4-5
Texas Tech	106.2	106.4	105.5	106.0	2-4	4-5
West Virginia	100.1	99.7	99.3	99.7	1-5	3-6
Kansas	95.8	96.8	95.7	96.1	1-5	3-6
Big 12 Averages	109.3	109.7	109.1	109.4
Big Ten Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	BTen	Overall
Ohio St.	140.6	139.8	141.9	140.8	6-0	9-0
Penn St.	123.6	122.7	123.7	123.4	5-1	8-1
Michigan	123.3	121.9	123.6	122.9	4-2	7-2
Indiana	110.9	109.9	110.6	110.5	4-2	7-2
Michigan St.	110.3	109.4	109.6	109.8	2-4	4-5
Maryland	97.2	96.0	95.6	96.3	1-6	3-7
Rutgers	84.4	84.1	83.2	83.9	0-6	2-7
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	BTen	Overall
Wisconsin	120.4	120.0	120.3	120.2	4-2	7-2
Minnesota	118.9	118.8	118.8	118.8	6-0	9-0
Iowa	118.8	117.0	118.7	118.1	3-3	6-3
Illinois	103.8	104.7	103.6	104.1	4-3	6-4
Purdue	103.7	103.5	103.1	103.4	3-4	4-6
Nebraska	103.4	103.9	102.6	103.3	2-4	4-5
Northwestern	102.1	101.0	100.7	101.3	0-7	1-8
Big Ten Averages	111.5	110.9	111.1	111.2
Conference USA
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	CUSA	Overall
Florida Atlantic	97.8	97.8	99.2	98.3	5-1	7-3
Western Kentucky	92.7	93.6	94.3	93.5	4-2	6-4
Marshall	91.0	90.6	91.8	91.1	4-1	6-3
Middle Tennessee	90.0	89.2	90.1	89.8	2-3	3-6
Charlotte	85.8	86.2	86.2	86.1	3-3	5-5
Florida Int’l.	85.5	85.2	85.2	85.3	3-4	5-5
Old Dominion	73.7	74.0	73.8	73.8	0-6	1-9
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	CUSA	Overall
Louisiana Tech	97.1	97.5	97.6	97.4	5-0	8-1
Southern Miss.	96.7	95.3	97.1	96.4	4-1	6-3
U A B	87.7	89.5	88.1	88.5	3-2	6-3
North Texas	87.8	87.4	88.1	87.8	3-3	4-6
Rice	79.7	80.6	78.9	79.8	0-5	0-9
Texas-San Antonio	75.7	77.7	75.6	76.3	3-2	4-5
U T E P	68.8	72.7	69.4	70.3	0-6	1-8
CUSA Averages	86.4	87.0	86.8	86.7
FBS Independents
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	Conf.	Overall
Notre Dame	118.3	116.8	118.1	117.7	x	7-2
BYU	102.6	102.8	102.6	102.7	x	5-4
Army	94.9	95.1	94.4	94.8	x	4-6
Liberty	90.1	91.2	90.4	90.5	x	6-4
New Mexico St.	75.7	77.5	75.5	76.2	x	0-9
Massachusetts	56.3	57.9	54.8	56.3	x	1-9
Indep. Averages	89.6	90.2	89.3	89.7
Mid-American Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	MAC	Overall
Buffalo	93.1	93.8	94.6	93.8	3-2	5-4
Ohio	93.3	92.3	93.6	93.1	3-2	4-5
Miami (Ohio)	90.1	88.9	90.7	89.9	4-1	5-4
Kent St.	87.4	87.2	87.7	87.4	2-3	3-6
Bowling Green	74.3	74.1	74.3	74.3	2-3	3-6
Akron	67.1	66.9	65.8	66.6	0-5	0-9
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	MAC	Overall
Western Michigan	98.4	97.4	98.1	98.0	4-2	6-4
Ball St.	90.6	90.2	90.8	90.5	3-2	4-5
Northern Illinois	89.7	88.9	89.8	89.5	2-3	3-6
Central Michigan	88.4	89.0	89.3	88.9	4-2	6-4
Toledo	88.4	88.7	89.1	88.7	3-2	6-3
Eastern Michigan	84.4	84.5	84.7	84.6	1-4	4-5
MAC Averages	87.1	86.8	87.4	87.1
Mountain West Conference
Mountain Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	MWC	Overall
Boise St.	105.7	105.7	105.7	105.7	5-0	8-1
Air Force	104.0	105.3	104.8	104.7	4-1	7-2
Wyoming	99.3	101.4	100.0	100.2	3-2	6-3
Utah St.	99.2	98.4	99.8	99.1	4-1	5-4
Colorado St.	87.4	91.0	88.0	88.8	3-2	4-5
New Mexico	80.1	82.5	78.8	80.5	0-5	2-7
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	MWC	Overall
San Diego St.	96.6	98.2	96.2	97.0	4-2	7-2
Fresno St.	94.9	95.9	95.3	95.4	2-3	4-5
Hawaii	94.9	96.2	93.8	95.0	3-3	6-4
San Jose St.	88.0	89.9	88.2	88.7	1-5	4-6
Nevada	87.8	89.4	87.3	88.2	3-3	6-4
U N L V	83.4	85.0	83.0	83.8	1-5	2-7
MWC Averages	93.4	94.9	93.4	93.9
Pac-12 Conference
North Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	P12	Overall
Oregon	121.5	121.6	122.8	122.0	6-0	8-1
Washington	113.8	113.5	114.8	114.0	3-4	6-4
Washington St.	110.6	109.7	110.9	110.4	1-5	4-5
California	104.6	104.3	105.3	104.7	2-4	5-4
Stanford	103.3	102.5	102.8	102.9	3-4	4-5
Oregon St.	99.8	100.8	99.5	100.0	3-3	4-5
South Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	P12	Overall
Utah	124.0	122.9	124.8	123.9	5-1	8-1
U S C	108.2	108.7	108.7	108.6	5-2	6-4
Arizona St.	106.6	105.9	106.9	106.5	2-4	5-4
U C L A	102.0	101.9	101.8	101.9	4-2	4-5
Arizona	97.0	96.8	96.5	96.8	2-4	4-5
Colorado	96.2	96.0	96.0	96.0	2-5	4-6
Pac-12 Averages	107.3	107.1	107.6	107.3
Southeastern Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	SEC	Overall
Georgia	127.1	125.3	127.3	126.6	5-1	8-1
Florida	125.3	122.6	124.9	124.2	6-2	8-2
Missouri	110.9	108.4	110.2	109.8	2-3	5-4
South Carolina	110.6	108.9	109.8	109.8	3-4	4-6
Tennessee	109.9	109.7	109.2	109.6	3-3	5-5
Kentucky	108.3	106.9	107.0	107.4	2-5	4-5
Vanderbilt	94.5	93.0	93.1	93.5	1-5	2-7
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	SEC	Overall
Alabama	134.3	131.1	134.8	133.4	5-1	8-1
L S U	131.5	129.3	131.6	130.8	5-0	9-0
Auburn	122.8	121.1	122.6	122.2	4-2	7-2
Texas A&M	116.5	114.9	115.4	115.6	3-2	6-3
Mississippi St.	111.1	107.8	115.0	111.3	2-4	4-5
Ole Miss	106.8	106.1	106.9	106.6	2-4	4-6
Arkansas	87.1	87.0	86.3	86.8	0-6	2-8
SEC Averages	114.1	112.3	113.9	113.4
Sunbelt Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	SBC	Overall
Appalachian St.	106.6	105.6	106.0	106.1	4-1	8-1
Georgia Southern	96.9	96.7	96.4	96.7	3-2	5-4
Georgia St.	92.5	93.8	92.2	92.8	3-2	6-3
Troy	91.6	92.1	90.5	91.4	2-3	4-5
Coastal Carolina	87.2	88.4	86.8	87.5	1-4	4-5
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	SBC	Overall
Louisiana	101.3	101.6	101.4	101.4	4-1	7-2
Arkansas St.	91.3	91.6	91.2	91.4	3-2	5-4
Louisiana-Monroe	85.8	86.4	85.4	85.9	3-2	4-5
Texas St.	81.8	82.3	81.0	81.7	2-3	3-6
South Alabama	74.5	77.0	73.7	75.1	0-5	1-8
SBC Averages	91.0	91.6	90.5	91.0

 

This Week’s Playoff and Bowl Projections

 

Bowl	Conf	Conf	Team	Team
Bahamas	MAC	CUSA	Miami (O)	Florida Atlantic
Frisco	AAC	At-large	SMU	[Air Force]
Cure	AAC	SBC	Memphis	Georgia Southern
New Mexico	CUSA	MWC	Southern Miss.	Wyoming
Boca Raton	AAC	MAC	Cincinnati	Western Michigan
Camellia	MAC	SBC	Buffalo	Georgia St.
Las Vegas	MWC #1	Pac-12	Hawaii	[Toledo]
New Orleans	CUSA	SBC #1	Louisiana Tech	Louisiana
Gasparilla	AAC	CUSA	Navy	Western Kentucky
Hawaii	BYU/MWC	AAC	BYU	Central Florida
Independence	ACC	SEC	Florida St.	[UAB]
Quick Lane	ACC	Big Ten	North Carolina	Michigan St.
Military	ACC	AAC	Virginia	Temple
Pinstripe	ACC	Big Ten	Pittsburgh	Illinois
Texas	Big 12	SEC	Texas	Texas A&M
Holiday	Pac-12	Big Ten	Washington	Michigan
Cheez-It	Big 12	Pac-12	Texas Tech	[San Jose St.]
Camping World	ACC	Big 12	Notre Dame	Kansas St.
Cotton	At-large	At-large	Baylor	Boise St.
First Responder	CUSA	Big 12	Marshall	[Eastern Michigan]
Redbox	Pac-12	Big Ten	Washington St.	Iowa
Music City	SEC	ACC	[Liberty]	Louisville
Orange	ACC	BTen/SEC	Virginia Tech	Georgia
Belk	ACC	SEC	Wake Forest	Missouri *
Sun	ACC	Pac-12	Miami (Fla.)	Arizona St.
Liberty	Big 12	SEC	Iowa St.	Kentucky
Arizona	SBC	MWC	Appalachian St.	San Diego St.
Alamo	Big 12	Pac-12	Oklahoma St.	USC
Citrus	SEC	BTen/ACC	Florida	Wisconsin
Outback	Big Ten	SEC	Penn St.	Auburn
Rose	Big Ten	Pac-12	Minnesota	Utah
Sugar	Big 12	SEC	Oklahoma	Alabama
Birmingham	AAC	SEC	Tulane	[Charlotte]
Taxslayer/Gator	SEC	Big Ten	Tennessee	Indiana
Idaho Potato	MAC	MWC	Ball St.	Utah St.
Armed Forces	Big Ten	MWC	Nebraska	[Nevada]
Mobile Alabama	MAC	SBC	Central Michigan	Arkansas St.
FBS PLAYOFFS
Fiesta	Top 4	Top 4	LSU	Clemson
Peach	Top 4	Top 4	Ohio St.	Oregon
Championship	Fiesta	Peach	Clemson	Ohio St.
Teams in [Brackets] are at-large selections * Missouri is on probation and technically not eligible for a bowl, but the Tigers have filed an appeal that has yet to be judged by the NCAA Infractions Committee.  If they do not issue a decision before December, then Missouri can accept a bowl bid even though they have a bowl ban in place.

 

Questions and Answers

 

Every year, we receive numerous questions from you the reader.  When we get enough, we try to answer them in one post.  The number one question we receive from people that know us is: “How do you ask a question on your site?”

So we can reduce Spam and not give a link, this is how you do it.  Go to our sister site that you can see to the side on our Blogroll under “The PiRate Ratings, ” which is the 6th one down the page.  This will take you to our sister website.  Once at this other website, click on the Contact Us link, and you can ask your question after you fill out your information.

Here are the questions we have received since the start of football season.  Some of these have been asked every year for the last five or six seasons.

 

Q1. What does PiRate, Mean, and Bias mean in your ratings?

A1. We have one basic power rating that we compile based on game statistics and strength of schedule.  We have three ways of calculating this data.  The PiRate Rating is our old formula that we have used for many years with little change in calculation.  We can also estimate FCS team power ratings with this formula.  The Mean formula takes all the data and weighs each item identically.  There are seven basic grade scores that are then divided by seven to get this rating.  The Bias formula does apply weighted grades to the parts of the game that we believe are more important than others, thus the grading is biased in favor of four of the seven grading scores.

Q2. What is your home field advantage for football?

A2. The PiRate Ratings use differing home field advantages for every game.  If Miami of Florida is hosting Florida International, the home field advantage is going to be much different than if they were to host Hawaii, Buffalo, or Washington.  Some of the time, a road team might actually receive some advantage over the home team.  Let’s say a 2-7 team with little fan support is hosting a team from an adjacent state in a conference game, when the other team is trying to get bowl eligible, and there are fans of this other team just 45 minutes away from the visiting team’s stadium.  Let’s say that about 75% of the fans at the game will be fans of the visiting team, and the home team will have to use visual signals to snap the ball.  It happens.

Q3. How come you have a 5-2 team rated ahead of a 7-0 team in the same conference, and the 5-2 team lost to the 7-0 team in September?

A3. The PiRate Ratings aren’t about what happened three, four, five, or six weeks ago.  The goal of these ratings is to try to predict the outcomes of this week’s games.  For instance, you might notice that Alabama is still rated ahead of LSU in our ratings.  We believe if the two teams were to play again this week on a neutral field, Alabama would win the game.  It might be a lot easier to see this like baseball.  The Padres might beat the Dodgers on Thursday and Friday, but the Dodgers will still be favored to beat them on Saturday and Sunday.  These ratings are meant to be used to predict the future and not rate the past. 

Q4. Why do you like Ohio State so much and always move them up to number one every year?

A4. These are mechanical power ratings.  We could teach somebody else how to calculate the ratings with maybe 3 to 4 hours of teaching.  There is no real human factor where we can say that Ohio State is our favorite team, so let’s make them number one.  Ohio State is number one because the statistical numbers make them number one.  We like Ohio State no more or less than Illinois or Michigan or Rice or San Jose St.  What we love is to be accurate.  Thus, the real thing we root to be number one is our ratings.

Q5. What does your power rating number mean for each team?

A5. Our ratings are calculated so that the average FBS team is rated 100.00.  If a team has a power rating of 106.8, this means they are 6.8 points better than the average FBS team.  If they have a rating of 87.4, this means they are 12.6 points weaker than the average team.

Q6.  Why do you only issue one spread for FBS vs. FCS games?

A6. The Mean and Bias ratings require more statistical analysis using a lot more data than the regular PiRate Rating.  We cannot calculate these ratings for FCS teams.  The regular PiRate Rating consists of data calculation that takes about 3 minutes per FCS team.  And, the PiRate Rating for FCS teams is only an approximation rating.  We do not use the same adjustment to  the ratings of FBS teams that play FCS teams. 

Q7. I noticed that Nebraska did not play this weekend, yet your rating for Nebraska went up a little.  Why is this?

A7. There are two factors at play here.  Nebraska’s opponents played to date did play this past weekend, and their ratings adjusted, which adjusted Nebraska’s rating.  Also, the week off usually helps teams.  Thus, Nebraska’s three ratings rose by about 0.6 points each.

Q8. How do you calculate your Bowl and Playoff Projections?  It does not look like you use the “if the season ended today” method.

A8. We do not use the “if the season ended today” method.  We estimate each team’s final won-loss record and then try to do the bowl committees’ work by extending invitations to the bowl teams based on the criteria set in advance.  When all of our competitors agreed 100% that Penn State was their choice for the Rose Bowl, we had Minnesota projected there.  Expect a bunch more sites to now place Minnesota in the Rose Bowl in their projections.

For what it’s worth, in this week’s projections, we only had 79 bowl eligible teams, which means just one bowl eligible team would be excluded in our mind.  Because Missouri could easily lose their appeal before December, then team #79 could become #78.  That team this week is Ohio.

Q9. What do you think about the 4-team Playoff?

A9. While we believe that in most years only four teams might be championship quality, we don’t believe that Power 5 conference champions should be left out.  At the minimum, the NCAA Playoffs should be a 6-team tournament with all Power 5 conference champions making the playoffs along with the top remaining team.  We support the 8-team or even 12-team playoff.  In a perfect world, we would support a 12- team playoff with the reduction of bowls to 30.  The opening round from 12 to 8 with the top 4 getting byes would be played on the better seeded teams’ home field.  The Quarterfinal Round would then be held at four existing bowls, one in each region.  For instance, the Pinstripe, Music City, Alamo, and Holiday Bowls could host this round.

Q10. Who is the best team of all time?

A10. We can only offer our choice from teams that we have seen in our lifetime, and then only offer up who we believe was the most dominant team in the year they played.  Our answer is the 1971 Nebraska Cornhuskers.  They beat teams that finished second, third, and fourth by a combined 105-44, including destroying 11-0 Alabama in the Orange Bowl 38-6.  They also beat 8-win Utah State and Iowa State and 7-win Hawaii by a combined 124-9.  This team had 8 All-Americans and 19 players that made the All Big 8 teams.  22 players on this team were taken in an NFL Draft after their senior years, including multiple reserves.

Q11. If computers are so incredible, why can’t any beat the spread more than 60% of the time?

A11. That is probably the best question we receive.  Computers may or may not be able to beat the spread 60% of the time, but when they do, none of us ever discover this, because it is never made available to the public.

At the Prediction Tracker, where the PiRate Ratings have finished number one against the spread and in picking winners multiple times, in a typical year, the top computer program beats the spread about 56% of the time.  The top geniuses in Las Vegas, the ones that are severely restricted in how much they can wager at each book (and frequently hire others to pretend to be innocent bettors with a system to place their bets for them), beat the spread 60-65% of the time.  

Before you say that the computers aren’t up to snuff when compared to the Vegas brains, you must understand something.  These brainy geniuses don’t pick every game on the board.  At the Prediction Tracker, we pick every game against the spread.  Some of the multi-millionaires winning in Vegas cannot pick every game and beat 56%.  On a typical week, the top bettors might pick as few as three games and seldom more than nine.  They tend to go with an odd number of games to avoid a .500 outcome which guarantees a loss.  Picking three games and going 2-1 or picking 9 games and going 6-3 on a semi-consistent basis will cause the books to restrict or prohibit these smarts from wagering.

Q12. Why do you withhold basketball ratings until after New Year’s Day?

A12. This isn’t a football question, but six of you have asked this of us.  Our college basketball ratings are based on weighted four factors statistics and strength of schedule.  Until teams have played about 10 games, the statistics don’t mean enough to be viable.  The variance in these stats is much too wide until every team has had 10 games to reduce it.  For instance, if we issued ratings today, Utah would be 10 points ahead of Kentucky as the best team.  When you win by 94 points over a team rated in the bottom 5, it is like beating Michigan State by 10.  Therefore, the ratings need a lot more games to be played before they are worth anything.  Starting in January is the perfect fit, since we have minimal football games remaining.