PiRate Ratings Selections for September 20-24, 2018

Hooray for once.  The PiRate Ratings official picks last week enjoyed a nice winning record, sending the year to date record into positive territory.  It is a small profit, as the return on investment is just 1.92%, but at least it isn’t a red number.  Better yet, our straight picks against the spread or in the totals have a record of 11-6-1 for the season.  It is the exotic picks that have stunk up the joint.  Thus, we will go with just straight picks this week.

Best of all, out special Land Sharps are just torching the books with their selections.  One of the sharps, Buckeye Michelle, has been insane with her picks the last two weeks, and we have received messages from some of our regular subscribers asking for more information about her.  First of all, we are not in the business of matchmaking, so don’t ask.  And, yes, she is an incredibly beautiful 29-year old football fanatic.

One of you actually revealed to us that you know who Stewed Meat is.  Stewed is a real sharp.  Stewed lives in Nevada, and handicapping is Stewed career.  Stewed has shown us something special this week that many people never get the opportunity to see performed–playing the middle against both sides.  We’ll explain more about this at the end.

Here are this week’s PiRate Ratings Selections Against The Spread

Favorite	Underdog	Spread	Pick
Wisconsin	Iowa	3.5	Iowa
Louisiana	Coastal Carolina	4.5	Coastal Carolina
North Carolina St.	Marshall	4.5	North Carolina St.
Maryland	Minnesota	3	Minnesota
Stanford	Oregon	1.5	Stanford
West Virginia	Kansas St.	17	Kansas St.
Chicago	Arizona	7	Arizona
Philadelphia	Indianapolis	6	Philadelphia
Green Bay	Washington	3	Washington

Now for the Land Sharps.  At the present time, this is how each has done so far.

Buckeye Michelle is 9-1 for 90% against the spread and +$790 a 79% ROI

Cal Gal Tiffy is 9-3 for 75% against the spread and +$570 a 47.5% ROI

Friday Dog 13 is 4-2 for 67% against the spread and +$180 a 30% ROI

Stewed Meat is 6-4 for 60% against the spread and +$160 a 16% ROI

Dean 615 is 3-3 for 50% against the spread and -$30 a -5% ROI

If more than one of our expert pickers agree on picking the same game, it must be a strong pick.  You will notice that a couple of games were selected by multiple sharps this week.  You will also notice that a couple of sharps picked against each other.

If you are just tuning in to this feature, the rules are simple.  The 5 participants can select against the margin or going over or under the total for any FBS college football game.  They can select 3, 5,7, or 9 games each week.  We then select the most favorable spread available at oddshark.com.

Here are the Land Sharps Picks For the Week.

Buckeye Michelle

Minnesota +3 vs. Maryland

Kansas St. +17 vs. West Virginia

Wake Forest +8 vs. Notre Dame

Army +32 vs. Oklahoma

Stanford -1.5 vs. Oregon

 

Cal Gal Tiffy

Minnesota +3 vs. Maryland

Kansas St. +17 vs. West Virginia

South Carolina -2 vs. Vanderbilt

North Carolina St. -4.5 vs. Marshall

UTSA -7 vs. Texas St.

 

Friday Dog 13

Penn St. -28 vs. Illinois

North Carolina St. -4.5 vs. Marshall

Virginia -5 vs. Louisville

Clemson -16 vs. Georgia Tech

TCU -3 vs. Texas

 

Stewed Meat

Minnesota +3 vs. Maryland

Kansas St. +17 vs. West Virginia

Iowa +3.5 vs. Wisconsin

Stanford -1.5 vs. Oregon

Louisville +5.5 vs. Virginia

 

Dean 615

Notre Dame -7 vs. Wake Forest

Michigan St. -4.5 vs. Indiana

USC -3.5 vs. Washington St.

Texas +3.5 vs. TCU

Nebraska +18 vs. Michigan

 

Special Look At Stewed Meat’s Real Life Strategy

Stewed is an expert at “Middling”.  In order to be able to do this, Stewed gets access to playing the early line and then immediately plays one side of a game in which Stewed believes the line is off and will move in the opposite direction of which Stewed originally played.  Then, when the line moves in the opposite direction, Stewed plays the other side

Let’s look at an example.  Let’s say Alabama opens as a 14.5 point favorite over Auburn, and Stewed likes Auburn at this number.  So Stewed wagers on Auburn at +14.5.  During the week, a lot of other people believe 14.5 points are too much for Alabama, and they bet the spread down to 11.5.  Now, Stewed wagers on Alabama at -11.5.

On the surface, you might think this is nuts.  Stewed will have a slim chance of the game ending up at 12, 13, or 14 points in Alabama’s favor, giving Stewed two wins.  In most cases, Stewed will win one and lose one and lose $10 for every $100 wagered on both sides.

However, if you look at the 11-10 odds and do a little mathematical calculations, Stewed only needs to have the game come in at the middle of the extremes one time out of 19 in order to turn a profit, plus Stewed has a Margin of Safety in place, because the most Stewed can lose is 10% on the dollar wagered.

Earlier this week, Stewed Wagered on the following games that have seen a significant line change and then wagered on the other team once the line moved in the other direction.

SMU +12.5 vs. Navy

Navy -7 vs. SMU

 

Ball St. Pk vs. Western Kentucky

Western Kentucky +3 vs. Ball St.

 

Alabama -23.5 vs. Texas A&M

Texas A&M +27 vs. Alabama

 

Auburn -24 vs. Arkansas

Arkansas +30 vs. Auburn

If just one of these four games come in with the spread in the middle, Stewed will turn a nice profit.

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PiRate Ratings–College Football Week 4

This Week’s PiRate Rating Spreads

Thursday,	September 20
Home	Visitor	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Temple	Tulsa	8.4	9.6	8.3

 

Friday	September 21
Home	Visitor	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Central Florida	Florida Atlantic	17.3	16.5	16.6
Illinois	Penn St.	-26.8	-23.9	-28.2
USC	Washington St.	2.8	1.8	3.1

 

Saturday	September 22
Home	Visitor	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Iowa St.	Akron	18.5	15.2	17.5
Marshall	North Carolina St.	-16.0	-12.5	-14.4
Massachusetts	Charlotte	10.2	9.7	11.0
Indiana	Michigan St.	-20.5	-18.8	-20.5
Maryland	Minnesota	-2.4	-3.4	-3.3
Ball St.	Western Kentucky	1.6	0.6	-0.2
Purdue	Boston College	-10.2	-9.0	-11.1
Syracuse	Connecticut	33.9	32.3	34.3
Miami (Fla.)	Florida Int’l.	32.4	26.6	31.4
North Carolina	Pittsburgh	0.8	0.0	0.6
Florida St.	Northern Illinois	13.6	11.8	13.0
Bowling Green	Miami (O)	-3.6	-5.3	-4.1
Ohio St.	Tulane	37.3	34.7	38.4
Georgia Tech	Clemson	-18.0	-15.8	-19.2
Cincinnati	Ohio U	1.8	2.2	1.0
South Florida	East Carolina	15.4	18.9	17.0
Wake Forest	Notre Dame	-7.7	-6.4	-8.5
Toledo	Nevada	9.0	10.8	9.1
Virginia	Louisville	4.8	5.2	4.4
Georgia St.	Western Michigan	-11.4	-10.3	-11.3
Rutgers	Buffalo	-2.3	-5.5	-5.7
Oregon St.	Arizona	-10.1	-10.8	-11.6
Oregon	Stanford	-5.6	-3.0	-5.5
Tennessee	Florida	-10.9	-8.8	-12.0
Kentucky	Mississippi St.	-12.1	-10.6	-12.9
Michigan	Nebraska	26.9	27.2	29.8
West Virginia	Kansas St.	9.5	10.0	9.8
Ole Miss	Kent St.	26.5	25.3	28.1
Southern Miss.	Rice	14.9	15.1	16.7
Auburn	Arkansas	24.7	26.1	28.6
Oklahoma St.	Texas Tech	14.7	14.3	16.3
SMU	Navy	-1.6	-5.2	-2.3
Louisiana	Coastal Carolina	3.7	2.6	4.1
Arkansas St.	UNLV	2.6	2.3	3.9
Texas	TCU	0.2	-0.4	0.4
Oklahoma	Army	29.5	27.8	30.2
LSU	Louisiana Tech	23.0	20.4	22.9
Baylor	Kansas	4.4	3.3	5.9
Vanderbilt	South Carolina	-7.1	-5.2	-6.3
Memphis	South Alabama	26.8	27.0	27.3
Utah St.	Air Force	13.2	14.6	15.3
UTEP	New Mexico St.	-3.9	-3.1	-4.5
UTSA	Texas St.	11.1	12.4	12.5
UL-Monroe	Troy	-1.2	-2.9	-2.0
Old Dominion	Virginia Tech	-34.2	-29.7	-34.3
Liberty	North Texas	-17.1	-21.5	-17.8
Missouri	Georgia	-14.7	-12.5	-14.9
Alabama	Texas A&M	28.9	28.0	30.4
Iowa	Wisconsin	0.3	0.6	0.1
Washington	Arizona St.	22.5	21.5	25.4
San Diego St.	Eastern Michigan	10.9	10.1	11.5

 

FBS vs. FCS
Home	Visitor	PiRate
Colorado St.	Illinois St.	10.5
Central Michigan	Maine	5.0
Duke	UNC-Central	49.9
Appalachian St.	Gardner-Webb	40.9
BYU	McNeese St.	19.0
Houston	Texas Southern	45.6
Hawaii	Duquesne	27.1

 

This Week’s PiRate Ratings

PiRate Ratings
#	Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
1	Alabama	139.3	137.2	141.2	139.2
2	Georgia	132.2	128.4	133.6	131.4
3	Clemson	129.8	126.7	130.5	129.0
4	Ohio St.	128.7	126.2	129.3	128.1
5	Washington	126.8	124.4	129.1	126.7
6	Mississippi St.	123.8	121.1	124.4	123.1
7	Oklahoma	122.6	121.3	123.2	122.4
8	Michigan	122.3	121.1	122.8	122.0
9	Penn St.	122.7	119.8	123.2	121.9
10	Michigan St.	122.6	120.3	122.3	121.8
11	Auburn	121.4	120.2	123.6	121.7
12	Stanford	120.0	117.6	120.5	119.4
13	Notre Dame	119.4	115.8	117.8	117.6
14	Miami	117.9	116.3	117.7	117.3
15	Boston College	118.2	115.3	118.4	117.3
16	Virginia Tech	116.5	116.0	116.4	116.3
17	Wisconsin	117.0	114.3	116.6	116.0
18	Oklahoma St.	116.4	114.6	116.7	115.9
19	Duke	115.6	113.2	115.2	114.7
20	L S U	114.1	114.0	115.2	114.4
21	Missouri	114.5	113.0	115.7	114.4
22	T C U	114.2	113.3	113.2	113.5
23	Boise St.	113.5	112.7	113.9	113.4
24	Iowa	114.3	111.9	113.7	113.3
25	N. Carolina St.	113.6	113.0	113.2	113.3
26	Texas A&M	113.4	112.2	113.8	113.1
27	Central Florida	113.0	112.8	113.1	113.0
28	S. Carolina	112.3	111.1	111.7	111.7
29	Oregon	111.4	111.5	112.1	111.7
30	West Virginia	112.0	111.2	111.4	111.5
31	Utah	111.1	109.3	112.0	110.8
32	Texas	111.4	109.9	110.6	110.6
33	Florida	110.8	109.1	111.1	110.3
34	Fresno St.	110.0	108.3	109.9	109.4
35	Iowa State	110.0	108.0	109.3	109.1
36	Georgia Tech	109.3	108.3	108.7	108.8
37	Washington St.	109.1	108.2	108.0	108.4
38	Northwestern	109.1	107.2	108.9	108.4
39	California	109.4	106.6	109.0	108.3
40	Kentucky	108.8	107.6	108.5	108.3
41	Syracuse	109.0	107.6	108.1	108.2
42	U S C	108.9	107.0	108.1	108.0
43	Wake Forest	108.7	106.4	106.3	107.1
44	Arizona St.	107.3	105.9	106.6	106.6
45	Minnesota	106.7	106.2	106.6	106.5
46	Memphis	105.0	107.3	106.3	106.2
47	Florida St.	105.8	104.9	105.1	105.2
48	Kansas St.	105.5	104.1	104.5	104.7
49	Utah St.	103.5	105.0	105.1	104.5
50	Purdue	105.0	103.3	104.3	104.2
51	Ole Miss	104.0	103.7	104.8	104.1
52	Texas Tech	104.7	103.2	103.4	103.8
53	Vanderbilt	102.6	103.4	102.9	103.0
54	BYU	102.2	102.8	102.9	102.6
55	N. Texas	101.4	104.1	102.2	102.5
56	Houston	102.1	102.9	102.3	102.4
57	Colorado	101.1	102.7	102.4	102.1
58	Pittsburgh	102.3	102.0	101.7	102.0
59	Virginia	102.2	102.7	101.1	102.0
60	Baylor	102.3	100.1	101.7	101.4
61	San Diego St.	100.2	100.7	101.4	100.7
62	Arizona	101.2	99.5	101.1	100.6
63	Maryland	101.2	99.8	100.3	100.4
64	Louisville	100.4	100.4	99.8	100.2
65	N. Carolina	100.6	99.5	99.8	100.0
66	Kansas	100.9	99.8	98.9	99.9
67	South Florida	98.3	101.0	99.0	99.4
68	Indiana	99.1	98.5	98.8	98.8
69	Florida Atlantic	98.3	98.8	99.0	98.7
70	Arkansas	99.7	97.0	98.0	98.2
71	Temple	97.2	97.2	97.6	97.3
72	Toledo	96.6	98.3	96.5	97.1
73	Nebraska	98.4	96.9	96.0	97.1
74	Tennessee	96.9	97.3	96.1	96.8
75	Buffalo	95.4	97.7	96.7	96.6
76	Wyoming	96.6	96.5	96.4	96.5
77	Navy	95.5	98.3	95.2	96.4
78	Army	96.1	96.5	96.0	96.2
79	Marshall	94.6	97.5	95.8	96.0
80	Northern Illinois	95.3	96.0	95.1	95.5
81	Appalachian St.	94.5	96.0	95.8	95.4
82	U C L A	96.2	96.0	93.2	95.1
83	Akron	94.4	95.8	94.8	95.0
84	Louisiana Tech	93.6	96.1	94.8	94.8
85	Ohio U	93.9	95.1	94.7	94.6
86	Tulane	94.3	94.6	93.9	94.3
87	Cincinnati	93.2	94.8	93.2	93.7
88	Air Force	93.3	93.4	92.8	93.2
89	Eastern Michigan	92.3	93.6	92.9	92.9
90	Illinois	93.0	92.9	92.0	92.6
91	Troy	90.9	92.2	92.3	91.8
92	Western Michigan	90.9	92.5	91.7	91.7
93	Tulsa	91.3	90.1	91.8	91.1
94	Nevada	91.1	90.9	90.9	91.0
95	SMU	91.5	90.6	90.4	90.8
96	U N L V	90.0	91.6	90.5	90.7
97	Arkansas St.	89.6	91.0	91.4	90.7
98	Miami (O)	89.0	90.7	89.7	89.8
99	U A B	88.9	91.1	89.1	89.7
100	Middle Tennessee	89.0	90.2	89.9	89.7
101	Rutgers	90.5	89.6	88.6	89.6
102	Florida Int’l.	87.5	91.8	88.3	89.2
103	New Mexico	86.9	88.8	87.2	87.6
104	Georgia Southern	86.3	87.7	86.6	86.9
105	UL-Monroe	86.7	86.2	87.3	86.8
106	Oregon St.	88.0	85.7	86.5	86.7
107	East Carolina	85.9	85.1	85.0	85.3
108	Central Michigan	84.0	86.7	84.4	85.0
109	W. Kentucky	83.1	86.3	84.2	84.5
110	Massachusetts	83.2	85.2	84.4	84.3
111	Colo. State	84.0	84.8	83.9	84.2
112	Southern Miss.	82.5	85.7	83.0	83.8
113	Bowling Green	83.4	83.4	83.6	83.5
114	Ball St.	82.1	84.5	81.6	82.7
115	South Alabama	81.2	83.3	82.0	82.2
116	U T S A	79.4	83.8	80.2	81.2
117	Old Dominion	79.8	83.8	79.6	81.1
118	Hawaii	80.6	82.9	79.4	81.0
119	Liberty	81.2	79.5	81.4	80.7
120	Kent St.	80.4	81.4	79.6	80.5
121	Louisiana	79.5	81.4	80.5	80.5
122	Coastal Carolina	78.8	81.8	79.4	80.0
123	Georgia St.	77.1	79.7	77.9	78.2
124	San Jose St.	78.5	79.3	76.7	78.2
125	Connecticut	78.1	78.3	76.8	77.7
126	Charlotte	75.0	77.5	75.3	75.9
127	N. Mexico St.	74.7	76.9	74.6	75.4
128	Texas State	70.8	73.9	70.2	71.6
129	Rice	70.6	73.6	69.3	71.2
130	U T E P	68.8	71.8	68.2	69.6

 

PiRate Rating By Conference

American Athletic Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	AAC	Overall
Central Florida	113.0	112.8	113.1	113.0	1-0	2-0
South Florida	98.3	101.0	99.0	99.4	0-0	3-0
Temple	97.2	97.2	97.6	97.3	0-0	1-2
Cincinnati	93.2	94.8	93.2	93.7	0-0	3-0
East Carolina	85.9	85.1	85.0	85.3	0-0	1-1
Connecticut	78.1	78.3	76.8	77.7	0-1	1-2
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	AAC	Overall
Memphis	105.0	107.3	106.3	106.2	0-1	2-1
Houston	102.1	102.9	102.3	102.4	0-0	2-1
Navy	95.5	98.3	95.2	96.4	1-0	2-1
Tulane	94.3	94.6	93.9	94.3	0-0	1-2
Tulsa	91.3	90.1	91.8	91.1	0-0	1-2
SMU	91.5	90.6	90.4	90.8	0-0	0-3
AAC Averages	95.5	96.1	95.4	95.6
Atlantic Coast Conference
Atlantic Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	ACC	Overall
Clemson	129.8	126.7	130.5	129.0	0-0	3-0
Boston College	118.2	115.3	118.4	117.3	1-0	3-0
N. Carolina St.	113.6	113.0	113.2	113.3	0-0	2-0
Syracuse	109.0	107.6	108.1	108.2	1-0	3-0
Wake Forest	108.7	106.4	106.3	107.1	0-1	2-1
Florida St.	105.8	104.9	105.1	105.2	0-2	1-2
Louisville	100.4	100.4	99.8	100.2	0-0	2-1
Coastal Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	ACC	Overall
Miami	117.9	116.3	117.7	117.3	0-0	2-1
Virginia Tech	116.5	116.0	116.4	116.3	1-0	2-0
Duke	115.6	113.2	115.2	114.7	0-0	3-0
Georgia Tech	109.3	108.3	108.7	108.8	0-1	1-2
Pittsburgh	102.3	102.0	101.7	102.0	1-0	2-1
Virginia	102.2	102.7	101.1	102.0	0-0	2-1
N. Carolina	100.6	99.5	99.8	100.0	0-0	0-2
ACC Averages	110.7	109.5	110.2	110.1
Big 12 Conference
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	B12	Overall
Oklahoma	122.6	121.3	123.2	122.4	1-0	3-0
Oklahoma St.	116.4	114.6	116.7	115.9	0-0	3-0
T C U	114.2	113.3	113.2	113.5	0-0	2-1
West Virginia	112.0	111.2	111.4	111.5	0-0	2-0
Texas	111.4	109.9	110.6	110.6	0-0	2-1
Iowa State	110.0	108.0	109.3	109.1	0-1	0-2
Kansas St.	105.5	104.1	104.5	104.7	0-0	2-1
Texas Tech	104.7	103.2	103.4	103.8	0-0	2-1
Baylor	102.3	100.1	101.7	101.4	0-0	2-1
Kansas	100.9	99.8	98.9	99.9	0-0	2-1
Big 12 Averages	110.0	108.5	109.3	109.3
Big Ten Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	BTen	Overall
Ohio St.	128.7	126.2	129.3	128.1	1-0	3-0
Michigan	122.3	121.1	122.8	122.0	0-0	2-1
Penn St.	122.7	119.8	123.2	121.9	0-0	3-0
Michigan St.	122.6	120.3	122.3	121.8	0-0	1-1
Maryland	101.2	99.8	100.3	100.4	0-0	2-1
Indiana	99.1	98.5	98.8	98.8	0-0	3-0
Rutgers	90.5	89.6	88.6	89.6	0-1	1-2
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	BTen	Overall
Wisconsin	117.0	114.3	116.6	116.0	0-0	2-1
Iowa	114.3	111.9	113.7	113.3	0-0	3-0
Northwestern	109.1	107.2	108.9	108.4	1-0	1-2
Minnesota	106.7	106.2	106.6	106.5	0-0	3-0
Purdue	105.0	103.3	104.3	104.2	0-1	0-3
Nebraska	98.4	96.9	96.0	97.1	0-0	0-2
Illinois	93.0	92.9	92.0	92.6	0-0	2-1
Big Ten Averages	109.3	107.7	108.8	108.6
Conference USA
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	CUSA	Overall
Florida Atlantic	98.3	98.8	99.0	98.7	0-0	2-1
Marshall	94.6	97.5	95.8	96.0	0-0	2-0
Middle Tennessee	89.0	90.2	89.9	89.7	0-0	1-2
Florida Int’l.	87.5	91.8	88.3	89.2	1-0	2-1
W. Kentucky	83.1	86.3	84.2	84.5	0-0	0-3
Old Dominion	79.8	83.8	79.6	81.1	0-2	0-3
Charlotte	75.0	77.5	75.3	75.9	1-0	2-1
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	CUSA	Overall
N. Texas	101.4	104.1	102.2	102.5	0-0	3-0
Louisiana Tech	93.6	96.1	94.8	94.8	0-0	2-0
U A B	88.9	91.1	89.1	89.7	0-0	2-1
Southern Miss.	82.5	85.7	83.0	83.8	0-0	1-1
U T S A	79.4	83.8	80.2	81.2	0-0	0-3
Rice	70.6	73.6	69.3	71.2	0-0	1-2
U T E P	68.8	71.8	68.2	69.6	0-0	0-3
CUSA Averages	85.2	88.0	85.7	86.3
FBS Independents
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	Conf.	Overall
Notre Dame	119.4	115.8	117.8	117.6	x	3-0
BYU	102.2	102.8	102.9	102.6	x	2-1
Army	96.1	96.5	96.0	96.2	x	2-1
Massachusetts	83.2	85.2	84.4	84.3	x	1-3
Liberty	81.2	79.5	81.4	80.7	x	1-1
N. Mexico St.	74.7	76.9	74.6	75.4	x	0-4
Indep. Averages	92.8	92.8	92.9	92.8
Mid-American Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	MAC	Overall
Buffalo	95.4	97.7	96.7	96.6	1-0	3-0
Akron	94.4	95.8	94.8	95.0	0-0	2-0
Ohio U	93.9	95.1	94.7	94.6	0-0	1-1
Miami (O)	89.0	90.7	89.7	89.8	0-0	0-3
Bowling Green	83.4	83.4	83.6	83.5	0-0	1-2
Kent St.	80.4	81.4	79.6	80.5	0-0	1-2
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	MAC	Overall
Toledo	96.6	98.3	96.5	97.1	0-0	1-1
Northern Illinois	95.3	96.0	95.1	95.5	1-0	1-2
Eastern Michigan	92.3	93.6	92.9	92.9	0-1	2-1
Western Michigan	90.9	92.5	91.7	91.7	0-0	1-2
Central Michigan	84.0	86.7	84.4	85.0	0-1	0-3
Ball St.	82.1	84.5	81.6	82.7	0-0	1-2
MAC Averages	89.8	91.3	90.1	90.4
Mountain West Conference
Mountain Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	MWC	Overall
Boise St.	113.5	112.7	113.9	113.4	0-0	2-1
Utah St.	103.5	105.0	105.1	104.5	0-0	2-1
Wyoming	96.6	96.5	96.4	96.5	0-0	2-2
Air Force	93.3	93.4	92.8	93.2	0-0	1-1
New Mexico	86.9	88.8	87.2	87.6	0-0	2-1
Colo. State	84.0	84.8	83.9	84.2	0-1	1-3
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	MWC	Overall
Fresno St.	110.0	108.3	109.9	109.4	0-0	2-1
San Diego St.	100.2	100.7	101.4	100.7	0-0	2-1
Nevada	91.1	90.9	90.9	91.0	0-0	2-1
U N L V	90.0	91.6	90.5	90.7	0-0	2-1
Hawaii	80.6	82.9	79.4	81.0	1-0	3-1
San Jose St.	78.5	79.3	76.7	78.2	0-0	0-3
MWC Averages	94.0	94.6	94.0	94.2
Pac-12 Conference
North Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	P12	Overall
Washington	126.8	124.4	129.1	126.7	1-0	2-1
Stanford	120.0	117.6	120.5	119.4	1-0	3-0
Oregon	111.4	111.5	112.1	111.7	0-0	3-0
Washington St.	109.1	108.2	108.0	108.4	0-0	3-0
California	109.4	106.6	109.0	108.3	0-0	3-0
Oregon St.	88.0	85.7	86.5	86.7	0-0	1-2
South Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	P12	Overall
Utah	111.1	109.3	112.0	110.8	0-1	2-1
U S C	108.9	107.0	108.1	108.0	0-1	1-2
Arizona St.	107.3	105.9	106.6	106.6	0-0	2-1
Colorado	101.1	102.7	102.4	102.1	0-0	3-0
Arizona	101.2	99.5	101.1	100.6	0-0	1-2
U C L A	96.2	96.0	93.2	95.1	0-0	0-3
Pac-12 Averages	107.5	106.2	107.4	107.0
Southeastern Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	SEC	Overall
Georgia	132.2	128.4	133.6	131.4	1-0	3-0
Missouri	114.5	113.0	115.7	114.4	0-0	3-0
S. Carolina	112.3	111.1	111.7	111.7	0-1	1-1
Florida	110.8	109.1	111.1	110.3	0-1	2-1
Kentucky	108.8	107.6	108.5	108.3	1-0	3-0
Vanderbilt	102.6	103.4	102.9	103.0	0-0	2-1
Tennessee	96.9	97.3	96.1	96.8	0-0	2-1
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	SEC	Overall
Alabama	139.3	137.2	141.2	139.2	1-0	3-0
Mississippi St.	123.8	121.1	124.4	123.1	0-0	3-0
Auburn	121.4	120.2	123.6	121.7	0-1	2-1
L S U	114.1	114.0	115.2	114.4	1-0	3-0
Texas A&M	113.4	112.2	113.8	113.1	0-0	2-1
Ole Miss	104.0	103.7	104.8	104.1	0-1	2-1
Arkansas	99.7	97.0	98.0	98.2	0-0	1-2
SEC Averages	113.8	112.5	114.3	113.6
Sunbelt Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	SBC	Overall
Appalachian St.	94.5	96.0	95.8	95.4	0-0	1-1
Troy	90.9	92.2	92.3	91.8	0-0	2-1
Georgia Southern	86.3	87.7	86.6	86.9	0-0	2-1
Coastal Carolina	78.8	81.8	79.4	80.0	0-0	2-1
Georgia St.	77.1	79.7	77.9	78.2	0-0	1-2
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	SBC	Overall
Arkansas St.	89.6	91.0	91.4	90.7	0-0	2-1
UL-Monroe	86.7	86.2	87.3	86.8	0-0	2-1
South Alabama	81.2	83.3	82.0	82.2	1-0	1-2
Louisiana	79.5	81.4	80.5	80.5	0-0	1-1
Texas State	70.8	73.9	70.2	71.6	0-1	1-2
Sun Belt Averages	83.5	85.3	84.3	84.4

 

PiRate Ratings By Conference
#	League	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
1	SEC	113.8	112.5	114.3	113.6
2	ACC	110.7	109.5	110.2	110.1
3	B12	110.0	108.5	109.3	109.3
4	BTEN	109.3	107.7	108.8	108.6
5	P-12	107.5	106.2	107.4	107.0
6	AAC	95.5	96.1	95.4	95.6
7	MWC	94.0	94.6	94.0	94.2
8	IND	92.8	92.8	92.9	92.8
9	MAC	89.8	91.3	90.1	90.4
10	CUSA	85.2	88.0	85.7	86.3
11	SUN	83.5	85.3	84.3	84.4

This Week’s Top 5 Group of 5 Teams

1. South Florida
2. Central Florida
3. North Texas
4. Cincinnati
5. Buffalo

 

This Week’s Playoff and Bowl Projections

Bowl	Conferences		Team 1	Team 2
New Mexico	MWC	CUSA	San Diego St.	[Northern Illinois]
Cure	AAC	SBC	Central Florida	Appalachian St.
Las Vegas	MWC	Pac-12	Fresno St.	Arizona St.
Camellia	MAC	SBC	Akron	Georgia Southern
New Orleans	CUSA	SBC	UAB	UL-Monroe
Boca Raton	MAC	CUSA	Marshall	Western Michigan
Frisco	AAC	MAC	[Utah]	Toledo
Gasparilla	AAC	CUSA	South Florida	Florida Atlantic
Bahamas	AAC	CUSA	Houston	Florida Int’l.
Idaho Potato	MAC	MWC	Buffalo	Utah St.
Birmingham	AAC	SEC	Memphis	Vanderbilt
Armed Forces	AAC	Big 12	Navy	[BYU]
Dollar General	MAC	SBC	Ohio U	Troy
Hawaii	CUSA	MWC	Louisiana Tech	Hawaii
Heart of Dallas	Big Ten	CUSA	[Army]	Southern Miss.
Quick Lane	ACC	Big Ten	Wake Forest	Indiana
Cactus	Big 12	Pac-12	Texas Tech	California
Independence	ACC	SEC	Virginia	[Coastal Carolina]
Pinstripe	ACC	Big Ten	Boston College	Wisconsin
Texas	Big 12	SEC	Iowa St.	South Carolina
Music City	ACC/Big Ten	SEC	Duke	Missouri
Camping World	ACC	Big 12	Notre Dame	West Virginia
Arizona	MWC	SBC	Boise St.	Arkansas St.
Alamo	Big 12	Pac-12	TCU	Washington
Belk	ACC	SEC	North Carolina St.	Auburn
Peach	At-large	At-large	Virginia Tech	Oklahoma St.
Military	AAC	ACC	Cincinnati	Pittsburgh
Sun	ACC	Pac-12	Syracuse	Colorado
San Francisco	Big Ten	Pac-12	Minnesota	USC
Liberty	Big 12	SEC	Texas	Kentucky
Holiday	Big Ten	Pac-12	Iowa	Stanford
Gator	ACC/Big Ten	SEC	Michigan	Florida
Outback	Big Ten	SEC	Michigan St.	LSU
Fiesta	At-large	At-large	Oregon	North Texas
Citrus	ACC/Big Ten	SEC	Miami (Fla.)	Texas A&M
Rose	Big Ten	Pac-12	Ohio St.	Washington St.
Sugar	Big 12	SEC	Oklahoma	Mississippi St.
PLAYOFFS
Cotton	FBS	PLAYOFF	Penn St.	Georgia
Orange	FBS	PLAYOFF	Alabama	Clemson
Champ. Game		Winners	Alabama	Georgia
Teams in [Brackets] are at-large selections

Sweet 16 Games on TV This Week

All times given are Eastern Daylight

Friday Night

Washington State at USC  10:30 PM  on ESPN

USC has dropped consecutive road games, the most previous not being all that close.  With a true freshman quarterback and his top receiver also being a true freshman, can the Trojans score enough points against the Air Raid offense of the Pirate, Mike Leach.

Washington State is 3-0 but has yet to face strong competition, but if the Cougars can win this game, they become a contender for the Pac-12 North Division title.

Saturday
12:00 Noon

Georgia at Missouri  ESPN

Georgia should win this game by playing smashmouth football against a Missouri defense that just gave up a lot of points and yards against Purdue.  However, the Tigers may have overlooked an 0-2 team.  Still, Georgia looks invincible at least until they travel to the Bayou later in the season.

Minnesota at Maryland  BTN

All of a sudden, the Big Ten West looks open for more than one team.  Minnesota is a silent 3-0, and a win in College Park could find the Gophers ranked and in contention for the division flag.

Maryland’s win over Texas would have meant a lot more had they not gotten their Terrapin shell handed to them by lowly Temple.  The Terps must win this game to have any chance at becoming bowl eligible.

Notre Dame at Wake Forest ABC

Notre Dame is a very soft 3-0, and they have played all three games at home.  This will be the Irish’s first road game and first ACC opponent of the season.  They play at a Wake Forest team that made a valiant comeback that came up a bit short against Boston College.  Notre Dame must go 12-0 or 11-1 with a lot of help to have any chance of making the playoffs.

3:30 PM

Clemson at Georgia Tech ABC

We are not going to tell you that this game should be close, but…..

Clemson has not really fired on all cylinders yet.  It can be hard to play two separate offensive game plans every week, and the two quarterback system may prove to be a liability at some point.

The Tigers have been upset both of the last two years in conference play.  We don’t expect this to be one of those games, but we are anxious to see how CU uses their two QBs in conference play.

Georgia Tech’s multiple option offense should be forced into more passing situations against the top defensive front in the nation, but should Clemson’s offense not sustain a good number of drives, the Tigers may give up some points in the second half.

Kansas St. at West Virginia ESPN

West Virginia missed Saturday’s game, and so far teams that had games cancelled have not been all that sharp.  They face a Kansas State team that is going to need to pick up an upset or two to reach bowl eligibility this year.  The Mountaineers need to pick up a statement win in conference play to strike fear in the Oklahoma’s, Oklahoma State’s, and TCU’s.

Texas A&M at Alabama CBS

This week, the Crimson Tide have done something that has not been done in 17 years.  At the end of the 2001 season, National Champion Miami of Florida rated 9.6 points ahead of #2 Oregon.  Alabama is the first team since to be more than a touchdown ahead of the number two team in our ratings.

At this point, we’re not sure the Buffalo Bills could beat Alabama at New Era Field in the snow.  Alabama looked as good if not better than the 1995 Nebraska team that won the national championship with ease.

What makes this game so inviting is that Texas A&M played Clemson a couple weeks ago.  In that game, the Aggies looked like they belonged on the same field with a top 10 team.  If Alabama makes this another laugher, that will tell us all just how far ahead of another potential playoff team they have advanced.

TCU at Texas Fox

These teams don’t particularly care much for each other, and with TCU coming into this game with doubts, while the Longhorns are sky high, it should be quite interesting.  Prior last Saturday, TCU looked like a cinch to win this game according to the ratings.  After the ‘Horns clobbered USC and TCU blew up in a four-minute stretch against Ohio State, this game becomes a toss-up in the ratings.

What’s up for grabs in this game is a chance to become a key contender for the number two spot in the conference standings, which in the Big 12 will get you in the Conference Championship Game.

4 PM

South Carolina at Vanderbilt SEC

South Carolina is another team that had a game cancelled unexpectedly due to the weather.  They have not played since Georgia mutilated them in Columbia.  At this point, the Gamecocks are playing for a Citrus Bowl bid, as Georgia is not going to lose two conference games.

Vanderbilt did everything but outscore Notre Dame in South Bend, Saturday.  The Commodores outgained the Irish by 40 yards, but they suffered a loss of at least 11 points due not being able to hang onto the ball.  If the Commodores can come out with a chip on their shoulders, this can be a close game that could be decided in the final minutes.  However, as long time Commodore fans know, Vanderbilt has been known to come out flat and not show up the week after they experienced a moral victory.

7 PM

Florida at Tennessee ESPN

The winner of this game will earn a bowl bid this year.  That’s more than enough to make a game important, but this is the first chance for two new coaches to get the upper hand over their rival in this big rivalry game.

Tennessee’s defense has looked strong the last two weeks against an FCS team and the #130 FBS team.  How will they look against a better than average SEC offense?  Better yet, if you can only score 24 points at home against UTEP, how are you going to score enough to beat the Gators?

Mississippi St. at Kentucky ESPN2

One of these two teams will be 4-0 after this game, almost assuredly ranked in the top 25, and a serious contender for the Citrus or even Sugar Bowl should Alabama and Georgia both make the playoffs.

The win over Florida in Gainesville is looking mighty good for the Wildcats, while Mississippi State looked a lot like Penn State in their last two games, which shouldn’t surprise many people that know that Coach Joe Moorhead was the offensive coordinator in Happy Valley.

Texas Tech at Oklahoma St. FS1

After getting pasted by Ole Miss in week one, Texas Tech coach Kliff Kingsbury was square in the middle of a hot seat in Lubbock.  The 63-point showing in a win over Houston has cooled the seat a bit, but the Red Raiders have an uphill climb to find four more wins and get bowl eligible.  Anything short of a bowl bid would most likely be the end of the Kingsbury era.

Oklahoma State looked like a playoff contender in their comfortable win over Boise State.  The Cowboys look like the top contender to their rival Sooners in the Big 12, and if they slow down the Red Raiders and hold them to 28 points or less, while winning by double digits, OSU could move on to a 9-0 start when they go to Norman in November.

 

7:30 PM

Michigan St. at Indiana BTN

Michigan State has been a major disappointment to start this season.  The Spartans had the most experience returning in FBS football this year, off a team that won 10 games last year.  A much closer than expected opening win over Utah State was followed by a loss at Arizona State.  After a week off, they now find themselves travelling into a potential ambush in Bloomington.

Indiana is 3-0 for the first time since 2015 and just the second time in the last nine seasons.  The Hoosiers look like a potential bowl eligible squad, and they basically need to pull off one conference upset to get to 3-6 in the league and guarantee six wins.  Their rebuilt defense is looking strong enough to keep them in this game, and if MSU hasn’t snapped out of their funk, the Hoosiers could surprise and move to 4-0.  The last three times IU began 4-0, they made it to a bowl game.

8:00 PM

Stanford at Oregon ABC

This may be the top game of the weekend.  The winner of this game will be the co-contender with Washington and possibly Washington State for the Pac-12 North flag.  Neither team has been exceptionally strong so far, and Stanford’s win over USC lost a lot of its oomph when USC was clobbered by Texas.  The key to this game may be the health of Bryce Love.  Love did not play against UC-Davis after rushing for 136 yards against USC.  Last year, he torched Oregon with 147 yards and two touchdowns.

Oregon’s defense against the run has looked solid this year, while the Ducks’ passing game behind Justin Herbert has been spectacular at times.  The Ducks have had this game circled on their schedule since Spring practice.  The Cardinal have embarrassed the Ducks with consecutive slaughters the last two seasons, and the Ducks will be inspired to shut down Stanford’s running game and force the Cardinal out of their game plan.

8:30 PM

Wisconsin at Iowa Fox

If Wisconsin continues to look lifeless on offense for 20 minutes per game, the Badgers are not going to win the Big Ten West.  They are in a precarious position having to come to Iowa City for a prime time game, where the Hawkeyes enjoy an incredible home field advantage.

Iowa rarely puts up flashy offensive yardage numbers.  But, when you limit opponents to 42 rushing yards and 209 total yards per game, you can win by scoring 24 points and gaining 380 total yards.  They gang tackle and rarely let an opponent get many yards after contact.

10:30 PM

Arizona St. at Washington ESPN

The late game on ESPN is usually exciting, because it involves two teams with wide open offenses from the West Coast.  Also, frequently, these teams cannot play a lot of defense.  This mold was broken Saturday night, when in Washington’s win over Utah in Salt Lake City, the Huskies looked more like their 1959 and 1960 teams that went 10-1.  UW gained just 330 yards and gave up 261 to the Utes.

Arizona State did nothing on the ground against San Diego State, and if the Sun Devils don’t correct this Saturday night, they will get pasted in Seattle.  The ASU passing game cannot pass for 300 yards against the Huskies’ secondary, so if UW can limit ASU’s running game, this could be another one of those 1960-style defensive victories.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

PiRate Ratings–College Football Week 3

This Week’s PiRate Rating Spreads

Thursday,	September 13
Home	Visitor	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Wake Forest	Boston College	-6.6	-5.7	-9.3

 

Friday	September 14
Home	Visitor	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Memphis	Georgia St.	29.4	28.6	29.4

 

Saturday	September 15
Home	Visitor	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Tennessee	UTEP	31.7	28.9	31.8
Indiana	Ball St.	16.8	13.2	16.6
Maryland	Temple	15.9	14.3	14.8
Florida Int’l.	Massachusetts	-2.0	0.7	-2.7
Toledo	Miami (Fla.)	-17.1	-13.1	-16.6
Army	Hawaii	20.9	19.0	22.6
Penn St.	Kent St.	42.6	38.1	43.4
North Carolina	Central Florida	-9.3	-10.2	-10.2
Charlotte	Old Dominion	-4.0	-6.0	-3.9
Syracuse	Florida St.	0.5	-0.4	-0.3
Iowa St.	Oklahoma	-9.6	-10.3	-10.9
Nebraska	Troy	13.5	10.4	9.3
Kansas	Rutgers	3.3	3.1	3.2
Virginia Tech	East Carolina	33.5	33.8	34.3
Pittsburgh	Georgia Tech	-6.6	-5.9	-7.0
Notre Dame	Vanderbilt	22.1	17.4	20.3
Virginia	Ohio U	9.9	8.8	7.1
Michigan	SMU	35.4	35.3	37.8
Appalachian St.	Southern Miss.	14.8	13.1	15.6
Oklahoma St.	Boise St.	0.4	-1.0	-0.5
Wisconsin	BYU	25.2	21.6	24.3
North Carolina St.	West Virginia	4.6	4.9	4.8
Minnesota	Miami (O)	20.5	17.7	19.3
Auburn	LSU	13.4	11.8	15.3
Illinois	South Florida	-1.7	-5.1	-3.8
Northern Illinois	Central Michigan	15.6	13.4	15.4
Clemson	Georgia Southern	48.6	44.0	48.9
New Mexico St.	New Mexico	-8.7	-8.0	-8.3
UAB	Tulane	-5.5	-3.2	-4.9
Baylor	Duke	-9.8	-9.6	-9.8
Florida	Colorado St.	28.6	25.0	28.6
Texas Tech	Houston	3.6	0.6	1.0
Kansas St.	UTSA	29.8	23.4	28.0
Arkansas	North Texas	12.0	6.3	9.5
Oregon	San Jose St.	41.4	40.7	43.9
Buffalo	Eastern Michigan	5.3	6.4	5.9
Nevada	Oregon St.	6.5	9.3	8.2
Ole Miss	Alabama	-23.4	-21.5	-24.4
Tulsa	Arkansas St.	7.6	4.6	6.5
South Alabama	Texas St.	13.7	12.6	15.4
Georgia	Middle Tennessee	45.6	39.6	46.0
South Carolina	Marshall	20.5	16.5	18.7
Purdue	Missouri	-7.4	-7.5	-10.0
Northwestern	Akron	25.6	21.8	25.4
Mississippi St.	Louisiana	46.8	41.6	46.4
Texas A&M	UL-Monroe	28.8	27.9	28.3
Louisville	Western Kentucky	23.3	19.7	21.5
Texas	USC	-0.4	-0.2	-0.8
TCU	Ohio St.	-11.5	-9.4	-13.1
Utah	Washington	-12.5	-11.6	-14.1
UCLA	Fresno St.	-6.2	-4.8	-8.3
San Diego St.	Arizona St.	-7.1	-5.0	-5.3

 

FBS vs. FCS
Home	Visitor	PiRate
Utah St.	Tennessee Tech	38.6
Kentucky	Murray St.	36.1
Connecticut	Rhode Island	10.2
Stanford	UC-Davis	36.9
Navy	Lehigh	29.8
Wyoming	Wofford	17.5
Bowling Green	Eastern Kentucky	13.5
Colorado	New Hampshire	30.3
California	Idaho St.	32.1
Liberty	Norfolk St.	18.5
Florida Atlantic	Bethune-Cookman	38.5
Coastal Carolina	Campbell	17.7
Cincinnati	Alabama A&M	36.0
Western Michigan	Delaware St.	39.7
Iowa	Northern Iowa	32.2
Washington St.	Eastern Wash.	23.7
UNLV	Prairie-View	21.2
Arizona	Southern Utah	24.3

 

This Week’s PiRate Ratings

PiRate Ratings
#	Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
1	Alabama	133.8	131.7	135.7	133.7
2	Georgia	131.9	127.6	133.3	130.9
3	Clemson	130.8	127.7	131.5	130.0
4	Ohio St.	128.7	125.9	129.3	128.0
5	Washington	126.7	124.2	129.1	126.6
6	Auburn	123.2	121.8	125.8	123.6
7	Mississippi St.	123.8	120.8	124.4	123.0
8	Michigan	123.1	122.0	124.0	123.0
9	Oklahoma	122.6	121.3	123.2	122.4
10	Michigan St.	122.3	120.0	122.0	121.5
11	Penn St.	121.2	118.0	121.5	120.2
12	Wisconsin	121.2	118.3	120.9	120.1
13	Stanford	120.5	118.1	121.0	119.9
14	Notre Dame	120.7	116.9	119.1	118.9
15	Boston College	118.2	115.2	118.5	117.3
16	Miami	117.3	115.3	116.9	116.5
17	Boise St.	116.4	115.8	117.2	116.5
18	Virginia Tech	116.2	115.7	116.1	116.0
19	Missouri	115.2	113.7	116.8	115.2
20	Oregon	114.5	114.6	115.2	114.8
21	Duke	115.2	112.7	114.7	114.2
22	T C U	114.2	113.6	113.2	113.6
23	Iowa	114.2	111.8	113.6	113.2
24	Oklahoma St.	113.8	111.8	113.7	113.1
25	L S U	112.8	112.9	113.5	113.1
26	N. Carolina St.	113.3	112.7	112.9	113.0
27	Central Florida	112.7	112.5	112.8	112.7
28	Texas A&M	113.0	111.7	113.2	112.6
29	Northwestern	112.9	110.8	112.9	112.2
30	S. Carolina	112.0	110.8	111.4	111.4
31	U S C	112.1	110.3	111.5	111.3
32	West Virginia	111.7	110.9	111.1	111.2
33	Utah	111.2	109.5	112.0	110.9
34	Georgia Tech	110.6	109.6	110.2	110.2
35	Florida	110.2	108.0	110.3	109.5
36	Iowa State	110.0	108.0	109.3	109.1
37	California	109.7	106.9	109.3	108.6
38	Florida St.	109.0	108.3	108.6	108.6
39	Kentucky	108.7	107.5	108.4	108.2
40	Washington St.	108.8	107.9	107.7	108.1
41	Arizona St.	108.8	107.3	108.1	108.1
42	Texas	108.7	107.1	107.7	107.8
43	Ole Miss	107.5	107.2	108.3	107.6
44	Fresno St.	107.9	106.3	107.4	107.2
45	Wake Forest	108.7	106.5	106.2	107.1
46	Minnesota	106.6	105.8	106.3	106.2
47	Syracuse	106.5	104.9	105.3	105.6
48	Memphis	104.2	106.3	105.3	105.3
49	Maryland	105.9	104.4	105.1	105.1
50	Kansas St.	106.0	104.3	105.0	105.1
51	Purdue	104.8	103.1	103.7	103.9
52	Houston	103.1	104.3	103.8	103.7
53	Utah St.	102.5	104.0	104.1	103.5
54	Arkansas	104.9	102.0	103.2	103.4
55	Louisville	102.9	102.7	102.3	102.6
56	Texas Tech	103.7	101.8	101.9	102.5
57	Colorado	101.1	102.7	102.4	102.1
58	Vanderbilt	101.5	102.5	101.8	102.0
59	Baylor	102.4	100.2	101.9	101.5
60	Virginia	101.5	101.8	99.9	101.1
61	Pittsburgh	101.0	100.7	100.2	100.7
62	Arizona	101.0	99.3	100.9	100.4
63	N. Carolina	100.4	99.3	99.6	99.8
64	BYU	99.0	99.8	99.6	99.4
65	Florida Atlantic	99.0	99.5	99.7	99.4
66	South Florida	98.0	101.0	98.9	99.3
67	San Diego St.	98.7	99.3	99.9	99.3
68	Nebraska	100.1	98.4	97.5	98.6
69	Toledo	97.2	99.3	97.3	97.9
70	U C L A	98.8	98.5	96.2	97.8
71	Indiana	98.0	97.1	97.5	97.5
72	Wyoming	97.4	97.3	97.2	97.3
73	N. Texas	95.9	98.8	96.7	97.1
74	Tennessee	97.2	97.5	96.5	97.1
75	Army	96.3	96.7	96.5	96.5
76	Buffalo	95.3	97.6	96.5	96.5
77	Navy	95.5	98.3	95.2	96.4
78	Northern Illinois	96.1	96.7	96.1	96.3
79	Marshall	94.4	97.3	95.6	95.8
80	Tulane	95.6	95.7	95.2	95.5
81	Ohio U	94.6	96.0	95.9	95.5
82	Appalachian St.	94.2	95.7	95.5	95.1
83	Kansas	96.1	95.0	94.1	95.1
84	Rutgers	95.8	94.9	93.9	94.9
85	Louisiana Tech	93.4	95.9	94.6	94.6
86	Eastern Michigan	92.4	93.7	93.1	93.1
87	Air Force	93.0	93.1	92.5	92.9
88	Illinois	93.3	92.9	92.1	92.8
89	Tulsa	93.0	91.6	93.6	92.7
90	Temple	92.5	92.6	92.8	92.6
91	Cincinnati	92.0	93.6	92.0	92.5
92	Nevada	91.3	91.4	91.3	91.3
93	Akron	90.3	91.9	90.5	90.9
94	Western Michigan	89.9	91.5	90.7	90.7
95	Troy	89.5	91.0	91.1	90.5
96	U N L V	89.5	91.1	90.0	90.2
97	Middle Tennessee	89.3	91.0	90.2	90.2
98	Miami (O)	89.1	91.1	90.0	90.1
99	SMU	90.7	89.7	89.2	89.9
100	Massachusetts	88.2	90.0	89.6	89.3
101	Arkansas St.	87.9	89.5	89.6	89.0
102	U A B	87.6	90.0	87.8	88.5
103	UL-Monroe	87.1	86.7	87.9	87.3
104	New Mexico	86.4	88.1	86.3	86.9
105	Oregon St.	87.8	85.2	86.1	86.4
106	Georgia Southern	85.3	86.7	85.6	85.9
107	East Carolina	85.7	84.9	84.8	85.1
108	Colo. State	84.6	85.9	84.7	85.1
109	Florida Int’l.	83.2	87.7	83.8	84.9
110	Central Michigan	83.5	86.3	83.7	84.5
111	Ball St.	83.2	85.9	82.9	84.0
112	Bowling Green	83.7	83.7	83.9	83.8
113	Southern Miss.	82.3	85.5	82.8	83.6
114	W. Kentucky	81.6	85.0	82.7	83.1
115	Old Dominion	81.0	85.2	81.0	82.4
116	South Alabama	81.3	83.4	82.3	82.3
117	Kent St.	81.6	82.9	81.0	81.8
118	U T S A	79.2	83.9	80.0	81.1
119	Louisiana	79.5	81.7	80.5	80.6
120	Liberty	81.0	79.3	81.2	80.5
121	Hawaii	79.9	82.2	78.4	80.2
122	Coastal Carolina	78.5	81.5	79.1	79.7
123	Georgia St.	77.9	80.7	78.9	79.2
124	Connecticut	78.5	78.7	77.2	78.1
125	N. Mexico St.	75.7	78.1	76.0	76.6
126	San Jose St.	76.1	76.9	74.3	75.8
127	Charlotte	74.5	76.8	74.6	75.3
128	Texas State	70.7	73.8	69.9	71.5
129	Rice	70.4	73.4	69.1	71.0
130	U T E P	68.5	71.6	67.8	69.3

 

PiRate Ratings By Conference

American Athletic Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	AAC	Overall
Central Florida	112.7	112.5	112.8	112.7	1-0	2-0
South Florida	98.0	101.0	98.9	99.3	0-0	2-0
Temple	92.5	92.6	92.8	92.6	0-0	0-2
Cincinnati	92.0	93.6	92.0	92.5	0-0	2-0
East Carolina	85.7	84.9	84.8	85.1	0-0	1-1
Connecticut	78.5	78.7	77.2	78.1	0-1	0-2
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	AAC	Overall
Memphis	104.2	106.3	105.3	105.3	0-1	1-1
Houston	103.1	104.3	103.8	103.7	0-0	2-0
Navy	95.5	98.3	95.2	96.4	1-0	1-1
Tulane	95.6	95.7	95.2	95.5	0-0	1-1
Tulsa	93.0	91.6	93.6	92.7	0-0	1-1
SMU	90.7	89.7	89.2	89.9	0-0	0-2
AAC Averages	95.1	95.7	95.1	95.3
Atlantic Coast Conference
Atlantic Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	ACC	Overall
Clemson	130.8	127.7	131.5	130.0	0-0	2-0
Boston College	118.2	115.2	118.5	117.3	0-0	2-0
N. Carolina St.	113.3	112.7	112.9	113.0	0-0	2-0
Florida St.	109.0	108.3	108.6	108.6	0-1	1-1
Wake Forest	108.7	106.5	106.2	107.1	0-0	2-0
Syracuse	106.5	104.9	105.3	105.6	0-0	2-0
Louisville	102.9	102.7	102.3	102.6	0-0	1-1
Coastal Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	ACC	Overall
Miami	117.3	115.3	116.9	116.5	0-0	1-1
Virginia Tech	116.2	115.7	116.1	116.0	1-0	2-0
Duke	115.2	112.7	114.7	114.2	0-0	2-0
Georgia Tech	110.6	109.6	110.2	110.2	0-0	1-1
Virginia	101.5	101.8	99.9	101.1	0-0	1-1
Pittsburgh	101.0	100.7	100.2	100.7	0-0	1-1
N. Carolina	100.4	99.3	99.6	99.8	0-0	0-2
ACC Averages	110.8	109.5	110.2	110.2
Big 12 Conference
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	B12	Overall
Oklahoma	122.6	121.3	123.2	122.4	0-0	2-0
T C U	114.2	113.6	113.2	113.6	0-0	2-0
Oklahoma St.	113.8	111.8	113.7	113.1	0-0	2-0
West Virginia	111.7	110.9	111.1	111.2	0-0	2-0
Iowa State	110.0	108.0	109.3	109.1	0-0	0-1
Texas	108.7	107.1	107.7	107.8	0-0	1-1
Kansas St.	106.0	104.3	105.0	105.1	0-0	1-1
Texas Tech	103.7	101.8	101.9	102.5	0-0	1-1
Baylor	102.4	100.2	101.9	101.5	0-0	2-0
Kansas	96.1	95.0	94.1	95.1	0-0	1-1
Big 12 Averages	108.9	107.4	108.1	108.1
Big Ten Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	BTen	Overall
Ohio St.	128.7	125.9	129.3	128.0	1-0	2-0
Michigan	123.1	122.0	124.0	123.0	0-0	1-1
Michigan St.	122.3	120.0	122.0	121.5	0-0	1-1
Penn St.	121.2	118.0	121.5	120.2	0-0	2-0
Maryland	105.9	104.4	105.1	105.1	0-0	2-0
Indiana	98.0	97.1	97.5	97.5	0-0	2-0
Rutgers	95.8	94.9	93.9	94.9	0-1	1-1
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	BTen	Overall
Wisconsin	121.2	118.3	120.9	120.1	0-0	2-0
Iowa	114.2	111.8	113.6	113.2	0-0	2-0
Northwestern	112.9	110.8	112.9	112.2	1-0	1-1
Minnesota	106.6	105.8	106.3	106.2	0-0	2-0
Purdue	104.8	103.1	103.7	103.9	0-1	0-2
Nebraska	100.1	98.4	97.5	98.6	0-0	0-1
Illinois	93.3	92.9	92.1	92.8	0-0	2-0
Big Ten Averages	110.6	108.8	110.0	109.8
Conference USA
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	CUSA	Overall
Florida Atlantic	99.0	99.5	99.7	99.4	0-0	1-1
Marshall	94.4	97.3	95.6	95.8	0-0	2-0
Middle Tennessee	89.3	91.0	90.2	90.2	0-0	1-1
Florida Int’l.	83.2	87.7	83.8	84.9	1-0	1-1
W. Kentucky	81.6	85.0	82.7	83.1	0-0	0-2
Old Dominion	81.0	85.2	81.0	82.4	0-1	0-2
Charlotte	74.5	76.8	74.6	75.3	0-0	1-1
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	CUSA	Overall
N. Texas	95.9	98.8	96.7	97.1	0-0	2-0
Louisiana Tech	93.4	95.9	94.6	94.6	0-0	2-0
U A B	87.6	90.0	87.8	88.5	0-0	1-1
Southern Miss.	82.3	85.5	82.8	83.6	0-0	1-1
U T S A	79.2	83.9	80.0	81.1	0-0	0-2
Rice	70.4	73.4	69.1	71.0	0-0	1-2
U T E P	68.5	71.6	67.8	69.3	0-0	0-2
CUSA Averages	84.3	87.3	84.8	85.4
FBS Independents
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	Conf.	Overall
Notre Dame	120.7	116.9	119.1	118.9	x	2-0
BYU	99.0	99.8	99.6	99.4	x	1-1
Army	96.3	96.7	96.5	96.5	x	1-1
Massachusetts	88.2	90.0	89.6	89.3	x	1-2
Liberty	81.0	79.3	81.2	80.5	x	1-1
N. Mexico St.	75.7	78.1	76.0	76.6	x	0-3
Ind. Averages	93.5	93.5	93.7	93.5
Mid-American Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	MAC	Overall
Buffalo	95.3	97.6	96.5	96.5	0-0	2-0
Ohio U	94.6	96.0	95.9	95.5	0-0	1-0
Akron	90.3	91.9	90.5	90.9	0-0	1-0
Miami (O)	89.1	91.1	90.0	90.1	0-0	0-2
Bowling Green	83.7	83.7	83.9	83.8	0-0	0-2
Kent St.	81.6	82.9	81.0	81.8	0-0	1-1
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	MAC	Overall
Toledo	97.2	99.3	97.3	97.9	0-0	1-0
Northern Illinois	96.1	96.7	96.1	96.3	0-0	0-2
Eastern Michigan	92.4	93.7	93.1	93.1	0-0	2-0
Western Michigan	89.9	91.5	90.7	90.7	0-0	0-2
Central Michigan	83.5	86.3	83.7	84.5	0-0	0-2
Ball St.	83.2	85.9	82.9	84.0	0-0	1-1
MAC Averages	89.8	91.4	90.1	90.4
Mountain West Conference
Mountain Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	MWC	Overall
Boise St.	116.4	115.8	117.2	116.5	0-0	2-0
Utah St.	102.5	104.0	104.1	103.5	0-0	1-1
Wyoming	97.4	97.3	97.2	97.3	0-0	1-2
Air Force	93.0	93.1	92.5	92.9	0-0	1-1
New Mexico	86.4	88.1	86.3	86.9	0-0	1-1
Colo. State	84.6	85.9	84.7	85.1	0-1	1-2
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	MWC	Overall
Fresno St.	107.9	106.3	107.4	107.2	0-0	1-1
San Diego St.	98.7	99.3	99.9	99.3	0-0	1-1
Nevada	91.3	91.4	91.3	91.3	0-0	1-1
U N L V	89.5	91.1	90.0	90.2	0-0	1-1
Hawaii	79.9	82.2	78.4	80.2	1-0	3-0
San Jose St.	76.1	76.9	74.3	75.8	0-0	0-2
MWC Averages	93.6	94.3	93.6	93.8
Pac-12 Conference
North Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	P12	Overall
Washington	126.7	124.2	129.1	126.6	0-0	1-1
Stanford	120.5	118.1	121.0	119.9	1-0	2-0
Oregon	114.5	114.6	115.2	114.8	0-0	2-0
California	109.7	106.9	109.3	108.6	0-0	2-0
Washington St.	108.8	107.9	107.7	108.1	0-0	2-0
Oregon St.	87.8	85.2	86.1	86.4	0-0	1-1
South Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	P12	Overall
U S C	112.1	110.3	111.5	111.3	0-1	1-1
Utah	111.2	109.5	112.0	110.9	0-0	2-0
Arizona St.	108.8	107.3	108.1	108.1	0-0	2-0
Colorado	101.1	102.7	102.4	102.1	0-0	2-0
Arizona	101.0	99.3	100.9	100.4	0-0	0-2
U C L A	98.8	98.5	96.2	97.8	0-0	0-2
Pac-12 Averages	108.4	107.0	108.3	107.9
Southeastern Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	SEC	Overall
Georgia	131.9	127.6	133.3	130.9	1-0	2-0
Missouri	115.2	113.7	116.8	115.2	0-0	2-0
S. Carolina	112.0	110.8	111.4	111.4	0-1	1-1
Florida	110.2	108.0	110.3	109.5	0-1	1-1
Kentucky	108.7	107.5	108.4	108.2	1-0	2-0
Vanderbilt	101.5	102.5	101.8	102.0	0-0	2-0
Tennessee	97.2	97.5	96.5	97.1	0-0	1-1
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	SEC	Overall
Alabama	133.8	131.7	135.7	133.7	0-0	2-0
Auburn	123.2	121.8	125.8	123.6	0-0	2-0
Mississippi St.	123.8	120.8	124.4	123.0	0-0	2-0
L S U	112.8	112.9	113.5	113.1	0-0	2-0
Texas A&M	113.0	111.7	113.2	112.6	0-0	1-1
Ole Miss	107.5	107.2	108.3	107.6	0-0	2-0
Arkansas	104.9	102.0	103.2	103.4	0-0	1-1
SEC Averages	114.0	112.5	114.5	113.7
Sunbelt Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	SBC	Overall
Appalachian St.	94.2	95.7	95.5	95.1	0-0	1-1
Troy	89.5	91.0	91.1	90.5	0-0	1-1
Georgia Southern	85.3	86.7	85.6	85.9	0-0	2-0
Coastal Carolina	78.5	81.5	79.1	79.7	0-0	1-1
Georgia St.	77.9	80.7	78.9	79.2	0-0	1-1
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	SBC	Overall
Arkansas St.	87.9	89.5	89.6	89.0	0-0	1-1
UL-Monroe	87.1	86.7	87.9	87.3	0-0	2-0
South Alabama	81.3	83.4	82.3	82.3	0-0	0-2
Louisiana	79.5	81.7	80.5	80.6	0-0	1-0
Texas State	70.7	73.8	69.9	71.5	0-0	1-1
Sun Belt Averages	83.2	85.1	84.0	84.1

 

Conference Ratings

#	League	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
1	SEC	114.0	112.5	114.5	113.7
2	ACC	110.8	109.5	110.2	110.2
3	BTEN	110.6	108.8	110.0	109.8
4	B12	108.9	107.4	108.1	108.1
5	P-12	108.4	107.0	108.3	107.9
6	AAC	95.1	95.7	95.1	95.3
7	MWC	93.6	94.3	93.6	93.8
8	IND	93.5	93.5	93.7	93.5
9	MAC	89.8	91.4	90.1	90.4
10	CUSA	84.3	87.3	84.8	85.4
11	SUN	83.2	85.1	84.0	84.1

This Week’s Playoff and Bowl Projections

Bowl	Conferences		Team 1	Team 2
New Mexico	MWC	CUSA	Utah St.	Southern Miss.
Cure	AAC	SBC	Central Florida	Appalachian St.
Las Vegas	MWC	Pac-12	Fresno St.	Colorado
Camellia	MAC	SBC	Buffalo	Troy
New Orleans	CUSA	SBC	Louisiana Tech	UL-Monroe
Boca Raton	MAC	CUSA	Toledo	Marshall
Frisco	AAC	MAC	Tulsa	Western Michigan
Gasparilla	AAC	CUSA	South Florida	Florida Atlantic
Bahamas	AAC	CUSA	Houston	North Texas
Idaho Potato	MAC	MWC	Eastern Michigan	UNLV
Birmingham	AAC	SEC	Memphis	[Virginia]
Armed Forces	AAC	Big 12	Navy	[California]
Dollar General	MAC	SBC	Ohio U	Louisiana
Hawaii	CUSA	MWC	Florida Int’l.	Hawaii
Heart of Dallas	Big Ten	CUSA	[BYU]	Middle Tennessee
Quick Lane	ACC	Big Ten	Louisville	Indiana
Cactus	Big 12	Pac-12	[Army]	Arizona St.
Independence	ACC	SEC	Georgia Tech	[UAB]
Pinstripe	ACC	Big Ten	Duke	Maryland
Texas	Big 12	SEC	[Utah]	Texas A&M
Music City	ACC/Big Ten	SEC	North Carolina St.	Missouri
Camping World	ACC	Big 12	Notre Dame	Iowa St.
Arizona	MWC	SBC	San Diego St.	Arkansas St.
Alamo	Big 12	Pac-12	Oklahoma St.	Washington
Belk	ACC	SEC	Boston College	South Carolina
Peach	At-large	At-large	West Virginia	Virginia Tech
Military	AAC	ACC	Cincinnati	Syracuse
Sun	ACC	Pac-12	Miami (Fla.)	Washington St.
San Francisco	Big Ten	Pac-12	Iowa	Oregon
Liberty	Big 12	SEC	[Georgia Southern]	Kentucky
Holiday	Big Ten	Pac-12	Michigan	USC
Gator	ACC/Big Ten	SEC	Wisconsin	Florida
Outback	Big Ten	SEC	Minnesota	LSU
Fiesta	At-large	At-large	Boise St.	TCU
Citrus	ACC/Big Ten	SEC	Michigan St.	Mississippi St.
Rose	Big Ten	Pac-12	Penn St.	Stanford
Sugar	Big 12	SEC	Oklahoma	Auburn
FBS PLAYOFFS
Cotton	FBS	PLAYOFF	Alabama	Ohio St.
Orange	FBS	PLAYOFF	Clemson	Georgia
Championship	Semifinal	Winners	Alabama	Georgia
Teams in [Brackets] are at-large selections

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

PiRate Ratings–College Football Week 2

This Week’s PiRate Ratings

#	Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
1	Alabama	133.5	131.2	135.4	133.4
2	Clemson	131.9	128.6	132.8	131.1
3	Georgia	131.1	126.5	132.6	130.0
4	Washington	126.9	124.4	129.3	126.8
5	Ohio St.	126.2	123.5	126.8	125.5
6	Michigan St.	124.7	122.4	124.8	124.0
7	Notre Dame	125.7	121.9	124.1	123.9
8	Auburn	123.2	121.8	125.8	123.6
9	Oklahoma	122.5	121.1	123.1	122.2
10	Mississippi St.	122.8	119.5	123.0	121.8
11	Michigan	121.6	120.2	122.3	121.3
12	Wisconsin	121.7	118.6	121.7	120.7
13	Stanford	120.1	117.5	120.7	119.4
14	Boston College	118.1	115.1	118.4	117.2
15	Miami	117.1	115.1	116.7	116.3
16	Virginia Tech	116.1	115.6	116.0	115.9
17	Penn St.	116.7	113.5	117.0	115.7
18	Oregon	114.5	114.6	115.2	114.8
19	Missouri	114.6	112.9	116.2	114.5
20	Northwestern	114.8	112.8	115.2	114.3
21	Boise St.	113.3	112.8	114.3	113.5
22	N. Carolina St.	113.6	112.8	113.4	113.3
23	L S U	112.8	112.9	113.5	113.1
24	Central Florida	113.0	112.8	113.1	113.0
25	Florida	113.4	111.1	113.8	112.7
26	Iowa	113.7	111.2	112.9	112.6
27	T C U	112.9	112.2	111.7	112.2
28	Oklahoma St.	113.2	110.8	112.7	112.2
29	Duke	113.3	110.7	112.4	112.2
30	Georgia Tech	112.5	111.2	112.1	112.0
31	S. Carolina	112.3	111.4	111.6	111.8
32	U S C	112.3	110.7	111.6	111.5
33	Utah	111.5	109.5	112.4	111.2
34	West Virginia	111.6	110.8	111.0	111.1
35	Texas A&M	111.2	110.1	111.2	110.8
36	Iowa State	110.5	108.6	110.0	109.7
37	Florida St.	109.7	109.0	109.3	109.3
38	Texas	109.8	108.3	108.9	109.0
39	California	110.0	107.2	109.6	108.9
40	Ole Miss	107.8	107.5	108.6	107.9
41	Washington St.	108.6	107.7	107.5	107.9
42	Fresno St.	108.5	106.9	108.2	107.9
43	Arkansas	109.4	106.5	107.7	107.9
44	Wake Forest	108.7	106.5	106.2	107.1
45	Purdue	107.9	106.1	106.8	106.9
46	Memphis	105.2	107.3	106.7	106.4
47	Kansas St.	106.8	105.4	106.2	106.1
48	Arizona St.	106.7	105.2	105.6	105.8
49	Minnesota	106.0	105.2	105.5	105.6
50	Kentucky	106.0	104.9	105.4	105.4
51	Arizona	106.1	104.1	106.0	105.4
52	Syracuse	106.3	104.7	105.1	105.4
53	Pittsburgh	105.5	105.2	104.7	105.2
54	N. Carolina	105.3	104.3	104.7	104.8
55	Maryland	104.6	102.8	103.4	103.6
56	Louisville	103.6	103.4	103.0	103.3
57	Texas Tech	103.2	101.3	101.4	102.0
58	Baylor	102.7	100.4	102.1	101.7
59	Colorado	100.6	102.3	102.0	101.6
60	Virginia	101.9	102.4	100.3	101.5
61	Utah St.	100.3	101.5	101.9	101.2
62	Houston	99.1	100.6	99.8	99.8
63	Florida Atlantic	99.3	99.9	100.3	99.8
64	Vanderbilt	99.1	100.1	99.2	99.5
65	San Diego St.	98.9	99.5	100.1	99.5
66	BYU	99.0	99.8	99.6	99.4
67	Nebraska	100.3	98.5	97.6	98.8
68	U C L A	98.9	98.7	96.3	97.9
69	Wyoming	98.0	98.1	97.8	97.9
70	Toledo	97.0	99.1	97.1	97.7
71	South Florida	95.8	99.1	96.7	97.2
72	Rutgers	98.1	97.1	96.2	97.1
73	Indiana	97.6	96.5	97.1	97.1
74	N. Texas	95.8	98.7	96.6	97.0
75	Tennessee	96.9	97.2	96.2	96.8
76	Marshall	94.7	97.6	95.9	96.1
77	Northern Illinois	95.8	96.7	95.7	96.1
78	Army	95.6	96.1	95.5	95.8
79	Buffalo	94.5	96.9	95.6	95.7
80	Tulane	95.5	95.6	95.1	95.4
81	Ohio U	94.4	95.8	95.7	95.3
82	Navy	94.5	97.3	93.8	95.2
83	Louisiana Tech	93.3	95.8	94.5	94.5
84	Nevada	93.7	93.8	93.9	93.8
85	Temple	93.3	93.3	93.7	93.4
86	U A B	91.8	94.3	92.2	92.8
87	Air Force	92.7	92.7	91.9	92.4
88	Western Michigan	91.4	93.3	92.4	92.4
89	Illinois	92.9	92.5	91.7	92.4
90	Miami (O)	91.1	93.4	92.5	92.3
91	Appalachian St.	91.5	92.8	92.8	92.3
92	Kansas	93.5	91.9	91.2	92.2
93	Massachusetts	90.5	92.5	92.3	91.8
94	Tulsa	91.9	90.4	92.4	91.6
95	SMU	92.0	91.1	90.7	91.3
96	Akron	90.3	91.9	90.5	90.9
97	Eastern Michigan	89.6	91.0	90.3	90.3
98	Troy	89.2	90.7	90.8	90.2
99	Middle Tennessee	89.1	90.8	90.0	90.0
100	U N L V	89.3	90.8	89.8	90.0
101	Cincinnati	89.7	91.0	89.2	89.9
102	Arkansas St.	88.0	89.8	89.7	89.2
103	UL-Monroe	87.1	86.5	87.9	87.2
104	Central Michigan	85.6	88.9	86.1	86.9
105	New Mexico	85.9	87.8	85.5	86.4
106	Oregon St.	87.4	84.8	85.7	86.0
107	Bowling Green	85.0	85.3	85.6	85.3
108	Florida Int’l.	82.2	86.6	82.8	83.9
109	W. Kentucky	82.3	85.7	83.4	83.8
110	Southern Miss.	82.3	85.7	82.8	83.6
111	Old Dominion	82.0	86.3	82.0	83.5
112	South Alabama	81.9	84.4	83.3	83.2
113	Georgia Southern	82.7	83.9	82.6	83.1
114	East Carolina	82.3	81.4	81.2	81.6
115	Connecticut	81.9	82.0	80.4	81.4
116	Liberty	81.7	79.9	82.2	81.3
117	Colo. State	80.6	81.9	80.7	81.1
118	Kent St.	80.8	82.1	80.2	81.0
119	U T S A	78.9	83.7	79.8	80.8
120	Louisiana	79.3	81.5	80.3	80.4
121	Hawaii	79.8	82.0	78.3	80.0
122	N. Mexico St.	78.9	81.6	79.2	79.9
123	Ball St.	78.2	80.9	77.9	79.0
124	Georgia St.	77.6	80.6	78.4	78.9
125	Charlotte	76.7	79.2	76.8	77.6
126	San Jose St.	76.3	77.1	74.5	76.0
127	Coastal Carolina	73.8	76.7	74.2	74.9
128	Texas State	70.7	73.8	69.9	71.5
129	Rice	70.5	73.6	69.2	71.1
130	U T E P	68.7	71.9	68.0	69.5

PiRate Ratings By Conference

American Athletic Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	AAC	Overall
Central Florida	113.0	112.8	113.1	113.0	1-0	1-0
South Florida	95.8	99.1	96.7	97.2	0-0	1-0
Temple	93.3	93.3	93.7	93.4	0-0	0-1
Cincinnati	89.7	91.0	89.2	89.9	0-0	1-0
East Carolina	82.3	81.4	81.2	81.6	0-0	0-1
Connecticut	81.9	82.0	80.4	81.4	0-1	0-1
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	AAC	Overall
Memphis	105.2	107.3	106.7	106.4	0-0	1-0
Houston	99.1	100.6	99.8	99.8	0-0	1-0
Tulane	95.5	95.6	95.1	95.4	0-0	0-1
Navy	94.5	97.3	93.8	95.2	0-0	0-1
Tulsa	91.9	90.4	92.4	91.6	0-0	1-0
SMU	92.0	91.1	90.7	91.3	0-0	0-1
AAC Averages	94.5	95.1	94.4	94.7
Atlantic Coast Conference
Atlantic Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	ACC	Overall
Clemson	131.9	128.6	132.8	131.1	0-0	1-0
Boston College	118.1	115.1	118.4	117.2	0-0	1-0
N. Carolina St.	113.6	112.8	113.4	113.3	0-0	1-0
Florida St.	109.7	109.0	109.3	109.3	0-1	0-1
Wake Forest	108.7	106.5	106.2	107.1	0-0	1-0
Syracuse	106.3	104.7	105.1	105.4	0-0	1-0
Louisville	103.6	103.4	103.0	103.3	0-0	0-1
Coastal Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	ACC	Overall
Miami	117.1	115.1	116.7	116.3	0-0	0-1
Virginia Tech	116.1	115.6	116.0	115.9	1-0	1-0
Duke	113.3	110.7	112.4	112.2	0-0	1-0
Georgia Tech	112.5	111.2	112.1	112.0	0-0	1-0
Pittsburgh	105.5	105.2	104.7	105.2	0-0	1-0
N. Carolina	105.3	104.3	104.7	104.8	0-0	0-1
Virginia	101.9	102.4	100.3	101.5	0-0	1-0
ACC Averages	111.7	110.3	111.1	111.0
Big 12 Conference
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	B12	Overall
Oklahoma	122.5	121.1	123.1	122.2	0-0	1-0
T C U	112.9	112.2	111.7	112.2	0-0	1-0
Oklahoma St.	113.2	110.8	112.7	112.2	0-0	1-0
West Virginia	111.6	110.8	111.0	111.1	0-0	1-0
Iowa State	110.5	108.6	110.0	109.7	0-0	0-0
Texas	109.8	108.3	108.9	109.0	0-0	0-1
Kansas St.	106.8	105.4	106.2	106.1	0-0	1-0
Texas Tech	103.2	101.3	101.4	102.0	0-0	0-1
Baylor	102.7	100.4	102.1	101.7	0-0	1-0
Kansas	93.5	91.9	91.2	92.2	0-0	0-1
Big 12 Averages	108.7	107.1	107.8	107.9
Big Ten Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	BTen	Overall
Ohio St.	126.2	123.5	126.8	125.5	0-0	1-0
Michigan St.	124.7	122.4	124.8	124.0	0-0	1-0
Michigan	121.6	120.2	122.3	121.3	0-0	0-1
Penn St.	116.7	113.5	117.0	115.7	0-0	1-0
Maryland	104.6	102.8	103.4	103.6	0-0	1-0
Rutgers	98.1	97.1	96.2	97.1	0-0	1-0
Indiana	97.6	96.5	97.1	97.1	0-0	1-0
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	BTen	Overall
Wisconsin	121.7	118.6	121.7	120.7	0-0	1-0
Northwestern	114.8	112.8	115.2	114.3	1-0	1-0
Iowa	113.7	111.2	112.9	112.6	0-0	1-0
Purdue	107.9	106.1	106.8	106.9	0-1	0-1
Minnesota	106.0	105.2	105.5	105.6	0-0	1-0
Nebraska	100.3	98.5	97.6	98.8	0-0	0-0
Illinois	92.9	92.5	91.7	92.4	0-0	1-0
Big Ten Averages	110.5	108.6	109.9	109.7
Conference USA
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	CUSA	Overall
Florida Atlantic	99.3	99.9	100.3	99.8	0-0	0-1
Marshall	94.7	97.6	95.9	96.1	0-0	1-0
Middle Tennessee	89.1	90.8	90.0	90.0	0-0	0-1
Florida Int’l.	82.2	86.6	82.8	83.9	0-0	0-1
W. Kentucky	82.3	85.7	83.4	83.8	0-0	0-1
Old Dominion	82.0	86.3	82.0	83.5	0-0	0-1
Charlotte	76.7	79.2	76.8	77.6	0-0	1-0
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	CUSA	Overall
N. Texas	95.8	98.7	96.6	97.0	0-0	1-0
Louisiana Tech	93.3	95.8	94.5	94.5	0-0	1-0
U A B	91.8	94.3	92.2	92.8	0-0	1-0
Southern Miss.	82.3	85.7	82.8	83.6	0-0	1-0
U T S A	78.9	83.7	79.8	80.8	0-0	0-1
Rice	70.5	73.6	69.2	71.1	0-0	1-1
U T E P	68.7	71.9	68.0	69.5	0-0	0-1
CUSA Averages	84.8	87.8	85.3	86.0
FBS Independents
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	Conf.	Overall
Notre Dame	125.7	121.9	124.1	123.9	x	1-0
BYU	99.0	99.8	99.6	99.4	x	1-0
Army	95.6	96.1	95.5	95.8	x	0-1
Massachusetts	90.5	92.5	92.3	91.8	x	1-1
Liberty	81.7	79.9	82.2	81.3	x	1-0
N. Mexico St.	78.9	81.6	79.2	79.9	x	0-2
Indep.  Averages	95.2	95.3	95.5	95.3
Mid-American Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	MAC	Overall
Buffalo	94.5	96.9	95.6	95.7	0-0	1-0
Ohio U	94.4	95.8	95.7	95.3	0-0	1-0
Miami (O)	91.1	93.4	92.5	92.3	0-0	0-1
Akron	90.3	91.9	90.5	90.9	0-0	0-0
Bowling Green	85.0	85.3	85.6	85.3	0-0	0-1
Kent St.	80.8	82.1	80.2	81.0	0-0	0-1
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	MAC	Overall
Toledo	97.0	99.1	97.1	97.7	0-0	1-0
Northern Illinois	95.8	96.7	95.7	96.1	0-0	0-1
Western Michigan	91.4	93.3	92.4	92.4	0-0	0-1
Eastern Michigan	89.6	91.0	90.3	90.3	0-0	1-0
Central Michigan	85.6	88.9	86.1	86.9	0-0	0-1
Ball St.	78.2	80.9	77.9	79.0	0-0	1-0
MAC Averages	89.5	91.3	90.0	90.2
Mountain West Conference
Mountain Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	MWC	Overall
Boise St.	113.3	112.8	114.3	113.5	0-0	1-0
Utah St.	100.3	101.5	101.9	101.2	0-0	0-1
Wyoming	98.0	98.1	97.8	97.9	0-0	1-1
Air Force	92.7	92.7	91.9	92.4	0-0	1-0
New Mexico	85.9	87.8	85.5	86.4	0-0	1-0
Colo. State	80.6	81.9	80.7	81.1	0-1	0-2
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	MWC	Overall
Fresno St.	108.5	106.9	108.2	107.9	0-0	1-0
San Diego St.	98.9	99.5	100.1	99.5	0-0	0-1
Nevada	93.7	93.8	93.9	93.8	0-0	1-0
U N L V	89.3	90.8	89.8	90.0	0-0	0-1
Hawaii	79.8	82.0	78.3	80.0	1-0	2-0
San Jose St.	76.3	77.1	74.5	76.0	0-0	0-1
MWC Averages	93.1	93.7	93.1	93.3
Pac-12 Conference
North Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	P12	Overall
Washington	126.9	124.4	129.3	126.8	0-0	0-1
Stanford	120.1	117.5	120.7	119.4	0-0	1-0
Oregon	114.5	114.6	115.2	114.8	0-0	1-0
California	110.0	107.2	109.6	108.9	0-0	1-0
Washington St.	108.6	107.7	107.5	107.9	0-0	1-0
Oregon St.	87.4	84.8	85.7	86.0	0-0	0-1
South Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	P12	Overall
U S C	112.3	110.7	111.6	111.5	0-0	1-0
Utah	111.5	109.5	112.4	111.2	0-0	1-0
Arizona St.	106.7	105.2	105.6	105.8	0-0	1-0
Arizona	106.1	104.1	106.0	105.4	0-0	0-1
Colorado	100.6	102.3	102.0	101.6	0-0	1-0
U C L A	98.9	98.7	96.3	97.9	0-0	0-1
Pac-12 Averages	108.6	107.2	108.5	108.1
Southeastern Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	SEC	Overall
Georgia	131.1	126.5	132.6	130.0	0-0	1-0
Missouri	114.6	112.9	116.2	114.5	0-0	1-0
Florida	113.4	111.1	113.8	112.7	0-0	1-0
S. Carolina	112.3	111.4	111.6	111.8	0-0	1-0
Kentucky	106.0	104.9	105.4	105.4	0-0	1-0
Vanderbilt	99.1	100.1	99.2	99.5	0-0	1-0
Tennessee	96.9	97.2	96.2	96.8	0-0	0-1
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	SEC	Overall
Alabama	133.5	131.2	135.4	133.4	0-0	1-0
Auburn	123.2	121.8	125.8	123.6	0-0	1-0
Mississippi St.	122.8	119.5	123.0	121.8	0-0	1-0
L S U	112.8	112.9	113.5	113.1	0-0	1-0
Texas A&M	111.2	110.1	111.2	110.8	0-0	1-0
Ole Miss	107.8	107.5	108.6	107.9	0-0	1-0
Arkansas	109.4	106.5	107.7	107.9	0-0	1-0
SEC Averages	113.9	112.4	114.3	113.5
Sunbelt Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	SBC	Overall
Appalachian St.	91.5	92.8	92.8	92.3	0-0	0-1
Troy	89.2	90.7	90.8	90.2	0-0	0-1
Georgia Southern	82.7	83.9	82.6	83.1	0-0	1-0
Georgia St.	77.6	80.6	78.4	78.9	0-0	1-0
Coastal Carolina	73.8	76.7	74.2	74.9	0-0	0-1
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	SBC	Overall
Arkansas St.	88.0	89.8	89.7	89.2	0-0	1-0
UL-Monroe	87.1	86.5	87.9	87.2	0-0	1-0
South Alabama	81.9	84.4	83.3	83.2	0-0	0-1
Louisiana	79.3	81.5	80.3	80.4	0-0	1-0
Texas State	70.7	73.8	69.9	71.5	0-0	0-1
Sun Belt Averages	82.2	84.1	83.0	83.1

Conference Ratings

PiRate Ratings By Conference
#	League	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
1	SEC	113.9	112.4	114.3	113.5
2	ACC	111.7	110.3	111.1	111.0
3	BTEN	110.5	108.6	109.9	109.7
4	P-12	108.6	107.2	108.5	108.1
5	B12	108.7	107.1	107.8	107.9
6	IND	95.2	95.3	95.5	95.3
7	AAC	94.5	95.1	94.4	94.7
8	MWC	93.1	93.7	93.1	93.3
9	MAC	89.5	91.3	90.0	90.2
10	CUSA	84.8	87.8	85.3	86.0
11	SBC	82.2	84.1	83.0	83.1

This Week’s PiRate Ratings’ Spreads

Friday	September 7
Home	Visitor	PiRate	Mean	Bias
SMU	TCU	-19.4	-19.5	-19.5

Saturday	September 8
Home	Visitor	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Army	Liberty	16.4	18.7	15.8
Coastal Carolina	UAB	-15.5	-15.1	-15.6
South Florida	Georgia Tech	-13.7	-9.1	-12.4
Michigan	Western Michigan	32.7	29.3	32.3
Charlotte	Appalachian St.	-12.7	-11.6	-13.9
Purdue	Eastern Michigan	21.3	18.2	19.5
Wisconsin	New Mexico	38.8	33.8	39.2
Florida Atlantic	Air Force	9.6	10.2	11.4
Old Dominion	Florida Int’l.	2.3	2.3	1.7
Northwestern	Duke	4.6	5.0	5.8
Kansas St.	Mississippi St.	-13.1	-11.1	-13.8
Houston	Arizona	-3.9	-0.5	-3.2
Vanderbilt	Nevada	8.4	9.3	8.3
North Carolina St.	Georgia St.	39.1	35.2	38.0
Oklahoma	UCLA	26.6	25.4	29.8
Utah St.	New Mexico St.	24.4	22.9	25.7
Central Michigan	Kansas	-4.9	0.0	-2.1
UNLV	UTEP	23.6	22.0	24.9
Navy	Memphis	-7.7	-7.0	-9.9
East Carolina	North Carolina	-21.0	-20.9	-21.5
Ohio St.	Rutgers	31.0	29.4	33.6
Temple	Buffalo	0.8	-1.6	0.1
South Carolina	Georgia	-15.8	-12.1	-18.0
UTSA	Baylor	-21.3	-14.2	-19.8
Alabama	Arkansas St.	48.6	44.4	48.6
Nebraska	Colorado	2.6	-0.8	-1.4
Southern Miss.	UL-Monroe	-2.3	1.7	-2.6
Notre Dame	Ball St.	50.4	44.0	49.2
Iowa	Iowa St.	4.8	4.1	4.3
Bowling Green	Maryland	-17.1	-15.0	-15.2
Georgia Southern	Massachusetts	-4.8	-5.6	-6.7
Texas A&M	Clemson	-17.8	-15.5	-18.6
Missouri	Wyoming	19.6	17.8	21.4
Indiana	Virginia	-1.3	-2.9	-0.2
Florida	Kentucky	10.4	9.2	11.4
Northern Illinois	Utah	-12.8	-9.8	-13.7
Minnesota	Fresno St.	0.5	1.3	0.3
Colorado St.	Arkansas	-25.8	-21.6	-24.0
Miami (O)	Cincinnati	2.9	3.9	4.8
Texas	Tulsa	20.9	20.9	19.4
Oklahoma St.	South Alabama	34.3	29.4	32.3
Pittsburgh	Penn St.	-8.7	-5.7	-9.7
Stanford	USC	10.8	9.7	12.2
BYU	California	-8.0	-4.4	-7.0
Boise St.	Connecticut	34.4	33.8	36.9
Arizona St.	Michigan St.	-15.1	-14.3	-16.2
Washington St.	San Jose St.	35.3	33.6	36.0
Hawaii	Rice	13.3	12.4	13.1

This Week’s Bowl and Playoff Projections

Bowl	Conferences		Team 1	Team 2
New Mexico	MWC	CUSA	Wyoming	Louisiana Tech
Cure	AAC	SBC	Navy	Appalachian St.
Las Vegas	MWC	Pac-12	Fresno St.	Arizona St.
Camellia	MAC	SBC	Northern Illinois	Georgia Southern
New Orleans	CUSA	SBC	Western Kentucky	Louisiana-Lafayette
Boca Raton	MAC	CUSA	Ohio U	Florida Int’l.
Frisco	AAC	MAC	Cincinnati	Buffalo
Gasparilla	AAC	CUSA	Memphis	Marshall
Bahamas	AAC	CUSA	Central Florida	North Texas
Idaho Potato	MAC	MWC	Toledo	Utah St.
Birmingham	AAC	SEC	[UAB]	[UL-Monroe]
Armed Forces	AAC	Big 12	Houston	[BYU]
Dollar General	MAC	SBC	Western Michigan	Troy
Hawaii	CUSA	MWC	Florida Atlantic	Hawaii
Heart of Dallas	Big Ten	CUSA	[California]	Southern Miss.
Quick Lane	ACC	Big Ten	Virginia	[Army]
Cactus	Big 12	Pac-12	[Air Force]	Colorado
Independence	ACC	SEC	Miami (Fla.)	[Middle Tennessee]
Pinstripe	ACC	Big Ten	North Carolina St.	Minnesota
Texas	Big 12	SEC	Iowa St.	Texas A&M
Music City	ACC/Big Ten	SEC	Louisville	Arkansas
Camping World	ACC	Big 12	Boston College	West Virginia
Arizona	MWC	SBC	San Diego St.	Arkansas St.
Alamo	Big 12	Pac-12	Oklahoma St.	Oregon
Belk	ACC	SEC	Virginia Tech	South Carolina
Peach	At-large	At-large	TCU	Boise St.
Military	AAC	ACC	South Florida	Duke
Sun	ACC	Pac-12	Georgia Tech	Utah
San Francisco	Big Ten	Pac-12	Iowa	Washington St.
Liberty	Big 12	SEC	Kansas St.	Missouri
Holiday	Big Ten	Pac-12	Michigan	Stanford
Gator	ACC/Big Ten	SEC	Northwestern	LSU
Outback	Big Ten	SEC	Penn St.	Auburn
Fiesta	At-large	At-large	USC	Ohio St.
Citrus	ACC/Big Ten	SEC	Wisconsin	Mississippi St.
Rose	Big Ten	Pac-12	Michigan St.	Washington
Sugar	Big 12	SEC	Oklahoma	Florida
FBS PLAYOFFS
Cotton	FBS	PLAYOFF	Alabama	Notre Dame
Orange	FBS	PLAYOFF	Clemson	Georgia
National Championship Game	Semifinal	Winners	Alabama	Clemson
Teams in [Brackets] are at-large selections

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

PiRate Ratings–College Football Week 1

Since only a handful of games were played in Week 0, and the ratings barely moved, we will dispense with posting a new set of ratings this week and feature just our spreads for Week 1 and combine our Selections against the Spread For Week 1, as there are no NFL games this weekend.

This Week’s PiRate Rating Spreads

Thursday,	August 30
Home	Visitor	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Connecticut	Central Florida	-24.2	-23.5	-25.4
Purdue	Northwestern	-4.0	-3.2	-5.8
Minnesota	New Mexico St.	27.5	23.4	26.3
Tulane	Wake Forest	-12.8	-10.4	-10.7
Friday,	August 31
Home	Visitor	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Michigan St.	Utah St.	33.9	29.8	33.1
Western Michigan	Syracuse	-12.2	-7.8	-9.2
Wisconsin	Western Kentucky	45.7	37.6	45.2
Colorado (n)	Colorado St.	13.7	13.5	14.5
Stanford	San Diego St.	24.6	21.0	24.2
Duke	Army	20.2	16.5	19.4
Saturday,	September 1
Home	Visitor	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Oklahoma	Florida Atlantic	20.5	17.7	19.6
Rice	Houston	-26.2	-24.5	-29.0
Ohio St.	Oregon St.	36.1	35.8	38.2
Penn St.	Appalachian St.	36.8	31.6	35.9
Nebraska	Akron	12.9	9.6	10.0
Boston College	Massachusetts	27.5	21.3	25.2
Illinois	Kent St.	16.2	14.5	15.8
Rutgers	Texas St.	30.5	25.7	28.7
Florida Int’l.	Indiana	-13.3	-7.0	-12.2
Iowa	Northern Illinois	20.0	15.1	18.4
Maryland (n)	Texas	-18.4	-19.2	-19.8
Troy	Boise St.	-14.9	-12.1	-13.7
South Alabama	Louisiana Tech	-9.8	-10.1	-10.0
Miami (O)	Marshall	-0.3	-0.7	0.9
North Texas	SMU	-0.6	3.9	1.1
Vanderbilt	Middle Tennessee	6.9	5.6	4.6
Arizona	BYU	17.0	13.6	16.7
Arizona St.	UTSA	28.2	20.6	25.2
USC	UNLV	26.4	22.9	25.1
UCLA	Cincinnati	18.4	16.7	16.5
Auburn (n)	Washington	-4.6	-2.3	-4.8
Kentucky	Central Michigan	24.5	19.2	23.6
Texas Tech (n)	Ole Miss	0.7	-1.0	-1.9
South Carolina	Coastal Carolina	42.2	37.8	41.1
West Virginia (n)	Tennessee	11.2	9.2	10.7
California	North Carolina	9.5	7.6	10.1
Wyoming	Washington St.	-4.5	-2.8	-2.5
Oregon	Bowling Green	32.3	32.2	32.3
Liberty	Old Dominion	-9.8	-14.9	-12.3
Notre Dame	Michigan	6.9	3.9	4.0
Alabama (n)	Louisville	28.4	25.5	30.7
Hawaii	Navy	-17.6	-18.6	-19.4
Sunday,	September 2
Home	Visitor	PiRate	Mean	Bias
LSU (n)	Miami (Fla.)	-10.2	-7.9	-9.4
Monday,	September 3
Home	Visitor	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Florida St.	Virginia Tech	0.2	0.1	0.2

(n) means neutral site game, but some teams may receive a little advantage for playing close to home.

FBS vs. FCS Games–PiRate Rating Spread Only

FBS vs. FCS
Home	Visitor	PiRate
Ball St.	Central Conn.	5.1
Georgia St.	Kennesaw St.	3.6
Oklahoma St.	Missouri St.	40.9
San Jose St.	UC-Davis	-0.9
Texas A&M	Northwestern St.	40.6
UAB	Savannah St.	28.8
Utah	Weber St.	22.0
Eastern Michigan	Monmouth	20.0
Air Force	Stony Brook	13.7
Arkansas	Eastern Illinois	29.8
Arkansas St.	SE Missouri	24.9
Baylor	Abilene Christian	31.3
Buffalo	Delaware St.	38.6
Charlotte	Fordham	10.8
Clemson	Furman	43.7
East Carolina	N.C. A&T	9.9
Florida	Chas. Southern	32.5
Fresno St.	Idaho	21.0
Georgia	Austin Peay	47.8
Georgia Southern	S. Carolina St.	22.3
Georgia Tech	Alcorn St.	39.9
Iowa St.	South Dakota St.	16.5
Kansas	Nicholls St.	10.6
Kansas St.	South Dakota	25.2
La.-Monroe	SE Louisiana	10.1
Louisiana	Grambling	10.2
Memphis	Mercer	32.9
Mississippi St.	S F Austin	44.3
Missouri	UT-Martin	29.3
N. Carolina St.	James Madison	17.2
Nevada	Portland St.	21.0
New Mexico	Incarnate Word	27.8
Ohio U	Howard	34.7
Pittsburgh	Albany	30.1
South Florida	Elon	28.7
Southern Miss.	Jackson St.	35.4
TCU	Southern	47.6
Temple	Villanova	18.8
Toledo	VMI	42.4
Tulsa	Central Arkansas	10.0
UTEP	Northern Arizona	-6.0
Virginia	Richmond	15.6

PiRate Ratings Picks Versus The Spread

This year, we are going to stick our necks out and go with straight spread and totals wagering in our imaginary picks with an imaginary bank account.

Remember: We never lose money on these picks, because they are strictly for fun.  We suggest you use these selections the same way.

Unless otherwise stated, all of our pretend picks will be for $100 imaginary.

Date	8/27-9/3		$100 per pick
Favorite	Underdog	Spread	Pick
Purdue	Northwestern	2 1/2	Northwestern
Michigan St.	Utah St.	23	Michigan St.
Penn St.	Appalachian St.	23 1/2	Penn St.
Nebraska	Akron	24 1/2	Akron
Iowa	Northern Illinois	10	Iowa
Texas	Maryland	13	Texas
California	North Carolina	7	California

 

 

 

2018 Big 12 Conference Preview

Note: The preseason ratings you see in the previews may not be the same as the ratings you see for the first game. We update every team’s rating based on player injuries, changes to the depth charts, and other factors that may change during preseason practice.
Our Power 5 Conference preseason ratings and won-loss predictions were figured before knowing the outcome of recent suspensions to Coaches Urban Meyer and D.J. Durkin at Ohio State and Maryland. Because our ratings set 100.0 as average, and the mean of all 130 teams must be 100.0, taking points away from Ohio State and Maryland require redistributing points to the other 128 teams. Expect these ratings to change prior to August 25.

Today, the PiRates begin to preview the Power 5 conferences. With five leagues and four playoff spots, one Power 5 conference is guaranteed to miss out every year. Last year, with two SEC teams making it, two Power 5 leagues did not make the cut. The Big 12 was one of the fortunate leagues as Oklahoma won the revived Big 12 Conference Championship Game and gave Georgia all it could handle in the National Semifinals before losing in overtime.
The Sooners still have quite a lot of talent remaining in Norman, but Coach Lincoln Riley faces a minor reloading project. Because Texas, West Virginia, Oklahoma State, TCU, and Iowa State are solid this year, and because this league is the only one in which every team plays every other, we believe the champion could easily be 7-2 and miss out on the playoffs.

Oklahoma has stolen the title of Quarterback U. from BYU and Stanford in the last 20 seasons. From Josh Heupel to to Jason White to Paul Thompson to Sam Bradford to Landry Jones to Trevor Knight, the Sooners always had an A+ passing attack and sometimes complimentary running threat. However, Baker Mayfield was in an A++ class by himself. Mayfield averaged 11.5 yards per passing ATTEMPT when most NCAA teams do not average 11.5 yards per completion these days! He threw 43 touchdown passes versus just 6 interceptions. Oklahoma averaged 362 passing yards per game to go with 218 rushing yards per game and Riley’s first year offense scored 45 points per game.
Mayfield is now the new hope in Cleveland, and Oklahoma turns to another future pro as their new quarterback. Kyler Murray will be playing for pay soon, but it will not be in football. He signed with the Oakland Athletics for $4.66 million, and one has to wonder if every time Murray drops back to pass against blitzing monsters, he will subconsciously think about that contract and throw the ball a bit too soon to avoid an injury that would end his baseball career before it starts.
Oklahoma will still be the decided favorite to win the Big 12 thanks to the running game. Backs Rodney Anderson and Trey Sermon teamed up to run the ball 309 times for 1,905 yards. They combined to catch 33 passes for 420 additional yards. They scored 25 total touchdowns, and the dynamic duo have another fine offensive line opening holes for them this year.
Murray will have a trio of top flight receivers catching his passes this year. Marquise Brown, CeeDee Lamb, and Mykel Jones all have the quickness to turn a 7 yard route into a 50 yard touchdown.

If Oklahoma falters this year, or should we say when, it will be because the opponent scored points easier than they could. The Sooner defense is vulnerable this year with a green secondary and a questionable pass rush following the loss of some incredible talent. Linebacker Kenneth Murray and cornerback Parnell Motley return, but the Sooners lost too much talent from a defense that gave up 27 points per game last year, and a couple opponents will top 40 points and most likely beat OU in 2018. The schedule doesn’t offer much help, as the Sooners always play Texas in Dallas and face West Virginia, Oklahoma State, and Iowa State on the road. 10-2 looks like the ceiling for this team.

Tom Herman’s first season at Texas was somewhat positive and somewhat disappointing. The Longhorns did not immediately take to his spread offense, and the offense was not as strong last year as it was during Charlie Strong’s final season. The defense was strong and kept the burnt orange in many games. Narrow losses to USC, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, and Texas Tech could easily flip to the win column this year, as UT is poised to be a serious contender in the conference race and stands a good chance of making the Big 12 Championship Game.

Sam Ehlinger appears to have a slight lead over Shane Buechele to be under center when the Longhorns kick off the season against Maryland. The Longhorn roster is short on talent at running back and receiver, and the offensive line is good but not outstanding, but there is room for improvements. Expect Texas to increase their offensive output by a little.

It’s the defense that will allow the ‘Horns to possibly contend for the Big 12 title. Ironically, Herman, the offensive guru lowered the point total given up by 10 points a game over prior defensive guru coach Strong. Texas gave up 21 points per game in 2017, which is about like giving up 15 points a game in other Power 5 conferences. As good as the defense was last year, this year’s edition will be better, maybe much better. The roster is packed with talented stars, especially in the trenches, where ends Charles Omenihu and Breckyn Hager are the best duo in the league. Anthony Wheeler anchors the second line of defense from his middle linebacker position. He’ll team with Gary Johnson and Malcolm Roach to form the best trio in the league. Arguably, Texas also has the best secondary in the league with potential All-American Kris Boyd returning at cornerback.

The schedule is as favorable for the Longhorns as it is unfavorable for Oklahoma, so we believe Texas has a grand chance at earning one of the two playoff spots.

West Virginia is the sexy choice this year to win the Big 12. The Mountaineers have the top quarterback in the league, when he remains healthy. Will Grier was 6-0 as the quarterback at Florida in 2015. He is 12-4 lifetime at Florida and West Virginia, but he has not complete either season in his short career. His season ended last year in the Texas game when he suffered a fractured finger. When healthy, Grier is a difference maker. He was fifth nationally in passer efficiency rating.

Grier has two elite receivers returning in Gary Jennings and David Sills. The duo teamed up for 157 receptions last year; Jennings is the possession receiver, and Sills is the touchdown machine. For any passing team to be consistently good, the pass blocking has to be outstanding, and the Mountaineers have that type of interior line, as good as the line at Oklahoma.

What will likely keep WVU in the 8-win area is a porous defense. The Mountaineers gave up 31.5 points per game and did so by allowing more than 200 yard rushing and 200 yard passing. It may be considered a good thing that most of that weak defense is no longer around, but the Mountaineers will actually take a step back this year with major concerns on the front line and in the secondary. There is talent in every unit, but not enough to be a force in the league. Linebacker David Long returns after making 15 1/2 tackles for loss last year. Defensive end Ezekiel Rose led the team with 5 sacks, while Dravon Askew-Henry mans the highly important spur safety (a hybrid safety-linebacker position that can make the defense a 3-4 or 3-3-5) spot.

West Virginia has two tough non-conference opponents to face prior to Big 12 play. They open with Tennessee in Charlotte, North Carolina, and two weeks later, they play at North Carolina State. The close the season with a home game against Oklahoma, which could have serious conference championship implications for one or both teams.
Oklahoma State’s string of three consecutive double-digit win seasons is in serious jeopardy in 2018. The Cowboys’ spectacular passing game will take a major hit this year. Mason Rudolph led the nation with more than 4,900 passing yards last year. That number in 13 games topped every NFL quarterback by almost 400 yards! Rudolph is now a backup to Ben Roethlisberger in Pittsburgh. New OSU quarterback Dru Brown has never taken a snap as the Cowboy quarterback, but he’s not a newcomer to FBS football. Brown started the past two years for Hawaii, and he will assume the controls of Coach

Mike Gundy’s offense and bring a new style to the team. Brown does not have Rudolph’s arm strength or quick release, but he can take off and run for a lot of yards in a scramble. OSU might even add a wrinkle or two where Brown fakes to top-flight running back Justice Hill and boots in the opposite direction. Defenses will have to concentrate extra defenders when Hill is a running threat. He burned defenses for 1,467 rushing yards and 15 TDs, while coming out of the backfield to catch 31 passes.
Losing two star receivers that caught 133 passes for 2,705 yards and 21 socres is going to make the passing numbers go down more than having Brown replace Rudolph. OSU still has talent in the receiving corps, but James Washington and Marcell Ateman are not easily replaced.

The Cowboy offensive line is rebuilding this year, and the holes and pass protection just won’t be there like they were the last three years. Oklahoma State averaged 45 points per game in 2017 and finished second in the nation with 569 total yards per game. The numbers could take a 10-point and 100-yard hit this year. The defense might be marginally improved over last season, but after giving up 29.4 points per game, improving to 28 per game may mean the win total will be reduced by two or three.

TCU has more offensive retooling to do than Oklahoma State, as they lost quarterback Kenny Hill, running back Kyle Hicks, their top three receivers, and three offensive linemen. The Horned Frogs feature defense first, and there is enough talent returning to continue the stellar play on this side of the ball in 2018, but not excellent enough to return to the Big 12 Championship Game. There is talent in all three units, led by end Ben Banogu. Last year, Banogu made 16 1/2 tackles behind the line including 8 1/2 sacks. He forced three fumbles in the process.

Stong-side linebacker Ty Summers can stop the run at the line for little or no gain, and he can cover the short passing zones with competence. Safety Niko Small leads a talented secondary that should continue to limit opponent passing by about 25-30 yards under their average.

TCU led all Big 12 teams in scoring defense, rushing defense, and passing defense. It will take a repeat of that feat to contend for second place in the league, and even if the Frogs repeat, the offense may be off just enough to come up a win short.

Iowa State was a major surprise in 2017, as the Cyclones topped Oklahoma in Norman and TCU in October on the way to an 8-5 season. Coach Matt Campbell, who had previously done wonders at Toledo, became a hot commodity in the big-time coaching market, and another 8-win season in Ames could see several rich offers coming his way. The Cyclones left something on the table last year, as narrow losses to Iowa in overtime, West Virginia, Oklahoma State, and Kansas State could have made 2018 a historic high in Ames.

The Cyclones actually return more starters than any of the other contenders in the league, but overall, they are still a few players short from becoming a serious contender. Quarterback Kyle Kempt was the major cog that turned the season around for ISU, as he torched Oklahoma’s defense for 343 passing yards and three touchdowns. His being granted a 6th year of eligibility means that ISU is an outside contender for the Big 12 Championship Game. Stubby back David Montgomery bulled his way to 1,146 rushing yards and 11 touchdowns. He won’t run the toss sweep down the sideline for a long touchdown, but he rarely goes down on first contact, and it frequently takes two defenders to bring him to the ground.

The receiving corps lost a stud in Allen Lazard, who is turning heads in Jacksonville as an undrafted free-agent that will most likely make the Jaguars’ roster. Hakeem Butler was a fine second option last year, and he should be the go-to guy this year, as the other receivers on the roster are possession receivers lacking the ability to turn a 7-yard pattern into a 50-yard gain.

Iowa State’s big jump happened because the defense no longer resembled 11 matadors against bulls with the letter “O” somewhere on their helmets. The Cyclones finished a close second to TCU in scoring defense last year. Enough talent returns this year to keep this unit strong. The front seven is second or third best in the league. As weak-side edge rusher JaQuan Bailey goes, so goes the ISU pass defense. Bailey has the ability to meet the quarterback about one second after the quarterback takes his fifth step in his drop. Defenses will have to double up on him, so it will be important for outside linebacker Willie Harvey to step up and improve on last year’s numbers.

Kansas State enters most seasons as an also-ran in the league, but the Wildcats always beat one or two teams they are not supposed to beat. KSU knocked off Oklahoma State in Stillwater and then knocked off Iowa State to earn a Cactus Bowl bid at the 11th hour last year. The Wildcats lost close games to Vanderbilt, Texas, Oklahoma, and West Virginia, meaning they were not farm from being 12-1. Only TCU dominated them on the scoreboard. Expect more of the same in 2018, as Coach Bill Snyder guides his team to one or two upsets and earns yet another bowl bid.

Texas Tech has not been a factor in the Big 12 race since Mike Leach was fired. The Red Raiders tried the Tommy Tuberville way for a few years and fell back into the middle of the pack. Former TTU quarterback Kliff Kingsbury has taken the program down another couple notches, as the Raiders have struggled to get six wins during his tenure. If Kingsbury cannot right the ship this year and take his team up a notch or so, there probably will be a new man walking the sidelines at Jones Stadium next year. Prospects are not all that excellent for this TTU edition. The team has not been able to produce a running game that forces defensive coaches to have to stop it, so the passing game has to “struggle” to put up gawdy numbers. Too often, the defense stays on the field too long and tires, eventually succumbing to opposing offenses that punish tired defenses. The Red Raiders gave up 444 yards per game and 32+ points per game last year, and the schedule offers them no favors with out of conference games against Ole Miss and Houston. Additionally, the one toss-up game on the conference schedule, versus Kansas State, will be played in the Little Apple, making KSU a decided favorite.

Baylor has a long way to go to return to prominence. Matt Rhule turned the program around at Temple, but quite frankly, that was easier than having to win in the Lone Star State where 100 FBS teams recruit the state like they play their home games in Dallas. The Bears were plainly the ninth best team in the league, both offensively and defensively. They lost at home to Liberty, and had it not been for the worst FBS team also being a Big 12 team, BU could have gone 0-12 last year. There is a little talent in Waco this year, but it will take a gargantuan improvement for the Bears to improve from one to six wins. Having the easiest opening schedule of any Big 12 team could allow Baylor to enter October with two or three wins, but they may lose out the rest of the way.

Kansas is worse in the Big 12 than the Cleveland Browns are in the AFC North Division. The Jayhawks went 1-11 last year with the lone win coming against FCS member Southeast Missouri State, a team that went 3-8 in the Ohio Valley Conference. Coach David Beaty is now 3-33 in Lawrence through three years. He won’t see a fifth season if he is 4-44 after this season. The Jayhawks should be a better team this year, especially on defense, but then it is harder to be worse when you finish in last place in the league in offense and defense and lose to the next weakest team at home by more than four touchdowns!

Here is how the Big 12 Conference Media voted in the preseason poll

Big 12	1st Place	Points
1. Oklahoma	46	509
2. West Virginia	2	432
3. TCU	1	390
4. Texas	1	370
5. Oklahoma St.	0	300
6. Kansas St.	2	283
7. Iowa St.	0	250
8. Texas Tech	0	149
9. Baylor	0	125
10. Kansas	0	52

The PiRate Ratings differ somewhat after the top.

Big 12 Conference
Team	B12	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Oklahoma	0-0	0-0	119.5	117.7	119.8	119.0
Texas	0-0	0-0	113.2	111.9	112.8	112.6
Oklahoma St.	0-0	0-0	113.2	110.8	112.7	112.2
T C U	0-0	0-0	112.7	112.0	111.5	112.0
Iowa State	0-0	0-0	110.7	108.8	110.2	109.9
West Virginia	0-0	0-0	110.0	108.8	109.1	109.3
Kansas St.	0-0	0-0	107.4	106.0	106.8	106.7
Texas Tech	0-0	0-0	106.0	104.0	104.2	104.7
Baylor	0-0	0-0	102.9	100.6	102.3	101.9
Kansas	0-0	0-0	93.9	92.3	91.6	92.6
Big 12 Averages			108.9	107.3	108.1	108.1

New Coaches
There are no new coaches in the Big 12 this year, but there are a couple on very hot seats, and 2019 might see some new faces.

David Beaty needs to show some kind of advancement at Kansas, or the Jayhawks will be in the market for a new coach, possibly one from the Dakotas and the FCS ranks.
Kliff Kingsbury needs to win at least seven regular season games and look competitive in the losses, or else Texas Tech may look to move in another direction, maybe hiring a power-style coach.

Dana Holgorsen cannot afford to see West Virginia disappoint this season with so much offensive firepower. Anything short of nine wins would be a disappointment, and there are some restless fans in Morgantown.

Matt Campbell can do no wrong in the eyes of the fans at Iowa State. However, another 8-win season would most likely see him receive job offers with contracts too rich for Iowa State to match or top. His name has already been bantered among heavy-hitters at Ohio State should Urban Meyer be dismissed.

Predicted Won-Loss Records
Note: These predicted won-loss records are strictly mechanical based on the initial PiRate Ratings. No upsets are factored in these predictions. Additionally, our PiRate Ratings are only useful for the next week of games and cannot really be used to forecast past that point. Part of our weekly adjustment to our ratings includes a factor where depth issues or non-issues have been pre-set. In other words, a team without talented second stringers may lose ratings points as the season progresses even if they win games by the predicted margin, whereas a team with exceptional depth (like Alabama) will improve during the season and see its rating rise even if they win games by a little less than the predicted margin. What we’re saying is: don’t take these numbers with anything more than a grain of salt.   

Team	Conference	Overall
Oklahoma	9-0	13-0*
Oklahoma St.	7-2	10-3
Texas	7-2	10-2
TCU	6-3	8-4
Iowa St.	5-4	7-5
West Virginia	5-4	7-5
Kansas St.	3-6	5-7
Baylor	2-7	4-8
Texas Tech	1-8	3-9
Kansas	0-9	2-10

 

Bowl Tie-ins
1. Sugar Bowl in New Orleans, LA
2. Alamo Bowl in San Antonio, TX
3. Camping World Bowl in Orlando, FL
4. Texas Bowl in Houston, TX
5. Liberty Bowl in Memphis, TN
6. Cactus Bowl in Tucson, AZ
7. Armed Forces Bowl in Fort Worth, TX

Coming Tomorrow–The Pac-12 Conference

The PiRates Are Hard At Work For Football Season

Hello Mates.

This is the head PiRate telling you that we have set sail and are on our way out to the green sea, otherwise known as the Football Field.

We have already begun to update our college football ratings for the 2018 season.  We have a unique way of updating our ratings from the end of the previous season to the beginning of the new season.  We have point values assigned to every starting and backup position on offense and defense plus an overall rating for the components of special teams.

For instance, as it should be obvious, the Quarterback is the most important position in college football.  So, we take special care in determining how many points better or worse each of the 130 teams is in week one compared to their final game of the year before by adding or subtracting points based on the QB.  We look at certain analytics data, just like baseball teams look at advanced statistics.  We actually have our own version of WAR for college football.  Instead of Batting, Fielding, and Pitching WAR, we have offense, defense, and special teams WAR, only instead of putting the final numbers into wins above average, we use points per game above average.  In the PiRate Ratings, a rating of 100.0 is average.  If a quarterback is worth 6.3 points better than an average QB, then before we look at the reserves, a team that is totally average at every other position would begin the season at 106.3 for this particular piece of the ratings’ puzzle.  If a quarterback has been determined to be 3.8 points below average, it would reduce the average team from 100.0 to 96.2.

On offense, the receiving corps is the next most important part of the equation, while the offensive line and running back corps are equal in importance as the last two parts.

Defensively, we look at all three units as they play against the run and the pass.  Stopping the pass is more important these days than stopping the run.  Interceptions, Passes Broken Up, Sacks, and Hurries are all parts of the Pass defense stats we look at.  We also have special ratings for nose guards that have the responsibility of taking up space and keeping blockers away from the linebackers, as these heroes of the trenches rarely show up in box scores, until one of the behemoths gets injured, and his replacement prevents the star will linebacker from making his usual 14 tackles with 2 for loss.

We have an intangible part of this equation as well.  Say a team has a change in coaches.  The old coach was a spread option or flexbone disciple, while the new coach is an air raid disciple.  It’s going to take 2-4 years to fully implement the changes, as that five foot nine inch triple option QB is not going to work as a dropback passer.

Another example in an intangible is the team that had 9 key injuries the year before, and 8 of the 9 return at 100% after missing parts or all of the year before.

In 2018, there will be a case where a potential all-star junior quarterback will transfer from one Power 5 school to another and be immediately eligible.  This will have major effects on his new team, much more than if he were the top incoming freshman in the nation.  This QB has already proven himself in a power conference, while the top incoming freshman only proved himself in Georgia high school action.  There is a difference as deep as the Grand Canyon in comparing the two, even though the incoming freshman might eventually become the next John Elway.  The seasoned starter showed what he could do when he passed for close to 350 yards against Auburn, while the freshman threw for 220 yards against Troup County High School.

This is just one piece of a 5-prong process.  We rate each team against every other team using 5 different processes.  Once we are done, we use three different algorithms to come up with a PiRate, Mean, and Bias rating for each of the 130 teams.  The PiRate and Bias differ by very little, so they will frequently be highly correlated, while the Mean rating is somewhat different than the other two, because it takes the equally-weighted average of the five ratings, while the other two apply heavier weights to some of the five components.  Because they share the exact same weighting of the prong we showed you above, these two tend to stay correlated.

We know we have a lot of advanced mathematicians reading our blog, and we are grateful for your patronage.  We try to make this more analytically dominated than you might get from other sports rating sites and even break down the fourth wall from time to time to show you what we do.

If you are not a math fan and just love football, then fear not.  We still hope to have computer ratings that are as accurate as possible, and we still will make fools of ourselves weekly to issue free picks that you can then take and gift to Las Vegas if you are foolish enough to not realize that these picks are worth exactly what you pay for them.

We have 10 weeks to go.  With a lot of late night work, we hope to have the ratings ready for you in 9 weeks max.

Thanks,

The Captain

PiRate Ratings Bracketology Late Night Update–March 10-11 , 2018

The Bracket Gurus are burning the midnight oil and pouring more coffee as they try to determine who the NCAA Men’s Basketball Selection Committee will invite into the Dance, and who will not hear the phone ring on Sunday.

At this point last year, most of the gurus were 100% in agreement on about 66 teams with only three teams really fighting for the final two spots.

There is a bit more dissension this season.  There are six teams seriously in the final discussion for three spots, but this will all change is Davidson beats Rhode Island on Sunday.  The Gurus are 100% in agreement in their belief that St. Bonaventure is in, so the Atlantic 10 could move from two to three teams if the Wildcats upset the Rams.

The teams that need to be worried about Davidson winning include Oklahoma State, Arizona State, Saint Mary’s, Louisville, and Middle Tennessee State.  The Gurus are close to eliminating Marquette, Baylor, and Syracuse, but these teams still appear on exactly one Guru list (three different Gurus have one each of the three).

Check back tomorrow after the conclusion of the Atlantic 10 Championship Game.  Within about 30 minutes of the outcome, we will publish our final Bracket Gurus report in full.  The pressure is on our Gurus.  Last year, they correctly picked all 68 teams in the field, and also correctly picked 61 teams on the correct seed line or just one seed off.

Teams In The Field as of Saturday Night, 11:59 PM EST

Team	Bid	Conf.	W-L
Bucknell	AUTO	Patriot	25-9
Buffalo	AUTO	MAC	26-8
Charleston	AUTO	CAA	26-7
Gonzaga	AUTO	WCC	30-4
Iona	AUTO	MAAC	20-13
Kansas	AUTO	B12	27-7
Lipscomb	AUTO	A-SUN	23-9
Long Island	AUTO	NEC	18-16
Loyola (Chi.)	AUTO	MVC	28-5
Marshall	AUTO	CUSA	24-10
MD-Baltimore Co.	AUTO	AE	24-10
Michigan	AUTO	BTen	28-7
Montana	AUTO	BSky	26-7
Murray St.	AUTO	OVC	26-5
New Mexico St.	AUTO	WAC	28-5
Radford	AUTO	B-South	22-12
San Diego St.	AUTO	MWC	22-10
South Dakota St.	AUTO	Summit	28-6
Stephen F. Austin	AUTO	SLC	28-6
Texas Southern	AUTO	SWAC	15-19
UNC-Central	AUTO	MEAC	19-15
UNC-Greensboro	AUTO	SoCon	27-7
Villanova	AUTO	BE	30-4
Virginia	AUTO	ACC	31-2
Wright St.	AUTO	Horizon	25-9

PiRate Ratings College Basketball Preview for February 3-4, 2018

This Weekend’s PiRate Ratings Spreads

For Multi-Bid  Leagues

Saturday’s Games
Home Team	Visitor	Spread
Connecticut	Cincinnati	-13.7
Central Florida	Houston	-3.0
East Carolina	Memphis	-6.4
St. John’s	Duke	-11.4
North Carolina St.	Notre Dame	0.6
Wake Forest	Clemson	-4.1
Virginia Tech	Miami (Fla.)	3.1
Syracuse	Virginia	-6.7
Louisville	Florida St.	3.3
North Carolina	Pittsburgh	21.9
Kansas	Oklahoma St.	13.8
TCU	Texas Tech	1.7
West Virginia	Kansas St.	8.4
Texas	Oklahoma	1.2
Baylor	Iowa St.	8.6
Butler	DePaul	12.9
Marquette	Providence	4.9
Xavier	Georgetown	15.4
Michigan	Minnesota	9.7
Rutgers	Purdue	-16.9
Penn St.	Iowa	6.7
Indiana	Michigan St.	-10.2
Wyoming	Fresno St.	1.6
San Jose St.	New Mexico	-9.0
Boise St.	UNLV	6.3
Colorado St.	Nevada	-13.3
San Diego St.	Air Force	18.2
Stanford	Oregon	-0.5
UCLA	USC	1.4
California	Oregon St.	-4.2
Washington	Arizona	-5.8
Missouri	Kentucky	1.6
Texas A&M	South Carolina	8.3
LSU	Arkansas	0.2
Florida	Alabama	7.6
Tennessee	Ole Miss	12.1
Mississippi St.	Georgia	2.8
Auburn	Vanderbilt	12.8
Portland	Loyola Marymount	1.1
San Diego	Saint Mary’s	-8.3
Gonzaga	BYU	12.1
Pepperdine	Pacific	-6.1
Santa Clara	San Francisco	-4.1

Sunday’s Games
Home Team	Visitor	Spread
South Florida	Tulsa	-9.8
Tulane	Temple	-2.1
Boston College	Georgia Tech	5.7
Villanova	Seton Hall	14.0
Ohio St.	Illinois	11.7
Maryland	Wisconsin	9.7
Washington St.	Arizona St.	-9.5

Note: As of last night’s games, with both Middle Tennessee and Western Kentucky winning big road contests, Conference USA actually moved into multi-bid league status.  We apologize for not including CUSA games in this week’s preview, but if both MTSU and WKU win this weekend and mid-week, then CUSA will be included in next Friday’s preview.

Additionally, Boise State fell from at-large status into one of the First Four out, so the Mountain West Conference should not be included as a multiple bid league.  The update occurred after this week’s games had been rated and placed in our database.  If the MWC is still just a one for sure bid league next Friday, we will remove it from our preview, thus trading CUSA for MWC.  If neither or both leagues remain in the multiple bid leagues, we will cancel both or include both in next Friday’s preview, depending on the outcomes through next Thursday night.

The PiRate Ratings Top 25

Rank	Team	PiRate	Conf.
1	Villanova	122.2	BIGE
2	Purdue	121.4	BTEN
3	Duke	120.2	ACC
4	Virginia	119.2	ACC
5	Michigan St.	118.9	BTEN
6	Kansas	117.5	B12
7	Cincinnati	117.4	AAC
8	Gonzaga	116.0	WCC
9	Xavier	115.2	BIGE
10	North Carolina	115.1	ACC
11	Auburn	114.9	SEC
12	Tennessee	114.8	SEC
13	West Virginia	114.4	B12
14	Texas Tech	114.4	B12
15	Wichita St.	114.2	AAC
16	Creighton	113.5	BIGE
17	Ohio St.	113.4	BTEN
18	Arizona	113.1	PAC12
19	TCU	113.1	B12
20	Saint Mary’s	112.9	WCC
21	Oklahoma	112.9	B12
22	Clemson	112.8	ACC
23	Nevada	112.4	MWC
24	Butler	112.4	BIGE
25	Florida St.	112.4	ACC

PiRate Ratings By Power Conference

Team	PiRate	Conf.
Cincinnati	117.4	AAC
Wichita St.	114.2	AAC
Houston	110.3	AAC
SMU	109.4	AAC
Temple	105.3	AAC
UCF	104.3	AAC
Tulsa	102.3	AAC
Tulane	100.2	AAC
Memphis	100.0	AAC
Connecticut	99.7	AAC
East Carolina	90.6	AAC
South Florida	89.5	AAC
Duke	120.2	ACC
Virginia	119.2	ACC
North Carolina	115.1	ACC
Clemson	112.8	ACC
Florida St.	112.4	ACC
Louisville	111.7	ACC
Miami FL	111.4	ACC
Virginia Tech	111.0	ACC
Notre Dame	110.8	ACC
Syracuse	108.5	ACC
North Carolina St.	107.4	ACC
Boston College	105.5	ACC
Wake Forest	105.2	ACC
Georgia Tech	103.3	ACC
Pittsburgh	96.7	ACC
Kansas	117.5	B12
West Virginia	114.4	B12
Texas Tech	114.4	B12
TCU	113.1	B12
Oklahoma	112.9	B12
Texas	110.6	B12
Kansas St.	110.0	B12
Baylor	109.9	B12
Oklahoma St.	107.2	B12
Iowa St.	104.8	B12
Villanova	122.2	BIGE
Xavier	115.2	BIGE
Creighton	113.5	BIGE
Butler	112.4	BIGE
Seton Hall	111.7	BIGE
Marquette	109.1	BIGE
Providence	107.7	BIGE
St. John’s	105.3	BIGE
Georgetown	103.3	BIGE
DePaul	102.5	BIGE
Purdue	121.4	BTEN
Michigan St.	118.9	BTEN
Ohio St.	113.4	BTEN
Michigan	112.2	BTEN
Maryland	110.7	BTEN
Penn St.	109.1	BTEN
Nebraska	107.3	BTEN
Northwestern	107.2	BTEN
Minnesota	106.0	BTEN
Iowa	105.4	BTEN
Illinois	105.2	BTEN
Indiana	105.2	BTEN
Wisconsin	105.0	BTEN
Rutgers	101.5	BTEN
Nevada	112.4	MWC
Boise St.	108.9	MWC
San Diego St.	107.8	MWC
UNLV	105.6	MWC
Fresno St.	104.8	MWC
New Mexico	102.4	MWC
Wyoming	102.4	MWC
Utah St.	101.3	MWC
Colorado St.	96.1	MWC
Air Force	93.1	MWC
San Jose St.	90.4	MWC
Arizona	113.1	PAC12
Arizona St.	111.1	PAC12
USC	109.7	PAC12
UCLA	108.1	PAC12
Oregon	107.6	PAC12
Utah	106.9	PAC12
Washington	103.8	PAC12
Stanford	103.6	PAC12
Colorado	102.7	PAC12
Oregon St.	102.7	PAC12
Washington St.	98.6	PAC12
California	95.0	PAC12
Auburn	114.9	SEC
Tennessee	114.8	SEC
Florida	112.3	SEC
Kentucky	112.0	SEC
Texas A&M	111.3	SEC
Arkansas	110.3	SEC
Missouri	110.1	SEC
Alabama	108.2	SEC
Georgia	107.2	SEC
Mississippi St.	107.0	SEC
LSU	107.0	SEC
South Carolina	106.5	SEC
Mississippi	106.2	SEC
Vanderbilt	105.6	SEC
Gonzaga	116.0	WCC
Saint Mary’s	112.9	WCC
BYU	107.4	WCC
San Diego	101.6	WCC
San Francisco	99.5	WCC
Pacific	98.9	WCC
Loyola Marymount	94.7	WCC
Portland	92.8	WCC
Santa Clara	92.4	WCC
Pepperdine	89.8	WCC

The PiRates Are Adjusting How We Look For Buried Treasure

The PiRate Ratings began and operated for years as a college and pro football prediction establishment.  The ratings themselves began in October of 1969 and have operated continuously since.  In 1978-79, basketball ratings were added, and from 1980-2009, the PiRates did some horse racing prognosticating.  In all this time, however, it was an added filler that actually became our most patronized product we have publicly issued, be it in print or radio.

Our March Madness Bracket Picking guides have annually dwarfed all others, be it in the number of readers to this site, the number of responses from our historic newspaper presence, or the number of responses to our historic radio presence (and in one case to our sponsor, when one team’s fans threatened to boycott the adult beverage because our leader picked their rival to win the rivalry game).

We back-tested all the past Final Four and National Champions for the years where we had statistical data to identify the fingerprint statistics that might help us forecast future Final Four and National Championship teams.  We identified some consistent stats and discovered that some stats had little or no bearing.

For instance, we discovered that for most years, teams that scored a very high percentage of their points at the foul line tended to lose with more frequency as the rounds progressed.  We surmised that a lesser number of fouls were called in the bigger games, and the teams that got this far that were not great foul shooting teams got to where they were because they were dominant in other areas.  It just so happened that these other areas were the consistent ones that produced the champions.

We wanted to come up with a statistic that could be used to represent what has helped teams dominate in NCAA Tournament play.  We began refining this data over the years.

When our captain became a baseball metric specialist and started researching advanced analytics, he learned what many others had already learned.  What may work to determine the regular season division winners may not work in the playoffs.  Oakland Athletics’ General Manager Billy Beane was quoted as saying (expletive altered), “My stuff doesn’t work in the playoffs.”

Beane was onto something, or in other words, it was plain to see that Oakland’s “Moneyball” ways produced 100-wins in the regular season, but it did not work in the playoffs, since the Athletics never won the pennant.  Forget for a minute that his predecessor Sandy Alderson actually began the advanced statistical age in Oakland, and he won three consecutive AL Pennants using a computer program to help determine some strategies.  Let’s look at why Moneyball issues do not work in the playoffs.

1. On base percentage is superior to batting average, but in order to draw walks, the pitcher must throw pitches outside the strike zone.  In 130 out of 162 regular season games, a team might face pitching that would throw enough balls outside of the strike zone to walk four times per game.  However, in the playoffs, this team is more likely to face pitchers like Corey Kluber, Chris Sale, Carlos Carrasco, Clayton Kershaw, and Steven Strasburg.  These guys will paint the corners and force batters to either swing or walk back to the dugout rather than to first base.
2. The sacrifice hit, hit and run, stolen base, and taking an extra base on singles and doubles may not be the most intelligent way to score runs in the regular season when again, 130 out of 162 games may present better ways to score runs by getting men on and hitting three-run homers.  However, try to wait for that three-run homer against Strasburg, Kluber, Sale, or Carrasco and see how far that gets you.  You are likely to lose 3-2 more than get that three-run tater.  Many people understand that giving up one of just 27 outs to advance a runner one base is foolish–most of the time.  If you are playing for one run in the eighth or ninth inning and have a runner on 2nd with no outs, it is the right thing to do to bunt the runner over to third.  Also, when the batter is facing a dominant pitcher, and the expected on base average for this batter against this pitcher is far south of what his normal OBA is, then it may also be the smarter option to bunt a runner up a base rather than risk a non-productive out or worse a GIDP.
3. Relief pitching changes in the playoffs, especially the World Series.  In actuality, managers more intelligently use their best reliever when leverage is the highest, even if that is with two outs in the fifth inning.  Rather than bring in the top ace to protect a 3-run lead in the ninth, managers are more likely to use that ace in a one-run game in earlier innings.  Under Beane in the height of the Moneyball years where the A’s made the playoffs and lost, Oakland never invested a lot in a true stopper.  The numbers said that just about any above-average reliever could get 35 saves coming into the game in the ninth inning protecting a two or three-run lead.  In the playoffs, when Oakland needed the next Rollie Fingers, Paul Lindblad, Bob Locker, or Darold Knowles, or the next Dennis Eckersley, and they needed that stopper to stop a rally in the 6th inning, he wasn’t on the roster.

What does this have to do with March Madness, you may ask?  Plenty, we respond.  In basketball, the Four Factors have come to represent some of the best statistical analysis that can reveal the superior teams over the inferior teams.  During the regular season, these stats may show that State U is a top 25 team and should be no worse than a 5-seed in the Big Dance.  Then, this team gets a 4 or 5-seed in the tournament and goes up against a 12 or 13-seed that dominated a mid-major conference during the regular season.  This underdog possesses some of the dominating stats that work in the tournament, while the big team from the big conference does not.  And, lo and behold, the underdog upsets the favorite, making the sports media talk about how so many 12-seeds beat 5-seeds, like it is a curse.

Never once did these media experts consider that the reason the 12-seeds beat the 5-seeds much more often than normal is because these 12-seeds would beat these 5-seeds 7 times out of 10.  In other words, they are not really upsets.  They are indicators that the people that set the seeds are doing a poor job.

So, by now, you must be anxious to see what these special stats are that help us determine what works in the playoffs.  The answer is: The PiRate R+T Rating.

Huh?  What is the R+T Rating?  If you have followed our site for a long enough time, you have seen the R+T used since the 2000 NCAA Tournament.  It has been refined through the years, sort of like how weighted on-base average goes through refinements based on each season’s environments.

At the present time, our R+T rating is:

(R * 2) + (S * .5) + (6 – Opp S) + T

R = Rebounding Margin per game

S = Average Steals per game

T= Turnover Margin per game

This formula translates into the number of extra scoring opportunities a team should be expected to gain over an average team.  It took hours of backtesting to refine it to the point where the result represented a real number that estimated the number of “cheap” points a team might be expected to receive over an average team.

It looks simple enough. If one team has a large rebounding edge in a game, they will benefit with an extra number of shots.  Depending on whether the advantage is at the offensive or defensive end, or both, limiting shots to one per possession and getting putbacks on the offensive end can create spurts in games that turn close contests into blowouts.

Turnover margin is not as important as rebounding margin except for when the turnover comes by way of a steal.  If the opponent turns the ball over due to travelling or stepping out of bounds or committing a charge, the opponent does not immediately see a benefit.  It ends the opponents’ possession, but it does not lead to fast break opportunities or the ability to tip the ball in the basket from a couple feet away.

When a team steals the ball, however, this is the absolute best extra possession.  Most steals come when the defense gains possession of the ball while their players are facing their basket, and the team turning the ball over has their back to that basket.  Almost all steals immediately present a number’s advantage for the team gaining possession.  If it is 2 on 1 or 3 on 2, this is like having a 3-0 count as a batter with the bases loaded.  Even if the steal results in a 2 on 2 or 3 on 3, the team with the ball has the advantage, since any even strength less than 5 on 5 favors the offense in basketball.

This is what the R+T represents.  A steal and rebound counts more than a turnover or lack of a turnover, but the turnover has value too.

How do we interpret R+T?  We have levels of interpretation.

If a team has an R+T rating of 20 or better, this is a potentially dangerous tournament team.  In a tight, evenly matched game, a team with a 20+ R+T rating has a huge advantage over a team with an average R+T rating.  At crunch time, a crucial steal or offensive rebound resulting in a basket can be the difference.

An R+T rating of 15-20 is a good rating, and a team with a rating in this range has Sweet 16 potential and maybe Elite 8 potential.

An R+T rating of 10-15 is average for an NCAA Tournament team.  Unless this team is outstanding in other areas such as field goal percentage margin, they probably do not have the necessary talent to make it past the Sweet 16.  There have been teams that made the Final Four with R+T ratings in  this range, but most of the time, they got there because they played opponents with even weaker R+T ratings.

An R+T rating in the 5-10 range might win a game or even sneak into the Sweet 16, but they should not be expected to go any farther.  It is unlikely that a team in this range will face three consecutive teams with even weaker R+T ratings.

An R+T rating in the 0-5 range does not have the goods to make it to the second weekend of the tournament.  Favored teams in this range playing underdogs with double-digit R+T ratings are prime to be “upset.”

And, when you see a team with a negative R+T, treat this team like you would treat a race horse with “four white socks.”

There is an old poem about horses wearing white socks (hooves), as it was generally believed, rightly or wrongly, that white hooves were a sign of weakness in a horse.  If we remember correctly it goes:

One white sock, keep him to the end.

Two white socks, give him to a friend.

Three white socks, send him far away.

Four white socks, keep him not a day.

A team with a negative R+T rating has four white socks.  Pick them not a game.  Teams with negative R+T ratings almost always lose in the Round of 64, even if they are a 2-seed playing a 15-seed.  There was a year where three heavily favored teams from power conferences but with negative R+T ratings played three double-digit seeds from mid-major conferences but with good R+T ratings.  All three heavily favored teams lost.

Do you remember in 2013 when Florida Gulf Coast made Andy Enfield famous for something more than his fantastic spouse, when his 15th-seeded Eagles clobbered second-seed Georgetown?  FGCU had a fat R+T rating, while the Hoyas had a negative R+T rating.

Let’s look at this statistic in tabular form with several potential NCAA Tournament teams.  These numbers represent only the stats from conference games for each team, thus eliminating games where a power conference team beat a low-major team by 35 points and padded their stats.

Team	Reb.	Stl.	Opp Stl.	TO	R+T	Conf.
Alabama	-0.1	7.7	6.7	-0.3	2.7	1
Arizona	6.1	4.8	5.7	-0.2	14.7	5
Auburn	-0.3	8.1	5.8	4.4	8.1	1
Buffalo	4.1	6.9	4.8	2.4	15.3	13
Cincinnati	9.1	7.1	5.1	3.1	25.8	7
Clemson	-1.9	5.4	6.4	-0.5	-2.0	2
Duke	6.9	7.8	5.7	-0.1	17.9	2
East Tennessee	7.7	6.8	5.6	0.2	19.4	17
Florida	-3.6	5.2	3.3	3.0	1.1	1
Florida St.	3.6	5.5	5.8	0.0	10.2	2
Gonzaga	10.5	5.7	4.9	2.6	27.6	11
Kansas	-5.2	5.8	5.7	0.3	-6.9	3
Kansas St.	-8.0	8.3	6.0	3.0	-8.9	3
Kentucky	2.0	5.7	5.1	-1.7	6.1	1
UL-Lafayette	10.2	7.9	5.7	1.1	25.8	23
Louisville	1.6	7.9	7.3	2.1	8.0	2
Loyola (Chi.)	0.8	7.4	5.7	2.2	7.8	9
Miami (Fla.)	0.9	7.6	6.3	1.6	6.9	2
Michigan	-0.5	5.1	4.7	3.2	6.1	6
Michigan St.	9.0	3.5	4.8	-4.5	16.5	6
Middle Tennessee	10.0	5.5	6.2	-0.9	21.7	14
Montana	4.5	8.8	4.1	4.3	19.6	20
Nevada	-1.2	7.3	4.4	4.8	7.7	10
New Mexico St.	11.5	4.3	5.3	1.7	27.6	15
North Carolina	9.9	5.5	5.7	-1.2	21.7	2
North Carolina St.	0.9	6.8	6.0	1.6	6.8	2
Ohio St.	6.0	5.8	3.9	0.0	17.0	6
Oklahoma	1.6	6.3	7.8	-3.2	1.4	3
Oregon	1.8	6.7	4.8	0.7	8.9	5
Purdue	1.9	5.5	5.4	1.5	8.7	6
Rhode Island	1.5	6.3	5.7	5.6	12.1	8
Saint Mary’s	6.4	5.8	6.3	-0.7	14.7	11
South Dakota St.	2.9	5.1	4.4	-0.2	9.8	16
USC	-1.4	8.0	4.7	7.0	9.5	5
SMU	-0.7	8.4	4.0	2.8	7.6	7
Tennessee	1.4	6.0	5.7	0.7	6.8	1
Texas Tech	5.1	6.2	6.7	0.6	13.2	3
UCLA	-0.1	6.1	4.9	0.5	4.5	5
Villanova	-3.2	6.7	4.3	3.6	2.3	4
Virginia	-2.9	8.3	4.1	6.2	6.5	2
Virginia Tech	-6.4	6.4	5.8	1.4	-8.0	2
West Virginia	2.8	6.9	6.0	2.3	11.4	3
Wichita St.	9.3	4.9	6.1	0.8	21.8	7

There are a couple of extra things to add to this discussion before you receive your BS in R+Tology.  Most of you by now have thought that it is a lot easier for New Mexico State to dominate in the WAC than it is for Kansas to dominate in the Big 12.  Beating Oklahoma, Kansas State, and Texas Tech is a lot harder than beating Chicago State, Missouri-Kansas City, and Seattle.  Definitely, the strength of the conference must be factored into this equation.  In the last column above, you see a number under the heading of “conf.”  This represents the rating of conferences by strength.  As of today, the SEC is the toughest league in college basketball.  The ACC is number two; the Big 12 is number three; and so on.  The WAC is number 15.  There are 31 Division One conferences, so 15 is about average, while the SEC and ACC are many points better than an average conference.

We do handicap these ratings when we do our March Madness picking.  An ACC team with an R+T rating of 15 is better than a Colonial Athletic Association team with an R+T rating of 23.  A SWAC team with an R+T rating of 7 is like a Big 12 team with a negative R+T rating.

One final adjustment.  When looking at the components of the R+T ratings, notice whether a team’s components are all positive numbers.  In other words, look to see if a team has positive rebounding margins, positive turnover margins (commit less than they force), averages more than 6 steals per game and who limits opponents steals to less than 6 per game.  This is the sign of a complete team, and complete teams frequently beat teams with superior R+T ratings when the other team is not a complete team.

Let’s look at two examples from above.

Dan Hurley has done a great job at Rhode Island, and the Rams are a “complete team.”  They have a positive rebounding margin.  They average more than 6 steals per game and give up less than 6 steals per game, and they have a really nice turnover margin.  Their R+T rating is 12.1, and the Atlantic 10 conference is rated #8.  URI is definitely Sweet 16-worthy with these stats before we begin to look at other factors like shooting percentages and defensive shooting percentages.

Now, let’s look at Michigan State.  The Spartans have a 16.5 R+T rating from the number 6 conference.  However, Sparty averages only 3.5 steals per game and have a negative turnover margin of 4.5.  This is a real warning sign for bracket-pickers.  MSU will dominate on the boards in a matchup against Rhode Island, but the Rams will even up that advantage with a large turnover margins against the Spartans.  If both teams shoot a similar percentage from inside and outside the 3-point line, you have a toss-up game.

Michigan State saw how this lack of being complete hurt them in the past.  In the 2016 NCAA Tournament, the Spartans faced a Middle Tennessee State team that excelled in turnover margin and steals.  The Blue Raiders basically were much quicker than Michigan State, and this is why their turnover margin was so excellent.  They could pressure the ball and play in the passing lanes without giving up easy baskets.  MTSU pulled off the upset thanks to turnover margin equalizing the rebounding margin of their opponent.  The Blue Raiders’ quickness led to a lot of open shots, while Michigan State’s power game did not produce an equivalent number of open shots.  MTSU took MSU out of its game plan and forced the tempo, turning this into a 70-possession game.  Michigan State preferred a 60-64 possession game, and those extra 6-10 possessions per side helped the underdog team.

It is not always this cut and dried.  Other factors have to be considered, and this is where the PiRate Ratings have made substantial changes starting this year.  In past years, we did not give a lot of support to excellent three-point shooting teams, because we favored teams that could get shots from within 5 feet of the basket.  During the last three or four years, the three-point shot has become much more important, essential if you will.  The Golden State Warriors and other NBA teams now rely on advanced analytical data almost as much as Major League Baseball teams.  Three-point shooting has been determined to be as vital as having the relief ace that can enter the World Series in the 6th inning and get six high-leverage outs.  The PiRate Bracket-picking protocol has now incorporated true shooting percentages with R+T ratings and conference strength to refine our ratings.

The game has come down to whether a team can be expected to shoot a certain percentage from inside and outside the 3-point line and whether they can be expected to get extra scoring opportunities.  A combination of these two basic factors will be how we handicap games in the future.  Of course, we will handicap the two factors based on conference strength.

When you look at our spreads each week, you are looking at an algorithm that incorporates and handicaps due to conference strength, expected true shooting percentages and scoring opportunities

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

PiRate Ratings College Basketball Preview for January 13-14, 2018

This Weekend’s PiRate Ratings Spreads of Major Conference Games

Saturday’s Games
Home Team	Visitor	Spread
Tulane	Connecticut	3.8
Temple	Memphis	10.2
South Florida	Cincinnati	-22.9
Tulsa	Wichita St.	-11.6
Duke	Wake Forest	17.3
Florida St.	Syracuse	7.6
Pittsburgh	Georgia Tech	-2.8
Clemson	Miami (Fla.)	4.4
Louisville	Virginia Tech	3.9
Notre Dame	North Carolina	0.5
Kansas	Kansas St.	12.0
Oklahoma	TCU	5.6
Texas Tech	West Virginia	4.8
Iowa St.	Baylor	-4.1
Oklahoma St.	Texas	0.0
Seton Hall	Georgetown	11.6
Xavier	Creighton	2.2
St. John’s	Villanova	-12.5
Michigan St.	Michigan	10.2
Minnesota	Purdue	-8.3
Wyoming	Colorado St.	8.2
San Jose St.	Air Force	0.8
Fresno St.	New Mexico	5.9
Nevada	Utah St.	14.6
Boise St.	San Diego St.	3.3
Arizona	Oregon	8.9
Washington St.	California	5.6
Arizona St.	Oregon St.	15.3
Washington	Stanford	4.5
UCLA	Colorado	10.5
Ole Miss	Florida	-5.0
Georgia	South Carolina	4.9
Mississippi St.	Auburn	-3.3
Vanderbilt	Kentucky	-4.1
Tennessee	Texas A&M	4.7
Arkansas	Missouri	4.9
LSU	Alabama	3.8
Pepperdine	Saint Mary’s	-17.3
San Francisco	Gonzaga	-13.5
Santa Clara	BYU	-10.4
San Diego	Loyola Marymount	11.2
Portland	Pacific	-2.5

Sunday’s Games
Home Team	Visitor	Spread
East Carolina	Houston	-17.2
Virginia	North Carolina St.	14.7
Indiana	Northwestern	0.6
Rutgers	Ohio St.	-6.0
USC	Utah	5.6

This Week’s PiRate Ratings Top 25

Rank	Team	PiRate	Conf.
1	Villanova	121.1	BIGE
2	Purdue	120.0	BTEN
3	Duke	119.7	ACC
4	Michigan St.	119.3	BTEN
5	Kansas	117.6	B12
6	Virginia	117.5	ACC
7	Gonzaga	117.2	WCC
8	Texas Tech	116.9	B12
9	North Carolina	116.2	ACC
10	Cincinnati	116.0	AAC
11	Wichita St.	116.0	AAC
12	West Virginia	115.6	B12
13	Creighton	115.0	BIGE
14	Oklahoma	114.8	B12
15	Xavier	113.7	BIGE
16	Tennessee	113.2	SEC
17	Arizona	113.2	PAC12
18	Arizona St.	113.2	PAC12
19	Clemson	112.9	ACC
20	Notre Dame	112.7	ACC
21	TCU	112.7	B12
22	Florida	112.7	SEC
23	Florida St.	112.5	ACC
24	Auburn	112.4	SEC
25	Michigan	112.1	BTEN

PiRate Ratings By Major Conference

Team	PiRate	Conf.
Cincinnati	116.0	AAC
Wichita St.	116.0	AAC
SMU	110.2	AAC
Houston	110.0	AAC
UCF	105.4	AAC
Temple	105.3	AAC
Tulsa	101.4	AAC
Tulane	101.3	AAC
Connecticut	100.5	AAC
Memphis	98.6	AAC
South Florida	90.1	AAC
East Carolina	89.8	AAC
Duke	119.7	ACC
Virginia	117.5	ACC
North Carolina	116.2	ACC
Clemson	112.9	ACC
Notre Dame	112.7	ACC
Florida St.	112.5	ACC
Miami FL	112.0	ACC
Louisville	110.5	ACC
Virginia Tech	110.1	ACC
Syracuse	108.4	ACC
North Carolina St.	106.8	ACC
Wake Forest	105.4	ACC
Boston College	105.4	ACC
Georgia Tech	102.3	ACC
Pittsburgh	96.5	ACC
Kansas	117.6	B12
Texas Tech	116.9	B12
West Virginia	115.6	B12
Oklahoma	114.8	B12
TCU	112.7	B12
Baylor	110.9	B12
Texas	110.8	B12
Kansas St.	108.6	B12
Oklahoma St.	107.8	B12
Iowa St.	103.8	B12
Villanova	121.1	BIGE
Creighton	115.0	BIGE
Xavier	113.7	BIGE
Seton Hall	112.0	BIGE
Butler	110.3	BIGE
Marquette	110.0	BIGE
Providence	106.8	BIGE
St. John’s	105.6	BIGE
Georgetown	103.9	BIGE
DePaul	103.6	BIGE
Purdue	120.0	BTEN
Michigan St.	119.3	BTEN
Michigan	112.1	BTEN
Ohio St.	112.1	BTEN
Maryland	110.7	BTEN
Penn St.	109.8	BTEN
Minnesota	108.2	BTEN
Northwestern	107.6	BTEN
Wisconsin	105.9	BTEN
Iowa	105.4	BTEN
Illinois	105.4	BTEN
Indiana	104.7	BTEN
Nebraska	104.7	BTEN
Rutgers	103.1	BTEN
Nevada	111.8	MWC
San Diego St.	109.1	MWC
Boise St.	108.9	MWC
UNLV	105.9	MWC
Fresno St.	104.3	MWC
Wyoming	101.9	MWC
New Mexico	101.4	MWC
Utah St.	100.7	MWC
Colorado St.	96.7	MWC
Air Force	92.1	MWC
San Jose St.	89.9	MWC
Arizona	113.2	PAC12
Arizona St.	113.2	PAC12
UCLA	108.7	PAC12
USC	108.7	PAC12
Oregon	107.8	PAC12
Utah	106.6	PAC12
Washington	102.7	PAC12
Colorado	102.2	PAC12
Stanford	101.7	PAC12
Oregon St.	101.4	PAC12
Washington St.	99.0	PAC12
California	96.4	PAC12
Tennessee	113.2	SEC
Florida	112.7	SEC
Auburn	112.4	SEC
Texas A&M	112.0	SEC
Kentucky	112.0	SEC
Arkansas	111.8	SEC
Missouri	110.4	SEC
LSU	108.6	SEC
Alabama	108.3	SEC
Georgia	107.0	SEC
Mississippi St.	105.6	SEC
South Carolina	105.1	SEC
Vanderbilt	104.9	SEC
Mississippi	104.2	SEC
Gonzaga	117.2	WCC
Saint Mary’s	111.3	WCC
BYU	106.5	WCC
San Diego	102.6	WCC
San Francisco	100.7	WCC
Pacific	97.0	WCC
Loyola Marymount	94.4	WCC
Santa Clara	92.6	WCC
Portland	91.5	WCC
Pepperdine	91.0	WCC

10 Mid-Major Teams That Have The Talent And Coaching To Make The Sweet 16
(listed alphabetically)

East Tennessee St.
Conference–Southern
Current Won-Loss Records– 4-0/13-4
Head Coach–Steve Forbes
Family Tree–Bruce Pearl & Gregg Marshall

With the Buccaneers’ win over UNC-Greensboro last night, ETSU remains in a 1st place tie with Furman in the SoCon. ETSU stayed close in their NCAA Tournament game with Florida last year, and this year’s team is a bit better. The Bucs came close to pulling off the upset win at #10 Xavier earlier this season, and they didn’t get embarrassed against Kentucky at Rupp Arena. The Bucs have won 11 of their last 12 with an average scoring margin of 81-64. ETSU plays at Furman next Thursday night.

Middle Tennessee St.
Conference–Conference USA
Current Won-Loss Records–4-0/12-4
Head Coach–Kermit Davis, Jr.
Family Tree–Bob Boyd & Tim Floyd

It should come as no surprise to most basketball fans, especially those in the Big Ten, that the Blue Raiders are a force to be reckoned with. MTSU has won back-to-back second round NCAA Tournament games over Michigan State and Minnesota, before falling in the Round of 32 to strong teams. The Blue Raiders have at times this year played like a top 20 team. In December, they swept Florida Gulf Coast in a rare, back-to-back home and home series; then they won at neighborhood SEC rival Vanderbilt; then they blew Ole Miss off the floor in a home game; before losing close to Auburn in Birmingham in a game where they made a furious comeback to have a chance to win. Then, in Hawaii, they lost close games to USC and Miami. Star forward Nick King has five double-doubles so far, while Giddy Potts is the glue that keeps this team together. His defensive pressure can take opponents out of their offensive game plans.

Next week, MTSU plays on the road at the two toughest venues outside of their own Murphy Athletic Center. On Thursday night, the Blue Raiders visit Marshall, and on Saturday, they face off against chief rival Western Kentucky. If MTSU splits those two games, then they should secure another CUSA regular season title.

Missouri St.
Conference–Missouri Valley
Current Won-Loss Records–3-2/13-5
Head Coach–Paul Lusk
Family Tree–Gene Keady & Matt Painter

With Wichita State moving up to the American Athletic Conference, Missouri State becomes one of multiple contenders for the top spot in the Valley. Under Coach Paul Lusk, a former Purdue assistant, MSU has become a defensive force, especially inside, where the Bears have the best frontcourt in the league, led by top big man Alize Johnson. Johnson currently averages 15.2 points and 11.4 rebounds per game. This team can go eight deep with talented depth, and when their supporting cast is knocking down threes, this team can compete against anybody. MSU has a key game coming up at Drake a week from tomorrow. The winner of that game should be looking down at the rest of the league in the standings into February.

New Mexico St.
Conference–Western Athletic
Current Won-Loss Records–2-0/14-3
Head Coach–Chris Jans
Family Tree–Gregg Marshall

The Aggies might be strong enough to make a Cinderella run into the second weekend of the NCAA Tournament, and even consider themselves a possible Final Four contender. If you think this is impossible, it actually would not be a first in Las Cruces. NMSU has been in the Final Four, and it was no fluke back in 1970 when then coach Lou Henson guided the Aggies to a number three ranking in the polls.

This NMSU team has already made a name for itself with wins over Illinois in a not-so-neutral site game in Chicago and against Miami of Florida in Hawaii. After besting conference rival Grand Canyon by 11 last night, NMSU could run the table in the WAC this year and enter the NCAA Tournament as high as an 11th seed.

The Aggies are undersized and need to rely on pressure man-to-man defense with the occasional full-court press, but they play taller than they are and usually win the rebounding war, where they have a plus 8.7 margin presently.

Northern Kentucky
Conference–Horizon
Current Won-Loss Records–4-1/11-6
Head Coach–John Brannen
Family Tree–John Kresse & Anthony Grant

Until losing at home to Wright State last night, NKU looked like an almost sure thing to return to the NCAA Tournament this year after making their first appearance last year.

The Norse return the three stars that kept the team in the game against Kentucky in the Second Round last year, and it figures that NKU could win a second and even third round game this year, but they have to get there first. With Wright State looking like they could soon make this list, who knows if they will get another shot?

Old Dominion
Conference–Conference USA
Current Won-Loss Records–3-1/12-4
Head Coach–Jeff Jones
Family Tree–Terry Holland

With an ACC championship at Virginia and four Colonial Athletic championships at American, Jeff Jones knows how to win. Old Dominion is one of four talented contenders for the CUSA crown, and most likely just one CUSA will get an invitation. So, it figures that ODU has about a 25% chance of going dancing this year. If they do get there, the Monarchs have the talent to stay around awhile.

ODU wins with its defense, where the Monarchs hold opponents to under 40% shooting from the field and then have a 5.6 rebounding margin and 3.9 turnover margin. At +9.5 in the hustle points, the opponent must shoot lights out or force ODU to shoot around 35% or worse to beat the Monarchs. Keep an eye on 6-10 post man Trey Porter, who appears to be on the cusp of breaking out into a star. In the last 5 games, he has averaged 17.2 points and 7.8 rebounds per game while shooting 62% from the field.

If you are a fan of seeing a great offense go up against a great defense, you may want to tune into tomorrow’s ODU-Marshall game to see how the Monarchs’ defend the D’Antoni seven-second offense.

Rhode Island
Conference–Atlantic 10
Current Won-Loss Records–4-0/12-3
Head Coach–Dan Hurley
Family Tree–Bob Wenzel (student of former Duke coach Bill Foster)

Before Rams’ fans get on our case that URI should be considered a Major and not Mid-Major team, and that they should move up into an at-large proability, we actually agree with you. And, if the Rams continue to win and make it obvious that they are a definite at-large team, we will move the A-10 up into the Major Conference grouping and rank the teams in this league like we are doing for the Mountain West and West Coast Conferences.

Dan Hurley is not getting all the publicity that his little brother has been getting at Arizona State, but the older of the two brothers is doing a smashup job at Rhode Island.
The Rams’ three losses have come to Nevada in Reno, Virginia in Brooklyn, and Alabama in Tuscaloosa. They have wins against Seton Hall, Providence, and Florida Gulf Coast, and they get a chance to pick up another key win tomorrow when they host St. Bonaventure.

URI came close to making the Sweet 16 last year, beating Creighton before losing a heartbreaker to Oregon in the NCAA Tournament.

St. Bonaventure
Conference–Atlantic 10
Current Won-Loss Records–2-2/12-4
Head Coach–Mark Schmidt
Family Tree–Bruce Parkhill and Skip Prosser

The Bonnies have been close to making the Big Dance the last two years, coming up a game or two short. This may be their best team since 1978. With wins over over Maryland and Syracuse, St. Bonaventure has already shown that big time teams do not intimidate this group. A couple of senior leaders, Matt Mobley and Jaylen Adams, make a great one-two punch for the Bonnies, as the two combine to average 35.5 points per game. Earlier this season against UMass, the two combined for 60 points and 9 of 16 from behind the arc. If a dance opponent or two catches the pair this hot, SBU can get to the second weekend of the NCAA Tournament. Of course, they still must earn their way into the dance, and losing back-to-back road games against Dayton and St. Joe’s damaged their at-large chances.

Their game with Rhode Island tomorrow morning is a real test to see if they are tournament worthy.

Vermont
Conference–America East
Current Won-Loss Records–2-0/12-5
Head Coach–John Becker
Family Tree–Mike Lonergan (who was a Gary Williams disciple)

Vermont has become the Villanova of the America East Conference. The Catamounts were overwhelming favorites to win the league this year after returning most of the team that won the league last year and led Purdue for a bit in their NCAA Tournament loss to the Boilermakers.

VU’s most impressive game this year was its opener at Kentucky, where the Catamounts made a furious comeback before falling by four points. Expect the Catamounts to extend their current five-game winning streak well into double digits, and it would not surprise us if VU wins out from here to enter the NCAA Tournament at 29-5.

Forward Anthony Lamb has averaged 22.5 points per game since New Year’s Day, and if guard Ernie Duncan can become more consistent, the Catamounts can make it to the Sweet 16.

Western Kentucky
Conference–Conference USA
Current Won-Loss Records–4-0/12-5
Head Coach–Rick Stansbury
Family Tree–Lake Kelly and Richard Williams

It should be no surprise to long-time basketball fans that Western Kentucky has a team capable of becoming a Sweet 16 entrant in the NCAA Tournament. The Hilltoppers have been there before multiple times, even earning a Final Four berth in 1971, where WKU fell in overtime to Villanova.

This Hilltopper team is not going to remind the old-timers of the Clem Haskins or Jim McDaniel days. However, if you saw this team play in the Battle for Atlantis, they narrowly lost to top-ranked Villanova and then bested Purdue and SMU.
More importantly, WKU went on the road this past week and topped two of the three rivals they must defeat to win the CUSA Championship. The Hilltoppers beat Marshall 112-87 and Old Dominion 75-68, which leaves them currently tied for first with their arch-rival, Middle Tennessee.

In other years, CUSA might qualify two teams for the NCAA Tournament coming from the four teams that on any given night, could knock off a Big Ten or SEC opponent. However, unless one team runs the table in the regular season and then finished runner-up in the CUSA Tournament, it isn’t likely that the league will get an at-large bid.
WKU wins games because they have an incredible number of accurate shooters who know how to get open. All 5 starters average double figure scoring, and Coach Stansbury has a trio of competent rebounders and a duo of great playmakers.

Saturday, January 20, and Thursday, March 1 are the dates when WKU and Middle face off. The first game will be in Bowling Green, so WKU should be a slight favorite.