PiRate Ratings–College Football Week 5

This Week’s PiRate Rating Spreads

Thursday	September 27
Home	Visitor	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Miami (Fla.)	North Carolina	18.6	18.2	19.1

 

Friday	September 28
Home	Visitor	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Tulane	Memphis	-7.4	-9.6	-9.0
Colorado	UCLA	8.0	9.7	12.2

 

Saturday	September 29
Home	Visitor	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Buffalo	Army	2.8	4.8	4.3
Connecticut	Cincinnati	-13.1	-14.6	-14.7
Michigan St.	Central Michigan	40.2	35.2	39.4
Eastern Michigan	Northern Illinois	0.9	1.6	2.1
Ball St.	Kent St.	3.5	4.9	3.3
Wake Forest	Rice	39.5	34.0	38.3
East Carolina	Old Dominion	5.3	1.1	5.3
Georgia Tech	Bowling Green	28.6	27.3	27.8
Boston College	Temple	20.7	17.8	20.0
Clemson	Syracuse	24.2	22.8	25.9
Appalachian St.	South Alabama	16.5	15.9	16.8
Duke	Virginia Tech	6.6	4.7	6.3
Georgia St.	UL-Monroe	-8.1	-5.2	-7.9
Ohio U	Massachusetts	13.2	12.1	12.3
Central Florida	Pittsburgh	14.1	14.5	15.1
Kentucky	South Carolina	2.2	2.0	2.1
North Carolina St.	Virginia	12.8	12.0	13.4
Rutgers	Indiana	-9.2	-9.3	-11.0
Air Force	Nevada	6.5	7.0	6.7
Washington St.	Utah	0.7	1.4	-1.3
Arizona St.	Oregon St.	24.8	25.8	26.3
Washington	BYU	26.1	23.1	27.3
Fresno St.	Toledo	16.0	12.7	15.8
Miami (O)	Western Michigan	-1.3	-1.4	0.3
Louisville	Florida St.	-4.9	-4.1	-5.2
Penn St.	Ohio St.	-2.6	-3.2	-2.9
Georgia Southern	Arkansas St.	-0.4	-0.4	-2.0
Georgia	Tennessee	39.3	35.0	41.7
New Mexico	Liberty	11.6	15.0	11.9
Auburn	Southern Miss.	41.8	37.3	43.5
TCU	Iowa St.	6.3	7.0	5.6
Alabama	Louisiana	63.2	59.2	64.1
Oklahoma	Baylor	18.7	19.4	19.8
UTSA	UTEP	12.3	13.7	13.8
Nebraska	Purdue	-9.5	-9.3	-11.5
Kansas St.	Texas	-6.4	-6.4	-6.9
Texas Tech	West Virginia	-1.9	-2.5	-2.9
North Texas	Louisiana Tech	13.6	13.8	13.4
UAB	Charlotte	17.0	17.0	17.1
Kansas	Oklahoma St.	-10.3	-9.6	-12.7
Western Kentucky	Marshall	-8.4	-7.8	-8.3
Mississippi St.	Florida	11.2	10.4	11.1
LSU	Ole Miss	13.3	13.8	13.9
Troy	Coastal Carolina	14.8	13.0	15.8
Middle Tennessee	Florida Atlantic	-6.5	-5.6	-6.0
Arizona	USC	-3.6	-3.4	-2.5
Wyoming	Boise St.	-14.0	-13.3	-14.7
San Jose St.	Hawaii	1.6	0.1	1.0
Notre Dame	Stanford	4.4	3.5	2.2
Northwestern	Michigan	-12.4	-13.2	-13.1
Texas A&M	Arkansas	17.6	19.0	19.7
California	Oregon	1.6	-1.5	0.6

 

FBS	FCS
Home	Visitor	PiRate
Vanderbilt	Tennessee St.	27.9
SMU	Houston Baptist	34.0
Florida Int’l.	Ark.-Pine Bluff	43.4

 

This Week’s PiRate Ratings

#	Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
1	Alabama	139.0	136.9	140.9	138.9
2	Georgia	131.9	128.2	133.3	131.1
3	Clemson	130.3	127.5	131.1	129.6
4	Ohio St.	129.5	127.3	130.2	129.0
5	Washington	125.5	123.1	127.4	125.3
6	Michigan	124.4	123.2	124.9	124.1
7	Penn St.	123.8	121.1	124.3	123.1
8	Auburn	121.5	120.3	123.7	121.8
9	Michigan St.	122.3	120.1	121.9	121.5
10	Notre Dame	121.7	118.3	120.2	120.0
11	Mississippi St.	120.5	117.8	121.1	119.8
12	Stanford	120.3	117.8	120.9	119.7
13	Oklahoma	119.4	118.1	120.0	119.2
14	Wisconsin	118.1	115.5	117.9	117.2
15	Miami	116.3	114.9	116.1	115.8
16	Duke	115.9	113.5	115.5	115.0
17	Boston College	115.6	112.7	115.5	114.6
18	Missouri	114.5	112.9	115.7	114.3
19	L S U	113.7	113.8	114.7	114.1
20	Texas A&M	114.2	113.0	114.6	113.9
21	Boise St.	113.8	113.0	114.2	113.7
22	S. Carolina	113.9	112.9	113.7	113.5
23	N. Carolina St.	113.7	113.3	113.4	113.5
24	West Virginia	113.8	113.0	113.4	113.4
25	Central Florida	113.1	113.1	113.4	113.2
26	Kentucky	113.1	111.9	112.8	112.6
27	Oklahoma St.	112.8	110.9	113.1	112.2
28	T C U	113.0	112.0	111.8	112.2
29	Virginia Tech	112.3	111.8	112.2	112.1
30	Florida	112.4	110.5	113.0	111.9
31	Texas	112.6	111.2	112.0	111.9
32	Iowa	112.9	110.4	112.1	111.8
33	Oregon	111.1	111.3	111.7	111.4
34	Utah	111.4	109.6	112.3	111.1
35	Fresno St.	110.3	108.6	110.2	109.7
36	Iowa State	109.7	107.9	109.1	108.9
37	Northwestern	109.4	107.5	109.2	108.7
38	California	109.7	106.9	109.3	108.6
39	Washington St.	109.1	108.1	108.0	108.4
40	Syracuse	109.1	107.7	108.2	108.3
41	U S C	108.9	107.1	108.1	108.0
42	Texas Tech	108.8	107.4	107.5	107.9
43	Arizona St.	108.3	106.9	108.0	107.7
44	Georgia Tech	108.3	107.0	107.6	107.7
45	Purdue	107.3	105.6	106.9	106.6
46	N. Texas	104.6	107.1	105.6	105.7
47	Florida St.	106.1	105.4	105.6	105.7
48	Wake Forest	106.9	104.4	104.4	105.2
49	Memphis	103.6	105.8	104.7	104.7
50	Utah St.	103.4	104.7	104.7	104.3
51	Virginia	103.9	104.4	103.0	103.8
52	Maryland	104.5	103.1	103.6	103.7
53	Ole Miss	103.4	103.1	103.8	103.4
54	Minnesota	103.4	102.9	103.3	103.2
55	Houston	102.6	103.4	102.8	102.9
56	Baylor	103.7	101.7	103.2	102.9
57	BYU	102.4	103.0	103.1	102.8
58	Colorado	101.4	103.0	102.7	102.4
59	Kansas St.	103.2	101.8	102.0	102.3
60	Arizona	102.4	100.8	102.6	101.9
61	Pittsburgh	102.0	101.6	101.3	101.7
62	Vanderbilt	100.7	101.3	100.6	100.9
63	Buffalo	99.2	101.5	100.5	100.4
64	N. Carolina	100.7	99.7	100.0	100.2
65	San Diego St.	99.5	99.9	100.4	99.9
66	Indiana	99.4	98.7	99.2	99.1
67	Army	98.8	99.2	98.7	98.9
68	South Florida	97.9	100.0	97.9	98.6
69	Florida Atlantic	98.2	98.5	98.7	98.5
70	Toledo	97.8	99.5	97.9	98.4
71	Kansas	99.5	98.2	97.4	98.4
72	Arkansas	99.6	96.9	97.9	98.1
73	Temple	97.9	97.9	98.5	98.1
74	Louisville	98.2	98.2	97.4	97.9
75	Wyoming	96.8	96.7	96.6	96.7
76	Appalachian St.	95.5	97.0	96.8	96.4
77	Navy	95.3	97.8	94.9	96.0
78	Marshall	94.5	97.2	95.6	95.8
79	Tennessee	95.6	96.2	94.5	95.4
80	U C L A	96.5	96.3	93.5	95.4
81	Akron	94.7	95.9	95.0	95.2
82	Louisiana Tech	94.0	96.3	95.3	95.2
83	Northern Illinois	95.0	95.5	94.6	95.0
84	Ohio U	93.8	94.9	94.3	94.3
85	Eastern Michigan	93.3	94.7	94.2	94.1
86	Cincinnati	93.3	95.0	93.6	93.9
87	Nebraska	94.8	93.3	92.4	93.5
88	Air Force	93.4	93.7	93.2	93.4
89	Tulane	93.2	93.2	92.7	93.0
90	Western Michigan	91.9	93.7	92.9	92.9
91	Troy	91.3	92.5	92.8	92.2
92	Illinois	91.6	91.3	90.6	91.2
93	SMU	91.7	91.1	90.7	91.2
94	Arkansas St.	89.9	91.4	91.8	91.0
95	Florida Int’l.	89.1	93.2	89.9	90.7
96	U N L V	89.7	91.2	90.1	90.3
97	Tulsa	90.6	89.4	90.9	90.3
98	U A B	89.1	91.3	89.3	89.9
99	Middle Tennessee	89.2	90.4	90.1	89.9
100	Nevada	89.9	89.7	89.5	89.7
101	Miami (O)	88.1	89.9	90.7	89.6
102	New Mexico	87.1	89.0	87.4	87.8
103	Georgia Southern	86.5	87.9	86.8	87.1
104	Rutgers	87.7	86.8	85.8	86.8
105	UL-Monroe	86.3	85.9	86.8	86.4
106	East Carolina	86.3	86.1	86.1	86.2
107	Central Michigan	84.2	86.9	84.6	85.2
108	W. Kentucky	83.7	86.9	84.8	85.1
109	Oregon St.	86.5	84.1	84.7	85.1
110	Massachusetts	83.6	85.8	85.0	84.8
111	Old Dominion	83.5	87.5	83.3	84.8
112	Southern Miss.	82.7	85.9	83.2	84.0
113	South Alabama	81.9	84.1	82.9	83.0
114	Colo. State	82.7	83.5	82.6	82.9
115	Bowling Green	82.2	82.3	82.3	82.3
116	Ball St.	81.5	83.9	81.0	82.1
117	Hawaii	80.6	82.9	79.4	81.0
118	Kent St.	80.5	81.5	80.1	80.7
119	Coastal Carolina	79.5	82.5	80.1	80.7
120	U T S A	78.8	83.1	79.4	80.5
121	Louisiana	78.8	80.7	79.8	79.8
122	Liberty	79.0	77.5	79.0	78.5
123	San Jose St.	78.7	79.5	76.9	78.4
124	Connecticut	77.7	77.9	76.4	77.3
125	Georgia St.	75.8	78.2	76.4	76.8
126	N. Mexico St.	74.7	76.9	74.8	75.5
127	Charlotte	74.6	76.9	74.7	75.4
128	Texas State	71.1	74.3	70.7	72.0
129	Rice	70.4	73.4	69.1	71.0
130	U T E P	68.5	71.5	67.7	69.2

 

PiRate Rating By Conference

American Athletic Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	AAC	Overall
Central Florida	113.1	113.1	113.4	113.2	1-0	3-0
South Florida	97.9	100.0	97.9	98.6	1-0	4-0
Temple	97.9	97.9	98.5	98.1	1-0	2-2
Cincinnati	93.3	95.0	93.6	93.9	0-0	4-0
East Carolina	86.3	86.1	86.1	86.2	0-1	1-2
Connecticut	77.7	77.9	76.4	77.3	0-1	1-3
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	AAC	Overall
Memphis	103.6	105.8	104.7	104.7	0-1	3-1
Houston	102.6	103.4	102.8	102.9	0-0	3-1
Navy	95.3	97.8	94.9	96.0	1-1	2-2
Tulane	93.2	93.2	92.7	93.0	0-0	1-3
SMU	91.7	91.1	90.7	91.2	1-0	1-3
Tulsa	90.6	89.4	90.9	90.3	0-1	1-3
AAC Averages	95.3	95.9	95.2	95.5
Atlantic Coast Conference
Atlantic Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	ACC	Overall
Clemson	130.3	127.5	131.1	129.6	1-0	4-0
Boston College	115.6	112.7	115.5	114.6	1-0	3-1
N. Carolina St.	113.7	113.3	113.4	113.5	0-0	3-0
Syracuse	109.1	107.7	108.2	108.3	1-0	4-0
Florida St.	106.1	105.4	105.6	105.7	0-2	2-2
Wake Forest	106.9	104.4	104.4	105.2	0-1	2-2
Louisville	98.2	98.2	97.4	97.9	0-1	2-2
Coastal Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	ACC	Overall
Miami	116.3	114.9	116.1	115.8	0-0	3-1
Duke	115.9	113.5	115.5	115.0	0-0	4-0
Virginia Tech	112.3	111.8	112.2	112.1	1-0	2-1
Georgia Tech	108.3	107.0	107.6	107.7	0-2	1-3
Virginia	103.9	104.4	103.0	103.8	1-0	3-1
Pittsburgh	102.0	101.6	101.3	101.7	1-1	2-2
N. Carolina	100.7	99.7	100.0	100.2	1-0	1-2
ACC Averages	110.0	108.7	109.4	109.4
Big 12 Conference
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	B12	Overall
Oklahoma	119.4	118.1	120.0	119.2	1-0	4-0
West Virginia	113.8	113.0	113.4	113.4	1-0	3-0
Oklahoma St.	112.8	110.9	113.1	112.2	0-1	3-1
T C U	113.0	112.0	111.8	112.2	0-1	2-2
Texas	112.6	111.2	112.0	111.9	1-0	3-1
Iowa State	109.7	107.9	109.1	108.9	0-1	1-2
Texas Tech	108.8	107.4	107.5	107.9	1-0	3-1
Baylor	103.7	101.7	103.2	102.9	1-0	3-1
Kansas St.	103.2	101.8	102.0	102.3	0-1	2-2
Kansas	99.5	98.2	97.4	98.4	0-1	2-2
Big 12 Averages	109.6	108.2	108.9	108.9
Big Ten Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	BTen	Overall
Ohio St.	129.5	127.3	130.2	129.0	1-0	4-0
Michigan	124.4	123.2	124.9	124.1	1-0	3-1
Penn St.	123.8	121.1	124.3	123.1	1-0	4-0
Michigan St.	122.3	120.1	121.9	121.5	1-0	2-1
Maryland	104.5	103.1	103.6	103.7	1-0	3-1
Indiana	99.4	98.7	99.2	99.1	0-1	3-1
Rutgers	87.7	86.8	85.8	86.8	0-1	1-3
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	BTen	Overall
Wisconsin	118.1	115.5	117.9	117.2	1-0	3-1
Iowa	112.9	110.4	112.1	111.8	0-1	3-1
Northwestern	109.4	107.5	109.2	108.7	1-0	1-2
Purdue	107.3	105.6	106.9	106.6	0-1	1-3
Minnesota	103.4	102.9	103.3	103.2	0-1	3-1
Nebraska	94.8	93.3	92.4	93.5	0-1	0-3
Illinois	91.6	91.3	90.6	91.2	0-1	2-2
Big Ten Averages	109.2	107.6	108.7	108.5
Conference USA
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	CUSA	Overall
Florida Atlantic	98.2	98.5	98.7	98.5	0-0	2-2
Marshall	94.5	97.2	95.6	95.8	0-0	2-1
Florida Int’l.	89.1	93.2	89.9	90.7	1-0	2-2
Middle Tennessee	89.2	90.4	90.1	89.9	0-0	1-2
W. Kentucky	83.7	86.9	84.8	85.1	0-0	1-3
Old Dominion	83.5	87.5	83.3	84.8	0-2	1-3
Charlotte	74.6	76.9	74.7	75.4	1-0	2-2
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	CUSA	Overall
N. Texas	104.6	107.1	105.6	105.7	0-0	4-0
Louisiana Tech	94.0	96.3	95.3	95.2	0-0	2-1
U A B	89.1	91.3	89.3	89.9	0-0	2-1
Southern Miss.	82.7	85.9	83.2	84.0	1-0	2-1
U T S A	78.8	83.1	79.4	80.5	0-0	1-3
Rice	70.4	73.4	69.1	71.0	0-1	1-3
U T E P	68.5	71.5	67.7	69.2	0-0	0-4
CUSA Averages	85.8	88.5	86.2	86.8
FBS Independents
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	Conf.	Overall
Notre Dame	121.7	118.3	120.2	120.0	x	4-0
BYU	102.4	103.0	103.1	102.8	x	3-1
Army	98.8	99.2	98.7	98.9	x	2-2
Massachusetts	83.6	85.8	85.0	84.8	x	2-3
Liberty	79.0	77.5	79.0	78.5	x	1-2
N. Mexico St.	74.7	76.9	74.8	75.5	x	1-4
Indep. Averages	93.4	93.4	93.5	93.4
Mid-American Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	MAC	Overall
Buffalo	99.2	101.5	100.5	100.4	1-0	4-0
Akron	94.7	95.9	95.0	95.2	0-0	2-1
Ohio U	93.8	94.9	94.3	94.3	0-0	1-2
Miami (O)	88.1	89.9	90.7	89.6	1-0	1-3
Bowling Green	82.2	82.3	82.3	82.3	0-1	1-3
Kent St.	80.5	81.5	80.1	80.7	0-0	1-3
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	MAC	Overall
Toledo	97.8	99.5	97.9	98.4	0-0	2-1
Northern Illinois	95.0	95.5	94.6	95.0	1-0	1-3
Eastern Michigan	93.3	94.7	94.2	94.1	0-1	2-2
Western Michigan	91.9	93.7	92.9	92.9	0-0	2-2
Central Michigan	84.2	86.9	84.6	85.2	0-1	1-3
Ball St.	81.5	83.9	81.0	82.1	0-0	1-3
MAC Averages	90.2	91.7	90.7	90.9
Mountain West Conference
Mountain Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	MWC	Overall
Boise St.	113.8	113.0	114.2	113.7	0-0	2-1
Utah St.	103.4	104.7	104.7	104.3	1-0	3-1
Wyoming	96.8	96.7	96.6	96.7	0-0	2-2
Air Force	93.4	93.7	93.2	93.4	0-1	1-2
New Mexico	87.1	89.0	87.4	87.8	0-0	2-1
Colo. State	82.7	83.5	82.6	82.9	0-1	1-4
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	MWC	Overall
Fresno St.	110.3	108.6	110.2	109.7	0-0	2-1
San Diego St.	99.5	99.9	100.4	99.9	0-0	3-1
U N L V	89.7	91.2	90.1	90.3	0-0	2-2
Nevada	89.9	89.7	89.5	89.7	0-0	2-2
Hawaii	80.6	82.9	79.4	81.0	1-0	4-1
San Jose St.	78.7	79.5	76.9	78.4	0-0	0-3
MWC Averages	93.8	94.4	93.8	94.0
Pac-12 Conference
North Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	P12	Overall
Washington	125.5	123.1	127.4	125.3	2-0	3-1
Stanford	120.3	117.8	120.9	119.7	2-0	4-0
Oregon	111.1	111.3	111.7	111.4	0-1	3-1
Washington St.	109.1	108.1	108.0	108.4	0-1	3-1
California	109.7	106.9	109.3	108.6	0-0	3-0
Oregon St.	86.5	84.1	84.7	85.1	0-1	1-3
South Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	P12	Overall
Utah	111.4	109.6	112.3	111.1	0-1	2-1
U S C	108.9	107.1	108.1	108.0	1-1	2-2
Arizona St.	108.3	106.9	108.0	107.7	0-1	2-2
Colorado	101.4	103.0	102.7	102.4	0-0	3-0
Arizona	102.4	100.8	102.6	101.9	1-0	2-2
U C L A	96.5	96.3	93.5	95.4	0-0	0-3
Pac-12 Averages	107.6	106.2	107.4	107.1
Southeastern Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	SEC	Overall
Georgia	131.9	128.2	133.3	131.1	2-0	4-0
Missouri	114.5	112.9	115.7	114.3	0-1	3-1
S. Carolina	113.9	112.9	113.7	113.5	1-1	2-1
Kentucky	113.1	111.9	112.8	112.6	2-0	4-0
Florida	112.4	110.5	113.0	111.9	1-1	3-1
Vanderbilt	100.7	101.3	100.6	100.9	0-1	2-2
Tennessee	95.6	96.2	94.5	95.4	0-1	2-2
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	SEC	Overall
Alabama	139.0	136.9	140.9	138.9	2-0	4-0
Auburn	121.5	120.3	123.7	121.8	1-1	3-1
Mississippi St.	120.5	117.8	121.1	119.8	0-1	3-1
L S U	113.7	113.8	114.7	114.1	1-0	4-0
Texas A&M	114.2	113.0	114.6	113.9	0-1	2-2
Ole Miss	103.4	103.1	103.8	103.4	0-1	3-1
Arkansas	99.6	96.9	97.9	98.1	0-1	1-3
SEC Averages	113.8	112.5	114.3	113.6
Sunbelt Conference
East Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	SBC	Overall
Appalachian St.	95.5	97.0	96.8	96.4	0-0	2-1
Troy	91.3	92.5	92.8	92.2	1-0	3-1
Georgia Southern	86.5	87.9	86.8	87.1	0-0	2-1
Coastal Carolina	79.5	82.5	80.1	80.7	1-0	3-1
Georgia St.	75.8	78.2	76.4	76.8	0-0	1-3
West Division
Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average	SBC	Overall
Arkansas St.	89.9	91.4	91.8	91.0	0-0	3-1
UL-Monroe	86.3	85.9	86.8	86.4	0-1	2-2
South Alabama	81.9	84.1	82.9	83.0	1-0	1-3
Louisiana	78.8	80.7	79.8	79.8	0-1	1-2
Texas State	71.1	74.3	70.7	72.0	0-1	1-3
Sun Belt Averages	83.7	85.4	84.5	84.5

 

The Conference Ratings

 

#	League	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
1	SEC	113.8	112.5	114.3	113.6
2	ACC	110.0	108.7	109.4	109.4
3	B12	109.6	108.2	108.9	108.9
4	BTEN	109.2	107.6	108.7	108.5
5	P-12	107.6	106.2	107.4	107.1
6	AAC	95.3	95.9	95.2	95.5
7	MWC	93.8	94.4	93.8	94.0
8	IND	93.4	93.4	93.5	93.4
9	MAC	90.2	91.7	90.7	90.9
10	CUSA	85.8	88.5	86.2	86.8
11	SUN	83.7	85.4	84.5	84.5

Top 5 Group of 5 Teams

1. Central Florida

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

 

Best TV Games This Week

All Game Times, Eastern Daylight

Games in Red Are Top 3 of the Day

Time	Home Team	Visitor	Network
12:00 PM	Clemson	Syracuse	ABC
12:00 PM	Buffalo	Army	CBSSN
12:00 PM	Texas Tech	West Virginia	ESPN2
12:20 PM	North Carolina St.	Virginia	ACCN
3:30 PM	Kansas St.	Texas	FS1
4:30 PM	Northwestern	Michigan	Fox
6:00 PM	Mississippi St.	Florida	ESPN
6:00 PM	Washington St.	Utah	Pac-12
7:00 PM	Duke	Virginia Tech	ESPN2
7:30 PM	Penn St.	Ohio St.	ABC
7:30 PM	Notre Dame	Stanford	NBC
7:30 PM	Kentucky	South Carolina	SEC
9:15 PM	LSU	Ole Miss	ESPN
10:30 PM	Fresno St.	Toledo	ESPNU
10:30 PM	California	Oregon	FS1

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Advertisements

PiRate Ratings NFL Forecast For Week 16: December 23-25, 2017

This Week’s PiRate Rating Spreads

Home	Visitor	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Total
Baltimore	Indianapolis	16.5	16.3	17.2	44
Green Bay	Minnesota	-6.3	-5.3	-7.6	39
Cincinnati	Detroit	-3.7	-3.3	-4.0	43
N. Y. Jets	LA Chargers	-6.6	-6.6	-6.8	41
Tennessee	LA Rams	-6.9	-6.0	-8.1	47
Chicago	Cleveland	7.9	7.3	11.0	34
Carolina	Tampa Bay	8.8	8.0	9.2	49
New Orleans	Atlanta	6.0	5.7	6.4	55
Washington	Denver	4.5	4.7	4.3	43
Kansas City	Miami	9.8	9.7	10.5	44
New England	Buffalo	14.2	13.9	14.2	42
San Francisco	Jacksonville	-7.3	-7.4	-7.5	45
Arizona	N. Y. Giants	5.6	5.1	5.8	41
Dallas	Seattle	4.1	3.5	4.8	45
Houston	Pittsburgh	-10.2	-10.1	-11.0	45
Philadelphia	Oakland	12.9	11.0	14.8	47

 

This Week’s PiRate Ratings

A F C
East	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Avg	Totals	W-L
New England	108.0	108.1	108.1	108.0	22	11-3
Buffalo	96.3	96.6	96.4	96.4	20	8-6
Miami	96.1	96.2	95.6	96.0	21	6-8
N. Y. Jets	94.3	94.0	94.4	94.3	18	5-9
North	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Avg	Totals	W-L
Baltimore	105.9	106.1	106.1	106.0	22	8-6
Pittsburgh	105.6	105.7	105.8	105.7	23	11-3
Cincinnati	94.2	95.0	93.8	94.4	16	5-9
Cleveland	91.0	91.7	88.1	90.2	17	0-14
South	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Avg	Totals	W-L
Jacksonville	104.9	104.7	105.1	104.9	22	10-4
Tennessee	97.6	97.8	97.2	97.5	22	8-6
Houston	92.4	92.6	91.8	92.3	22	4-10
Indianapolis	91.9	92.3	91.3	91.8	22	3-11
West	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Avg	Totals	W-L
LA Chargers	104.5	104.1	104.7	104.4	23	7-7
Kansas City	102.8	102.9	103.2	103.0	23	8-6
Oakland	97.5	98.1	96.7	97.4	22	6-8
Denver	96.1	95.9	96.0	96.0	19	5-9
N F C
East	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Avg	Totals	W-L
Philadelphia	106.9	105.6	108.0	106.8	25	12-2
Dallas	102.9	102.4	102.9	102.8	24	8-6
Washington	97.5	97.7	97.3	97.5	24	6-8
N.Y. Giants	93.0	93.5	92.7	93.1	20	2-12
North	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Avg	Totals	W-L
Minnesota	106.9	106.5	107.6	107.0	18	11-3
Detroit	100.5	100.8	100.3	100.6	27	8-6
Green Bay	98.7	99.2	98.0	98.6	21	7-7
Chicago	96.4	96.5	96.5	96.5	17	4-10
South	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Avg	Totals	W-L
New Orleans	107.2	106.6	107.7	107.2	29	10-4
Atlanta	104.1	103.9	104.3	104.1	26	9-5
Carolina	103.5	102.7	104.0	103.4	27	10-4
Tampa Bay	97.2	97.2	97.4	97.3	22	4-10
West	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Avg	Totals	W-L
LA Rams	107.5	106.8	108.3	107.5	25	10-4
Seattle	101.8	102.0	101.1	101.6	21	8-6
Arizona	95.7	95.6	95.5	95.6	21	6-8
San Francisco	94.5	94.3	94.6	94.5	23	4-10

 

This Week’s Playoff Projections

AFC Seeding
1	New England
2	Pittsburgh
3	Jacksonville
4	Kansas City
5	Baltimore
6	LA Chargers
NFC Seeding
1	Philadelphia
2	Minnesota
3	LA Rams
4	New Orleans
5	Carolina
6	Atlanta

Wildcard Round

Jacksonville over LA Chargers

Baltimore over Kansas City

LA Rams over Atlanta

New Orleans over Carolina

Divisional Round

New England over Baltimore

Pittsburgh over Jacksonville

New Orleans over Philadelphia

Minnesota over LA Rams

Conference Championship

Pittsburgh over New England

Minnesota over New Orleans

Super Bowl 52

Pittsburgh over Minnesota

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

PiRate Ratings NFL Forecast For Week 15: December 14-18, 2017

This Week’s PiRate Rating Spreads

Home	Visitor	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Total
Indianapolis	Denver	0.5	0.8	0.3	41
Detroit	Chicago	6.2	6.5	5.7	45
Kansas City	LA Chargers	-1.7	-0.8	-2.0	46
N. Y. Giants	Philadelphia	-12.6	-10.6	-14.6	43
Carolina	Green Bay	7.1	5.8	8.3	48
Minnesota	Cincinnati	12.9	11.7	14.0	35
Buffalo	Miami	2.4	2.8	2.7	41
Jacksonville	Houston	11.1	10.8	11.8	44
New Orleans	N. Y. Jets	16.2	16.0	16.6	47
Washington	Arizona	5.4	5.5	5.3	47
Cleveland	Baltimore	-12.0	-11.7	-12.2	39
Seattle	LA Rams	2.4	3.0	1.4	46
Pittsburgh	New England	1.1	1.0	1.1	45
San Francisco	Tennessee	0.2	0.0	0.7	45
Oakland	Dallas	-1.9	-0.9	-2.7	47
Tampa Bay	Atlanta	-4.5	-4.2	-4.4	48

 

This Week’s PiRate Ratings

A F C
East	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Avg	Totals	W-L
New England	107.8	107.9	107.9	107.8	22	10-3
Miami	96.5	96.5	96.1	96.4	21	6-7
Buffalo	95.9	96.3	95.9	96.0	20	7-6
N. Y. Jets	94.1	93.8	94.2	94.1	18	5-8
North	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Avg	Totals	W-L
Pittsburgh	105.8	105.9	106.0	105.9	23	11-2
Baltimore	105.7	106.0	105.8	105.8	22	7-6
Cincinnati	95.6	96.4	95.2	95.8	17	5-8
Cleveland	91.2	91.8	91.1	91.3	17	0-13
South	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Avg	Totals	W-L
Jacksonville	102.7	102.6	102.8	102.7	22	9-4
Tennessee	97.7	97.8	97.3	97.6	22	8-5
Houston	94.6	94.7	94.1	94.5	22	4-9
Indianapolis	93.0	93.3	92.5	92.9	22	3-10
West	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Avg	Totals	W-L
LA Chargers	105.8	105.1	106.2	105.7	23	7-6
Kansas City	101.0	101.4	101.2	101.2	23	7-6
Oakland	97.5	98.1	96.7	97.4	23	6-7
Denver	95.0	94.9	94.8	94.9	19	4-9
N F C
East	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Avg	Totals	W-L
Philadelphia	107.4	106.0	108.8	107.4	25	11-2
Dallas	102.4	101.9	102.4	102.3	24	7-6
Washington	97.5	97.7	97.3	97.5	25	5-8
N.Y. Giants	92.8	93.4	92.2	92.8	18	2-11
North	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Avg	Totals	W-L
Minnesota	105.5	105.1	106.2	105.6	18	10-3
Detroit	100.3	100.6	100.0	100.3	27	7-6
Green Bay	99.4	99.9	98.7	99.3	21	7-6
Chicago	96.6	96.7	96.8	96.7	18	4-9
South	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Avg	Totals	W-L
New Orleans	107.4	106.8	107.9	107.4	29	9-4
Atlanta	104.1	103.9	104.3	104.1	26	8-5
Carolina	103.5	102.7	104.0	103.4	27	9-4
Tampa Bay	97.2	97.2	97.4	97.3	22	4-9
West	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Avg	Totals	W-L
LA Rams	104.9	104.4	105.5	104.9	25	9-4
Seattle	104.4	104.4	103.9	104.2	21	8-5
Arizona	95.7	95.6	95.5	95.6	22	6-7
San Francisco	94.4	94.3	94.5	94.4	23	3-10

NFL Playoff Projections

Beginning this week, we look forward predicting the outcomes of every game and then use the NFL tiebreaker system to forecast seeds.  Prior to week 15, we use only the PiRate Ratings themselves to estimate won-loss record.

This week, we have Seattle winning a tiebreaker over the Rams for the NFC West, with the Rams getting a wildcard, and we have the Saints winning a tiebreaker over the Panthers in the NFC South, with the Panthers getting the other wildcard.

In the AFC, we still show New England getting the top seed by virtue of a road win against the Steelers.  We have the Chargers edging the Chiefs in the AFC West, but we show KC getting the last playoff spot due to a possible 4-game collapse by Tennessee.

This is rather sketchy and only one possible outcome for the season.  Obviously, by this time next week, the probabilities will be drastically reduced with many key games.

AFC Seeding
1	New England
2	Pittsburgh
3	Jacksonville
4	LA Chargers
5	Baltimore
6	Kansas City
NFC Seeding
1	Philadelphia
2	Minnesota
3	New Orleans
4	Seattle
5	LA Rams
6	Carolina

Wildcard Round

Jacksonville over Kansas City

LA Chargers over Baltimore

New Orleans over Carolina

Seattle over LA Rams

Divisional Round

New England over LA Chargers

Jacksonville over Pittsburgh

Seattle over Philadelphia

Minnesota over New Orleans

Conference Championship

New England over Jacksonville

Minnesota over Seattle

Super Bowl 52

New England over Minnesota

 

 

 

 

 

 

PiRate Ratings College Football Final Regular Season Polls

The PiRate Poll has been updated after the Conference Championship Games, and our ratings show something different from what the Playoff Committee will decide later today.

Our Retrodictive Ratings are our closest approximation to merit based rewards.  It only factors who you beat, where you beat them, when you beat them, and in minimal fashion how you beat them.  Here are our final Retro Ratings prior to the bowls and playoffs.

PiRate Retrodictive
#	Team
1	Clemson
2	Georgia
3	Oklahoma
4	Alabama
5	Ohio St.
6	Wisconsin
7	Central Florida
8	Penn St.
9	Auburn
10	Washington
11	Miami (Fla)
12	USC
13	Notre Dame
14	TCU
15	Virginia Tech
16	Oklahoma St.
17	Stanford
18	Michigan St.
19	Michigan
20	Washington St.
21	Northwestern
22	Memphis
23	LSU
24	North Carolina St.
25	Iowa
26	Louisville
27	Mississippi St.
28	Boston College
29	South Florida
30	Iowa St.
31	Boise St.
32	Toledo
33	Wake Forest
34	South Carolina
35	San Diego St.
36	Oregon
37	Florida Atlantic
38	Florida St.
39	Arizona St.
40	Texas A&M
41	Texas
42	West Virginia
43	Purdue
44	Georgia Tech
45	Kansas St.
46	Missouri
47	Arizona
48	Fresno St.
49	UCLA
50	Navy
51	Troy
52	Houston
53	Texas Tech
54	Utah
55	Army
56	Kentucky
57	Duke
58	SMU
59	Northern Illinois
60	Indiana
61	Virginia
62	North Texas
63	California
64	Ole Miss
65	Ohio
66	Pittsburgh
67	Central Michigan
68	Minnesota
69	Florida
70	Syracuse
71	Maryland
72	Wyoming
73	Marshall
74	Appalachian St.
75	Colorado
76	Colorado St.
77	Temple
78	Nebraska
79	Western Michigan
80	Tulane
81	Arkansas St.
82	Florida Int’l.
83	Akron
84	Southern Miss.
85	Vanderbilt
86	Buffalo
87	Arkansas
88	UAB
89	Tennessee
90	Utah St.
91	North Carolina
92	Eastern Michigan
93	Rutgers
94	Air Force
95	Louisiana Tech
96	Middle Tennessee
97	UTSA
98	Miami (O)
99	Cincinnati
100	Western Kentucky
101	Tulsa
102	UNLV
103	Baylor
104	New Mexico St.
105	BYU
106	East Carolina
107	Nevada
108	Georgia St.
109	Massachusetts
110	Connecticut
111	Illinois
112	Old Dominion
113	UL-Monroe
114	Bowling Green
115	New Mexico
116	Idaho
117	South Alabama
118	UL-Lafayette
119	Oregon St.
120	Hawaii
121	Coastal Carolina
122	Georgia Southern
123	Kansas
124	Kent St.
125	Ball St.
126	Rice
127	Charlotte
128	Texas St.
129	San Jose St.
130	UTEP

While our ratings show that Alabama should be chosen ahead of Ohio State, we believe there will be too much pressure to take two SEC teams and leave out the Big Ten and Pac-12, especially when the Rose Bowl is one of the semifinal games.

Our ratings reflect a 34-point loss by Ohio State at a mediocre Iowa team combined with a home loss to Oklahoma, which slightly offsets their wins over Michigan State, Penn State, and Wisconsin.  Alabama’s best wins were not as impressive as the Buckeyes, but as a whole, they did beat more decent teams, and the SEC is several points better than the Big Ten.  Plus, their one loss was at Auburn, a team that had just blown Georgia off the Jordan-Hare Field.  Truth be told, if the Committee deferred to the smart guys in Nevada, Alabama would be the number one seed in the playoffs.

Our Predictive ratings back us up on this point.  However, the predictive ratings show that Ohio State is one of the four best teams at this point of the season.  We are scratching our heads on why Oklahoma is so low in the predictive ratings, because they have been improving week by week.  Unfortunately, they may have fallen between the cracks in how we update.  We have a mechanical update based on statistics and the point in which an easy win was already guaranteed, and maybe OU kept missing out on extra points due to a few yards here or there.

PiRate Ratings
#	Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
1	Alabama	135.6	132.3	134.3	134.1
2	Clemson	132.8	129.9	132.6	131.8
3	Ohio St.	132.0	129.9	132.3	131.4
4	Georgia	130.6	129.9	131.2	130.6
5	Auburn	129.4	127.3	129.6	128.8
6	Penn St.	129.0	127.9	129.3	128.7
7	Oklahoma	128.2	126.7	129.4	128.1
8	Washington	126.6	124.4	126.6	125.9
9	Wisconsin	125.7	123.2	124.8	124.6
10	Oklahoma St.	120.6	119.9	121.0	120.5
11	U S C	120.4	119.5	120.1	120.0
12	Stanford	120.7	119.1	120.1	120.0
13	Miami	119.3	118.1	118.2	118.5
14	L S U	119.1	116.7	119.6	118.5
15	Virginia Tech	118.7	118.1	118.5	118.4
16	Louisville	117.9	116.9	117.8	117.5
17	T C U	117.9	116.4	118.0	117.4
18	Florida St.	116.9	115.9	115.4	116.1
19	Notre Dame	116.0	115.0	116.0	115.6
20	N. Carolina St.	115.9	115.1	115.7	115.6
21	Michigan	115.8	115.5	115.1	115.5
22	Northwestern	115.6	114.4	115.7	115.2
23	Central Florida	113.6	114.8	114.8	114.4
24	Iowa	114.1	114.4	113.3	114.0
25	Memphis	113.5	112.7	114.4	113.5
26	Iowa State	112.5	112.6	113.5	112.9
27	Boston College	112.8	112.4	112.9	112.7
28	Washington St.	113.3	111.2	112.8	112.4
29	Mississippi St.	112.4	112.4	112.0	112.3
30	Texas	111.8	112.1	112.4	112.1
31	Kansas St.	111.8	111.8	111.8	111.8
32	Wake Forest	112.2	110.5	112.3	111.7
33	Oregon	112.3	110.2	111.7	111.4
34	Duke	110.4	109.4	109.5	109.8
35	Georgia Tech	110.2	108.4	108.7	109.1
36	South Florida	109.0	108.2	109.3	108.8
37	Missouri	109.6	107.9	108.9	108.8
38	West Virginia	108.4	109.0	108.5	108.6
39	Pittsburgh	108.8	108.1	108.7	108.5
40	Utah	108.2	108.3	108.3	108.3
41	Michigan St.	107.5	108.1	108.6	108.1
42	Arizona St.	107.6	106.4	107.3	107.1
43	S. Carolina	107.5	106.8	106.5	106.9
44	Texas A&M	107.8	105.9	106.9	106.9
45	Indiana	105.5	105.6	105.9	105.7
46	Ole Miss	106.3	105.0	105.4	105.6
47	Purdue	105.4	105.3	105.9	105.5
48	Kentucky	106.2	105.5	104.8	105.5
49	Arizona	106.2	105.0	105.1	105.4
50	Florida	105.7	105.4	105.1	105.4
51	Boise St.	105.7	104.5	105.8	105.3
52	Texas Tech	105.2	104.9	104.8	105.0
53	Toledo	103.6	103.6	105.6	104.3
54	California	105.3	103.2	103.8	104.1
55	U C L A	104.1	103.3	103.5	103.6
56	Colorado	104.5	103.4	102.4	103.4
57	Virginia	103.1	102.1	103.4	102.9
58	San Diego St.	102.4	102.3	103.5	102.7
59	Houston	102.4	102.1	102.5	102.3
60	N. Carolina	102.9	102.0	102.0	102.3
61	Syracuse	102.0	100.8	101.1	101.3
62	Florida Atlantic	99.9	101.4	101.8	101.0
63	Colo. State	101.3	100.3	101.1	100.9
64	Navy	100.2	100.8	100.4	100.4
65	Minnesota	100.3	101.2	99.2	100.2
66	Vanderbilt	100.8	99.8	99.7	100.1
67	Army	99.8	99.8	100.1	99.9
68	Troy	99.3	99.4	99.3	99.3
69	Arkansas	99.4	98.5	99.2	99.1
70	Fresno St.	98.9	97.6	99.8	98.8
71	Baylor	98.1	99.4	98.2	98.6
72	SMU	97.5	98.0	97.8	97.8
73	Appalachian St.	97.7	96.5	97.9	97.4
74	Ohio U	96.3	97.9	97.1	97.1
75	Temple	96.3	96.8	96.7	96.6
76	Tennessee	97.3	95.9	95.3	96.2
77	Northern Illinois	95.7	95.6	96.7	96.0
78	Western Michigan	95.8	95.2	96.5	95.8
79	Arkansas St.	95.0	96.1	96.0	95.7
80	Central Michigan	95.1	95.4	96.0	95.5
81	Nebraska	94.9	95.4	94.4	94.9
82	Wyoming	95.5	94.6	94.6	94.9
83	Eastern Michigan	94.7	94.8	95.1	94.9
84	Maryland	94.5	95.8	93.9	94.7
85	Utah St.	95.0	94.3	94.7	94.7
86	Tulane	94.2	94.4	94.6	94.4
87	Tulsa	93.1	92.8	92.7	92.9
88	Air Force	92.2	92.5	92.2	92.3
89	Marshall	90.9	92.3	92.4	91.9
90	Rutgers	91.1	91.1	90.7	91.0
91	Middle Tennessee	89.2	90.3	90.3	89.9
92	BYU	90.0	89.9	89.9	89.9
93	Florida Int’l.	89.5	89.7	90.5	89.9
94	Nevada	88.9	90.5	90.0	89.8
95	Miami (O)	88.7	90.7	89.9	89.8
96	Oregon St.	90.0	89.9	88.4	89.4
97	Massachusetts	88.9	88.4	89.0	88.8
98	U T S A	87.6	90.0	88.4	88.6
99	Buffalo	87.3	89.3	89.3	88.6
100	Akron	87.7	89.6	88.4	88.6
101	Louisiana Tech	87.3	88.9	88.1	88.1
102	Southern Miss.	87.5	88.5	88.1	88.0
103	Illinois	87.9	89.0	86.8	87.9
104	W. Kentucky	87.5	87.9	88.0	87.8
105	N. Texas	86.8	88.2	87.5	87.5
106	U N L V	86.2	87.7	86.3	86.8
107	N. Mexico St.	85.8	84.7	85.9	85.5
108	Connecticut	84.5	86.3	84.8	85.2
109	Cincinnati	83.9	85.7	84.6	84.7
110	New Mexico	84.4	84.4	84.9	84.6
111	East Carolina	83.2	84.5	83.3	83.7
112	Kansas	81.8	85.1	80.5	82.5
113	UAB	81.6	81.6	83.5	82.2
114	Bowling Green	81.5	82.6	81.8	82.0
115	Hawaii	81.8	82.9	81.1	81.9
116	UL-Monroe	81.9	82.8	81.0	81.9
117	S. Alabama	81.1	83.0	81.3	81.8
118	Idaho	80.8	81.6	81.7	81.3
119	Old Dominion	80.3	82.7	80.5	81.2
120	Georgia St.	80.9	81.0	80.6	80.9
121	UL-Lafayette	79.3	80.5	79.0	79.6
122	Georgia Southern	79.1	80.4	78.5	79.3
123	Coastal Carolina	74.5	75.7	75.3	75.2
124	Kent St.	73.9	75.4	74.2	74.5
125	Rice	72.6	74.1	73.0	73.2
126	San Jose St.	72.3	72.4	71.6	72.1
127	Texas St.	70.3	72.5	69.4	70.7
128	Charlotte	69.5	71.8	69.7	70.3
129	U T E P	67.9	70.7	67.9	68.9
130	Ball St.	65.7	67.7	66.4	66.6

Ratings by Conference

American Athletic Conference
East Division
Team	AAC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Central Florida	8-0	12-0	113.6	114.8	114.8	114.4
South Florida	6-2	9-2	109.0	108.2	109.3	108.8
Temple	4-4	6-6	96.3	96.8	96.7	96.6
Connecticut	2-6	3-9	84.5	86.3	84.8	85.2
Cincinnati	2-6	4-8	83.9	85.7	84.6	84.7
East Carolina	2-6	3-9	83.2	84.5	83.3	83.7
West Division
Team	AAC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Memphis	7-1	10-2	113.5	112.7	114.4	113.5
Houston	5-3	7-4	102.4	102.1	102.5	102.3
Navy	4-4	6-5	100.2	100.8	100.4	100.4
SMU	4-4	7-5	97.5	98.0	97.8	97.8
Tulane	3-5	5-7	94.2	94.4	94.6	94.4
Tulsa	1-7	2-10	93.1	92.8	92.7	92.9
AAC Averages			97.6	98.1	98.0	97.9
Atlantic Coast Conference
Atlantic Division
Team	ACC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Clemson	7-1	12-1	132.8	129.9	132.6	131.8
Louisville	4-4	8-4	117.9	116.9	117.8	117.5
Florida St.	3-5	6-6	116.9	115.9	115.4	116.1
N. Carolina St.	6-2	8-4	115.9	115.1	115.7	115.6
Boston College	4-4	7-5	112.8	112.4	112.9	112.7
Wake Forest	4-4	7-5	112.2	110.5	112.3	111.7
Syracuse	2-6	4-8	102.0	100.8	101.1	101.3
Coastal Division
Team	ACC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Miami	7-1	10-2	119.3	118.1	118.2	118.5
Virginia Tech	5-3	9-3	118.7	118.1	118.5	118.4
Duke	3-5	6-6	110.4	109.4	109.5	109.8
Georgia Tech	4-4	5-6	110.2	108.4	108.7	109.1
Pittsburgh	3-5	5-7	108.8	108.1	108.7	108.5
Virginia	3-5	6-6	103.1	102.1	103.4	102.9
N. Carolina	1-7	3-9	102.9	102.0	102.0	102.3
ACC Averages			113.1	112.0	112.6	112.6
Big 12 Conference
Team	B12	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Oklahoma	8-1	12-1	128.2	126.7	129.4	128.1
Oklahoma St.	6-3	9-3	120.6	119.9	121.0	120.5
T C U	7-2	10-3	117.9	116.4	118.0	117.4
Iowa State	5-4	7-5	112.5	112.6	113.5	112.9
Texas	5-4	6-6	111.8	112.1	112.4	112.1
Kansas St.	5-4	7-5	111.8	111.8	111.8	111.8
West Virginia	5-4	7-5	108.4	109.0	108.5	108.6
Texas Tech	3-6	6-6	105.2	104.9	104.8	105.0
Baylor	1-8	1-11	98.1	99.4	98.2	98.6
Kansas	0-9	1-11	81.8	85.1	80.5	82.5
Big 12 Averages			109.6	109.8	109.8	109.8
Big Ten Conference
East Division
Team	BTen	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Ohio St.	8-1	11-2	132.0	129.9	132.3	131.4
Penn St.	7-2	10-2	129.0	127.9	129.3	128.7
Michigan	5-4	8-4	115.8	115.5	115.1	115.5
Michigan St.	7-2	9-3	107.5	108.1	108.6	108.1
Indiana	2-7	5-7	105.5	105.6	105.9	105.7
Maryland	2-7	4-8	94.5	95.8	93.9	94.7
Rutgers	3-6	4-8	91.1	91.1	90.7	91.0
West Division
Team	BTen	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Wisconsin	9-0	12-1	125.7	123.2	124.8	124.6
Northwestern	7-2	9-3	115.6	114.4	115.7	115.2
Iowa	4-5	7-5	114.1	114.4	113.3	114.0
Purdue	4-5	6-6	105.4	105.3	105.9	105.5
Minnesota	2-7	5-7	100.3	101.2	99.2	100.2
Nebraska	3-6	4-8	94.9	95.4	94.4	94.9
Illinois	0-9	2-10	87.9	89.0	86.8	87.9
Big Ten Averages			108.5	108.3	108.3	108.4
Conference USA
East Division
Team	CUSA	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Florida Atlantic	8-0	10-3	99.9	101.4	101.8	101.0
Marshall	4-4	7-5	90.9	92.3	92.4	91.9
Middle Tennessee	4-4	6-6	89.2	90.3	90.3	89.9
Florida Int’l.	5-3	8-4	89.5	89.7	90.5	89.9
W. Kentucky	4-4	6-6	87.5	87.9	88.0	87.8
Old Dominion	3-5	5-7	80.3	82.7	80.5	81.2
Charlotte	1-7	1-11	69.5	71.8	69.7	70.3
West Division
Team	CUSA	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
U T S A	3-5	6-5	87.6	90.0	88.4	88.6
Louisiana Tech	4-4	6-6	87.3	88.9	88.1	88.1
Southern Miss.	6-2	8-4	87.5	88.5	88.1	88.0
N. Texas	7-1	9-4	86.8	88.2	87.5	87.5
UAB	6-2	8-4	81.6	81.6	83.5	82.2
Rice	1-7	1-11	72.6	74.1	73.0	73.2
U T E P	0-8	0-12	67.9	70.7	67.9	68.9
CUSA Averages			84.2	85.6	85.0	84.9
FBS Independents
Team		Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Notre Dame		9-3	116.0	115.0	116.0	115.6
Army		8-3	99.8	99.8	100.1	99.9
Massachusetts		4-8	88.9	88.4	89.0	88.8
BYU		4-9	90.0	89.9	89.9	89.9
Indep. Averages			98.7	98.3	98.7	98.6
Mid-American Conference
East Division
Team	MAC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Ohio U	5-3	8-4	96.3	97.9	97.1	97.1
Miami (O)	4-4	5-7	88.7	90.7	89.9	89.8
Buffalo	4-4	6-6	87.3	89.3	89.3	88.6
Akron	6-2	7-6	87.7	89.6	88.4	88.6
Bowling Green	2-6	2-10	81.5	82.6	81.8	82.0
Kent St.	1-7	2-10	73.9	75.4	74.2	74.5
West Division
Team	MAC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Toledo	7-1	11-2	103.6	103.6	105.6	104.3
Northern Illinois	6-2	8-4	95.7	95.6	96.7	96.0
Western Michigan	4-4	6-6	95.8	95.2	96.5	95.8
Central Michigan	6-2	8-4	95.1	95.4	96.0	95.5
Eastern Michigan	3-5	5-7	94.7	94.8	95.1	94.9
Ball St.	0-8	2-10	65.7	67.7	66.4	66.6
MAC Averages			88.8	89.8	89.7	89.5
Mountain West Conference
Mountain Division
Team	MWC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Boise St.	7-1	10-3	105.7	104.5	105.8	105.3
Colo. State	5-3	7-5	101.3	100.3	101.1	100.9
Wyoming	5-3	7-5	95.5	94.6	94.6	94.9
Utah St.	4-4	6-6	95.0	94.3	94.7	94.7
Air Force	4-4	5-7	92.2	92.5	92.2	92.3
New Mexico	1-7	3-9	84.4	84.4	84.9	84.6
West Division
Team	MWC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
San Diego St.	6-2	10-2	102.4	102.3	103.5	102.7
Fresno St.	7-1	9-4	98.9	97.6	99.8	98.8
Nevada	3-5	3-9	88.9	90.5	90.0	89.8
U N L V	4-4	5-7	86.2	87.7	86.3	86.8
Hawaii	1-8	3-9	81.8	82.9	81.1	81.9
San Jose St.	1-7	2-11	72.3	72.4	71.6	72.1
MWC Averages			92.0	92.0	92.1	92.1
Pac-12 Conference
North Division
Team	P12	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Washington	7-2	10-2	126.6	124.4	126.6	125.9
Stanford	7-2	9-4	120.7	119.1	120.1	120.0
Washington St.	6-3	9-3	113.3	111.2	112.8	112.4
Oregon	4-5	7-5	112.3	110.2	111.7	111.4
California	2-7	5-7	105.3	103.2	103.8	104.1
Oregon St.	0-9	1-11	90.0	89.9	88.4	89.4
South Division
Team	P12	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
U S C	8-1	11-2	120.4	119.5	120.1	120.0
Utah	3-6	6-6	108.2	108.3	108.3	108.3
Arizona St.	6-3	7-5	107.6	106.4	107.3	107.1
Arizona	5-4	7-5	106.2	105.0	105.1	105.4
U C L A	4-5	6-6	104.1	103.3	103.5	103.6
Colorado	2-7	5-7	104.5	103.4	102.4	103.4
Pac-12 Averages			109.9	108.6	109.2	109.3
Southeastern Conference
East Division
Team	SEC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Georgia	7-1	12-1	130.6	129.9	131.2	130.6
Missouri	4-4	7-5	109.6	107.9	108.9	108.8
S. Carolina	5-3	8-4	107.5	106.8	106.5	106.9
Kentucky	4-4	7-5	106.2	105.5	104.8	105.5
Florida	3-5	4-7	105.7	105.4	105.1	105.4
Vanderbilt	1-7	5-7	100.8	99.8	99.7	100.1
Tennessee	0-8	4-8	97.3	95.9	95.3	96.2
West Division
Team	SEC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Alabama	7-1	11-1	135.6	132.3	134.3	134.1
Auburn	7-1	10-3	129.4	127.3	129.6	128.8
L S U	6-2	9-3	119.1	116.7	119.6	118.5
Mississippi St.	4-4	8-4	112.4	112.4	112.0	112.3
Texas A&M	4-4	7-5	107.8	105.9	106.9	106.9
Ole Miss	3-5	6-6	106.3	105.0	105.4	105.6
Arkansas	1-7	4-8	99.4	98.5	99.2	99.1
SEC Averages			112.0	110.7	111.3	111.3
Sunbelt Conference
Team	SBC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Troy	7-1	10-2	99.3	99.4	99.3	99.3
Appalachian St.	7-1	8-4	97.7	96.5	97.9	97.4
Arkansas St.	6-2	7-4	95.0	96.1	96.0	95.7
N. Mexico St.	4-4	6-6	85.8	84.7	85.9	85.5
UL-Monroe	4-4	4-8	81.9	82.8	81.0	81.9
S. Alabama	3-5	4-8	81.1	83.0	81.3	81.8
Idaho	3-5	4-8	80.8	81.6	81.7	81.3
Georgia St.	5-3	6-5	80.9	81.0	80.6	80.9
UL-Lafayette	4-4	5-7	79.3	80.5	79.0	79.6
Georgia Southern	2-6	2-10	79.1	80.4	78.5	79.3
Coastal Carolina	2-6	3-9	74.5	75.7	75.3	75.2
Texas St.	1-7	2-10	70.3	72.5	69.4	70.7
Sun Belt Averages			83.8	84.5	83.8	84.1

 

PiRate Ratings By Conference
#	League	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
1	ACC	113.1	112.0	112.6	112.6
2	SEC	112.0	110.7	111.3	111.3
3	BIG 12	109.6	109.8	109.8	109.8
4	PAC-12	109.9	108.6	109.2	109.3
5	BIG TEN	108.5	108.3	108.3	108.4
6	INDEP.	98.7	98.3	98.7	98.6
7	AAC	97.6	98.1	98.0	97.9
8	MWC	92.0	92.0	92.1	92.1
9	MAC	88.8	89.8	89.7	89.5
10	CUSA	84.2	85.6	85.0	84.9
11	Sun Belt	83.8	84.5	83.8	84.1

Look for our bowl and playoff spreads following next week’s Army – Navy game.

If you didn’t see our Army-Navy spread last week, it is:

Philadelphia	PA	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Army (n)	Navy	-0.4	-1.0	-0.3

Why the unique color purple?

This is what we call Love Purple.  You can replicate it with the RGB of 69-0-169 and the Hex Code of 4500A9.

Love purple is the official logo color of our mom and pop company in Nashville.  We are highly appreciative of all our supporters here, and we wish you a loving and joyous holiday season.

 

 

 

PiRate Ratings College Football Forecast for November 21-25, 2017

This Week’s PiRate Ratings Spreads

Home	Visitor	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Akron	Kent St.	16.2	16.9	16.6
Eastern Michigan	Bowling Green	17.7	16.8	17.7
Ball St.	Miami (O)	-20.5	-20.5	-21.0
Mississippi St.	Ole Miss	11.6	12.9	12.7
TCU	Baylor	24.2	21.2	24.4
Toledo	Western Michigan	7.5	8.1	8.3
Virginia	Virginia Tech	-13.7	-14.2	-13.2
Central Michigan	Northern Illinois	1.1	1.8	0.8
Buffalo	Ohio U	-9.4	-8.6	-8.4
Arkansas	Missouri	-7.9	-6.6	-7.6
San Diego St.	New Mexico	20.5	20.7	21.2
Houston	Navy	4.2	3.6	3.9
Pittsburgh	Miami (Fla.)	-16.3	-14.9	-15.8
Nebraska	Iowa	-9.3	-9.1	-9.0
Troy	Texas St.	24.9	23.0	25.2
Central Florida	South Florida	6.8	8.8	7.8
Florida Int’l.	Western Kentucky	-2.7	-2.2	-2.7
Texas	Texas Tech	12.5	12.7	13.8
UCLA	California	1.6	3.1	2.6
Cincinnati	Connecticut	2.6	2.6	3.2
Syracuse	Boston College	-1.6	-3.0	-2.2
Rutgers	Michigan St.	-8.2	-9.5	-9.5
Purdue	Indiana	-0.2	-0.2	-0.3
Michigan	Ohio St.	-13.6	-11.4	-14.8
North Carolina St.	North Carolina	14.0	14.1	14.7
Wake Forest	Duke	5.9	4.8	7.1
Georgia St.	Appalachian St.	-6.8	-5.8	-6.5
Tennessee	Vanderbilt	4.4	3.6	3.9
Kansas St.	Iowa St.	2.3	2.1	1.3
Kentucky	Louisville	-6.0	-5.9	-7.1
Georgia Tech	Georgia	-13.3	-15.3	-15.0
Maryland	Penn St.	-24.0	-21.5	-24.8
Illinois	Northwestern	-21.9	-20.0	-23.1
Rice	North Texas	-12.7	-12.6	-13.2
Charlotte	Florida Atlantic	-27.1	-26.5	-28.5
Air Force	Utah St.	-0.3	0.9	-0.3
Marshall	Southern Miss.	8.0	8.3	9.2
Nevada	UNLV	3.8	4.0	4.7
Washington	Washington St.	11.8	11.8	12.1
San Jose St.	Wyoming	-26.8	-25.4	-27.0
Utah	Colorado	2.7	4.6	4.7
Louisiana-Monroe	Arkansas St.	-8.3	-8.7	-10.3
Middle Tennessee	Old Dominion	6.9	5.8	7.7
Minnesota	Wisconsin	-19.4	-16.0	-19.2
Stanford	Notre Dame	5.3	4.8	4.3
South Carolina	Clemson	-18.2	-16.7	-18.4
LSU	Texas A&M	11.2	11.1	12.2
Fresno St.	Boise St.	-8.2	-7.7	-8.0
SMU	Tulane	6.9	7.1	6.8
Oklahoma St.	Kansas	41.7	37.8	43.5
Arizona St.	Arizona	0.6	1.2	1.3
Oklahoma	West Virginia	18.4	16.8	19.0
Oregon	Oregon St.	16.6	14.9	17.3
New Mexico St.	Idaho	9.9	7.5	9.1
Louisiana-Lafayette	Georgia Southern	8.3	7.9	9.0
Tulsa	Temple	5.1	3.9	4.7
Louisiana Tech	UTSA	-0.2	-0.5	-0.5
Memphis	East Carolina	27.0	24.9	27.7
UAB	UTEP	16.1	13.1	17.8
Auburn	Alabama	-7.3	-5.9	-6.0
Florida	Florida St.	-8.9	-8.4	-7.9
Hawaii	BYU	-3.4	-2.2	-3.6

This Week’s PiRate Ratings Retro Rankings

Based on what the teams have done for the entire season and not forward looking

PiRate Retrodictive
#	Team
1	Alabama
2	Miami (Fla)
3	Clemson
4	Wisconsin
5	Oklahoma
6	Georgia
7	Ohio St.
8	Central Florida
9	Notre Dame
10	Penn St.
11	Auburn
12	USC
13	TCU
14	Washington
15	Mississippi St.
16	Virginia Tech
17	Washington St.
18	Michigan
19	Oklahoma St.
20	Memphis
21	Michigan St.
22	Stanford
23	Northwestern
24	North Carolina St.
25	Boise St.
26	LSU
27	Wake Forest
28	Iowa St.
29	Iowa
30	South Florida
31	South Carolina
32	Boston College
33	Texas A&M
34	Louisville
35	Toledo
36	San Diego St.
37	Texas
38	Florida Atlantic
39	Oregon
40	Georgia Tech
41	West Virginia
42	Arizona
43	Navy
44	Florida St.
45	Arizona St.
46	Purdue
47	Kentucky
48	Northern Illinois
49	Missouri
50	Fresno St.
51	Kansas St.
52	Indiana
53	UCLA
54	Troy
55	Houston
56	Army
57	Ohio
58	Texas Tech
59	Virginia
60	SMU
61	Utah
62	California
63	North Texas
64	Duke
65	Florida
66	Wyoming
67	Syracuse
68	Maryland
69	Minnesota
70	Marshall
71	Ole Miss
72	Colorado
73	Western Michigan
74	Nebraska
75	Colorado St.
76	Central Michigan
77	Tulane
78	Pittsburgh
79	Utah St.
80	Arkansas St.
81	Temple
82	Tennessee
83	Akron
84	Arkansas
85	Southern Miss.
86	Florida Int’l.
87	Appalachian St.
88	North Carolina
89	Rutgers
90	UAB
91	Vanderbilt
92	UTSA
93	Georgia St.
94	Eastern Michigan
95	Buffalo
96	Air Force
97	Western Kentucky
98	Louisiana Tech
99	Middle Tennessee
100	Miami (O)
101	UNLV
102	Tulsa
103	Cincinnati
104	Connecticut
105	East Carolina
106	Massachusetts
107	Old Dominion
108	UL-Monroe
109	UL-Lafayette
110	New Mexico St.
111	Baylor
112	South Alabama
113	Illinois
114	BYU
115	Nevada
116	New Mexico
117	Idaho
118	Oregon St.
119	Bowling Green
120	Hawaii
121	Kent St.
122	Kansas
123	Coastal Carolina
124	Georgia Southern
125	Ball St.
126	Rice
127	Charlotte
128	Texas St.
129	San Jose St.
130	UTEP

PiRate Ratings For This Week

Forward Looking Predictive Ratings totally unrelated to rankings

PiRate Ratings
#	Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
1	Alabama	137.9	134.3	136.7	136.3
2	Ohio St.	132.2	129.9	132.6	131.6
3	Auburn	128.5	126.4	128.8	127.9
4	Clemson	128.6	126.1	128.1	127.6
5	Georgia	126.2	126.1	126.5	126.3
6	Oklahoma	125.1	123.9	125.9	125.0
7	Penn St.	125.2	124.1	125.5	124.9
8	Miami	125.4	123.7	124.6	124.6
9	Washington	125.0	122.9	124.9	124.3
10	Wisconsin	124.2	121.7	123.1	123.0
11	Oklahoma St.	120.6	119.9	121.0	120.5
12	T C U	119.8	118.1	120.1	119.3
13	U S C	119.4	118.6	119.0	119.0
14	Stanford	119.6	118.0	118.8	118.8
15	Virginia Tech	118.8	118.2	118.6	118.5
16	L S U	117.7	115.5	118.0	117.1
17	Notre Dame	117.3	116.2	117.6	117.0
18	Florida St.	116.7	115.8	115.2	115.9
19	N. Carolina St.	115.9	115.1	115.7	115.6
20	Louisville	115.8	114.9	115.6	115.4
21	Michigan	115.6	115.5	114.8	115.3
22	Central Florida	113.8	115.0	115.1	114.6
23	Washington St.	115.2	113.0	114.8	114.3
24	Mississippi St.	114.3	114.3	114.2	114.3
25	Texas	113.9	114.0	114.6	114.2
26	Northwestern	114.0	112.9	114.0	113.6
27	Wake Forest	113.5	111.6	113.7	112.9
28	Iowa State	112.5	112.6	113.5	112.9
29	Kansas St.	111.8	111.8	111.8	111.8
30	Iowa	110.9	111.2	110.1	110.8
31	Georgia Tech	111.9	109.8	110.5	110.7
32	Memphis	110.0	109.2	110.8	110.0
33	West Virginia	109.6	110.1	109.9	109.9
34	Boston College	109.7	109.6	109.6	109.6
35	Missouri	109.7	107.8	109.1	108.9
36	South Florida	109.0	108.2	109.3	108.8
37	Texas A&M	109.5	107.4	108.8	108.6
38	Duke	109.1	108.3	108.1	108.5
39	S. Carolina	108.9	107.9	108.1	108.3
40	Oregon	108.7	106.7	108.0	107.8
41	Kentucky	108.3	107.5	107.0	107.6
42	Boise St.	107.9	106.4	108.3	107.5
43	Arizona	107.3	105.9	106.3	106.5
44	Indiana	106.3	106.3	106.8	106.5
45	Utah	106.2	106.6	106.2	106.3
46	Arizona St.	106.5	105.5	106.1	106.0
47	Florida	106.3	105.9	105.8	106.0
48	Pittsburgh	106.1	105.8	105.8	105.9
49	Michigan St.	104.9	105.8	105.9	105.5
50	Colorado	106.5	105.1	104.5	105.3
51	Purdue	104.6	104.6	105.0	104.7
52	Syracuse	105.1	103.6	104.4	104.4
53	California	105.4	103.2	103.8	104.1
54	Ole Miss	104.7	103.4	103.5	103.9
55	U C L A	104.0	103.3	103.5	103.6
56	Texas Tech	103.4	103.3	102.9	103.2
57	Virginia	103.0	102.0	103.3	102.8
58	San Diego St.	102.2	102.2	103.3	102.6
59	Toledo	101.9	101.9	103.7	102.5
60	N. Carolina	102.9	102.0	102.0	102.3
61	Houston	101.9	101.7	101.9	101.8
62	Minnesota	101.8	102.7	100.9	101.8
63	Navy	100.7	101.2	101.0	100.9
64	Colo. State	101.3	100.3	101.1	100.9
65	Florida Atlantic	99.3	101.0	101.0	100.4
66	Army	99.5	99.5	99.8	99.6
67	Tennessee	99.9	98.3	98.1	98.8
68	Ohio U	98.0	99.4	98.9	98.8
69	Wyoming	99.3	98.2	98.6	98.7
70	Nebraska	98.6	99.1	98.1	98.6
71	Baylor	98.1	99.4	98.2	98.6
72	Maryland	98.3	99.6	97.7	98.5
73	Arkansas	98.8	98.1	98.5	98.5
74	SMU	97.8	98.3	98.1	98.1
75	Vanderbilt	98.5	97.7	97.2	97.8
76	Western Michigan	97.5	96.7	98.4	97.5
77	Fresno St.	96.7	95.7	97.3	96.6
78	Northern Illinois	96.1	95.9	97.2	96.4
79	Eastern Michigan	95.7	95.8	96.1	95.9
80	Tulsa	95.9	95.4	95.7	95.7
81	Troy	95.5	95.7	95.1	95.4
82	Central Michigan	94.7	95.1	95.5	95.1
83	Arkansas St.	94.3	95.5	95.5	95.1
84	Utah St.	95.3	94.4	95.1	94.9
85	Tulane	93.9	94.1	94.3	94.1
86	Temple	93.8	94.5	94.0	94.1
87	Oregon St.	94.1	93.9	92.6	93.5
88	Rutgers	93.7	93.4	93.4	93.5
89	Appalachian St.	93.6	92.4	93.4	93.1
90	Marshall	91.7	93.0	93.3	92.7
91	Air Force	91.9	92.4	91.8	92.0
92	W. Kentucky	90.4	90.6	91.1	90.7
93	Massachusetts	90.5	89.7	90.8	90.3
94	U T S A	89.2	91.4	90.2	90.2
95	Miami (O)	88.7	90.7	89.9	89.8
96	Nevada	88.7	90.4	89.8	89.6
97	Illinois	89.5	90.5	88.5	89.5
98	BYU	89.6	89.5	89.3	89.4
99	Akron	87.9	90.0	88.6	88.8
100	N. Texas	87.5	88.8	88.4	88.2
101	Middle Tennessee	86.6	87.7	87.6	87.3
102	Southern Miss.	86.7	87.8	87.2	87.2
103	Buffalo	85.6	87.8	87.5	87.0
104	U N L V	86.4	87.8	86.5	86.9
105	Louisiana Tech	86.0	87.8	86.6	86.8
106	East Carolina	86.0	87.3	86.1	86.5
107	N. Mexico St.	85.9	84.7	86.0	85.5
108	Florida Int’l.	84.7	85.4	85.3	85.2
109	Connecticut	84.4	86.2	84.6	85.1
110	Cincinnati	84.0	85.8	84.8	84.9
111	New Mexico	84.6	84.5	85.1	84.7
112	UL-Lafayette	84.0	84.9	84.0	84.3
113	Georgia St.	84.3	84.1	84.3	84.3
114	Old Dominion	82.6	85.0	82.9	83.5
115	UL-Monroe	83.0	83.8	82.2	83.0
116	Kansas	81.8	85.1	80.5	82.5
117	Hawaii	82.2	83.3	81.7	82.4
118	UAB	81.3	81.2	83.1	81.9
119	S. Alabama	80.7	82.7	80.9	81.4
120	Bowling Green	80.5	81.6	80.8	81.0
121	Idaho	79.1	80.2	79.9	79.7
122	Georgia Southern	78.6	80.0	78.0	78.9
123	Kent St.	73.7	75.2	74.0	74.3
124	Texas St.	73.6	75.7	72.9	74.1
125	Rice	72.8	74.2	73.2	73.4
126	Coastal Carolina	72.4	73.8	73.1	73.1
127	Charlotte	69.2	71.5	69.4	70.0
128	San Jose St.	69.5	69.8	68.6	69.3
129	U T E P	68.2	71.1	68.3	69.2
130	Ball St.	65.7	67.7	66.4	66.6

PiRate Ratings By Conference

American Athletic Conference
East Division
Team	AAC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Central Florida	7-0	10-0	113.8	115.0	115.1	114.6
South Florida	6-1	9-1	109.0	108.2	109.3	108.8
Temple	3-4	5-6	93.8	94.5	94.0	94.1
East Carolina	2-5	3-8	86.0	87.3	86.1	86.5
Connecticut	2-5	3-8	84.4	86.2	84.6	85.1
Cincinnati	1-6	3-8	84.0	85.8	84.8	84.9
West Division
Team	AAC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Memphis	6-1	9-1	110.0	109.2	110.8	110.0
Houston	4-3	6-4	101.9	101.7	101.9	101.8
Navy	4-3	6-4	100.7	101.2	101.0	100.9
SMU	3-4	6-5	97.8	98.3	98.1	98.1
Tulsa	1-6	2-9	95.9	95.4	95.7	95.7
Tulane	3-4	5-6	93.9	94.1	94.3	94.1
AAC Averages			97.6	98.1	98.0	97.9
Atlantic Coast Conference
Atlantic Division
Team	ACC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Clemson	7-1	10-1	128.6	126.1	128.1	127.6
Florida St.	3-5	4-6	116.7	115.8	115.2	115.9
N. Carolina St.	5-2	7-4	115.9	115.1	115.7	115.6
Louisville	4-4	7-4	115.8	114.9	115.6	115.4
Wake Forest	4-3	7-4	113.5	111.6	113.7	112.9
Boston College	3-4	6-5	109.7	109.6	109.6	109.6
Syracuse	2-5	4-7	105.1	103.6	104.4	104.4
Coastal Division
Team	ACC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Miami	7-0	10-0	125.4	123.7	124.6	124.6
Virginia Tech	4-3	8-3	118.8	118.2	118.6	118.5
Georgia Tech	4-4	5-5	111.9	109.8	110.5	110.7
Duke	2-5	5-6	109.1	108.3	108.1	108.5
Pittsburgh	2-5	4-7	106.1	105.8	105.8	105.9
Virginia	3-4	6-5	103.0	102.0	103.3	102.8
N. Carolina	1-6	3-8	102.9	102.0	102.0	102.3
ACC Averages			113.0	111.9	112.5	112.5
Big 12 Conference
Team	B12	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Oklahoma	7-1	10-1	125.1	123.9	125.9	125.0
Oklahoma St.	5-3	8-3	120.6	119.9	121.0	120.5
T C U	6-2	9-2	119.8	118.1	120.1	119.3
Texas	5-3	6-5	113.9	114.0	114.6	114.2
Iowa State	5-3	7-4	112.5	112.6	113.5	112.9
Kansas St.	4-4	6-5	111.8	111.8	111.8	111.8
West Virginia	5-3	7-4	109.6	110.1	109.9	109.9
Texas Tech	2-6	5-6	103.4	103.3	102.9	103.2
Baylor	1-7	1-10	98.1	99.4	98.2	98.6
Kansas	0-8	1-10	81.8	85.1	80.5	82.5
Big 12 Averages			109.7	109.8	109.9	109.8
Big Ten Conference
East Division
Team	BTen	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Ohio St.	7-1	9-2	132.2	129.9	132.6	131.6
Penn St.	6-2	9-2	125.2	124.1	125.5	124.9
Michigan	5-3	8-3	115.6	115.5	114.8	115.3
Indiana	2-6	5-6	106.3	106.3	106.8	106.5
Michigan St.	6-2	8-3	104.9	105.8	105.9	105.5
Maryland	2-6	4-7	98.3	99.6	97.7	98.5
Rutgers	3-5	4-7	93.7	93.4	93.4	93.5
West Division
Team	BTen	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Wisconsin	8-0	11-0	124.2	121.7	123.1	123.0
Northwestern	6-2	8-3	114.0	112.9	114.0	113.6
Iowa	3-5	6-5	110.9	111.2	110.1	110.8
Purdue	3-5	5-6	104.6	104.6	105.0	104.7
Minnesota	2-6	5-6	101.8	102.7	100.9	101.8
Nebraska	3-5	4-7	98.6	99.1	98.1	98.6
Illinois	0-8	2-9	89.5	90.5	88.5	89.5
Big Ten Averages			108.6	108.4	108.3	108.4
Conference USA
East Division
Team	CUSA	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Florida Atlantic	7-0	8-3	99.3	101.0	101.0	100.4
Marshall	4-3	7-4	91.7	93.0	93.3	92.7
W. Kentucky	4-3	6-5	90.4	90.6	91.1	90.7
Middle Tennessee	3-4	5-6	86.6	87.7	87.6	87.3
Florida Int’l.	4-3	6-4	84.7	85.4	85.3	85.2
Old Dominion	3-4	5-6	82.6	85.0	82.9	83.5
Charlotte	1-6	1-10	69.2	71.5	69.4	70.0
West Division
Team	CUSA	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
U T S A	3-4	6-4	89.2	91.4	90.2	90.2
N. Texas	6-1	8-3	87.5	88.8	88.4	88.2
Southern Miss.	5-2	7-4	86.7	87.8	87.2	87.2
Louisiana Tech	3-4	5-6	86.0	87.8	86.6	86.8
UAB	5-2	7-4	81.3	81.2	83.1	81.9
Rice	1-6	1-10	72.8	74.2	73.2	73.4
U T E P	0-7	0-11	68.2	71.1	68.3	69.2
CUSA Averages			84.0	85.5	84.8	84.8
FBS Independents
Team		Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Notre Dame		9-2	117.3	116.2	117.6	117.0
Army		8-3	99.5	99.5	99.8	99.6
Massachusetts		4-7	90.5	89.7	90.8	90.3
BYU		3-9	89.6	89.5	89.3	89.4
Indep. Averages			99.2	98.7	99.4	99.1
Mid-American Conference
East Division
Team	MAC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Ohio U	5-2	8-3	98.0	99.4	98.9	98.8
Miami (O)	3-4	4-7	88.7	90.7	89.9	89.8
Akron	5-2	6-5	87.9	90.0	88.6	88.8
Buffalo	3-4	5-6	85.6	87.8	87.5	87.0
Bowling Green	2-5	2-9	80.5	81.6	80.8	81.0
Kent St.	1-6	2-9	73.7	75.2	74.0	74.3
West Division
Team	MAC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Toledo	6-1	9-2	101.9	101.9	103.7	102.5
Western Michigan	4-3	6-5	97.5	96.7	98.4	97.5
Northern Illinois	6-1	8-3	96.1	95.9	97.2	96.4
Eastern Michigan	2-5	4-7	95.7	95.8	96.1	95.9
Central Michigan	5-2	7-4	94.7	95.1	95.5	95.1
Ball St.	0-7	2-9	65.7	67.7	66.4	66.6
MAC Averages			88.8	89.8	89.7	89.5
Mountain West Conference
Mountain Division
Team	MWC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Boise St.	7-0	9-2	107.9	106.4	108.3	107.5
Colo. State	5-3	7-5	101.3	100.3	101.1	100.9
Wyoming	5-2	7-4	99.3	98.2	98.6	98.7
Utah St.	4-3	6-5	95.3	94.4	95.1	94.9
Air Force	3-4	4-7	91.9	92.4	91.8	92.0
New Mexico	1-6	3-8	84.6	84.5	85.1	84.7
West Division
Team	MWC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
San Diego St.	5-2	9-2	102.2	102.2	103.3	102.6
Fresno St.	6-1	8-3	96.7	95.7	97.3	96.6
Nevada	2-5	2-9	88.7	90.4	89.8	89.6
U N L V	4-3	5-6	86.4	87.8	86.5	86.9
Hawaii	1-7	3-8	82.2	83.3	81.7	82.4
San Jose St.	0-7	1-11	69.5	69.8	68.6	69.3
MWC Averages			92.2	92.1	92.3	92.2
Pac-12 Conference
North Division
Team	P12	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Washington	6-2	9-2	125.0	122.9	124.9	124.3
Stanford	7-2	8-3	119.6	118.0	118.8	118.8
Washington St.	6-2	9-2	115.2	113.0	114.8	114.3
Oregon	3-5	6-5	108.7	106.7	108.0	107.8
California	2-6	5-6	105.4	103.2	103.8	104.1
Oregon St.	0-8	1-10	94.1	93.9	92.6	93.5
South Division
Team	P12	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
U S C	8-1	10-2	119.4	118.6	119.0	119.0
Arizona	5-3	7-4	107.3	105.9	106.3	106.5
Utah	2-6	5-6	106.2	106.6	106.2	106.3
Arizona St.	5-3	6-5	106.5	105.5	106.1	106.0
Colorado	2-6	5-6	106.5	105.1	104.5	105.3
U C L A	3-5	5-6	104.0	103.3	103.5	103.6
Pac-12 Averages			109.8	108.5	109.0	109.1
Southeastern Conference
East Division
Team	SEC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Georgia	7-1	10-1	126.2	126.1	126.5	126.3
Missouri	3-4	6-5	109.7	107.8	109.1	108.9
S. Carolina	5-3	8-3	108.9	107.9	108.1	108.3
Kentucky	4-4	7-4	108.3	107.5	107.0	107.6
Florida	3-5	4-6	106.3	105.9	105.8	106.0
Tennessee	0-7	4-7	99.9	98.3	98.1	98.8
Vanderbilt	0-7	4-7	98.5	97.7	97.2	97.8
West Division
Team	SEC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Alabama	7-0	11-0	137.9	134.3	136.7	136.3
Auburn	6-1	9-2	128.5	126.4	128.8	127.9
L S U	5-2	8-3	117.7	115.5	118.0	117.1
Mississippi St.	4-3	8-3	114.3	114.3	114.2	114.3
Texas A&M	4-3	7-4	109.5	107.4	108.8	108.6
Ole Miss	2-5	5-6	104.7	103.4	103.5	103.9
Arkansas	1-6	4-7	98.8	98.1	98.5	98.5
SEC Averages			112.1	110.8	111.5	111.4
Sunbelt Conference
Team	SBC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Troy	5-1	8-2	95.5	95.7	95.1	95.4
Arkansas St.	5-1	6-3	94.3	95.5	95.5	95.1
Appalachian St.	5-1	6-4	93.6	92.4	93.4	93.1
N. Mexico St.	2-4	4-6	85.9	84.7	86.0	85.5
UL-Lafayette	4-2	5-5	84.0	84.9	84.0	84.3
Georgia St.	5-1	6-3	84.3	84.1	84.3	84.3
UL-Monroe	4-3	4-6	83.0	83.8	82.2	83.0
S. Alabama	3-4	4-7	80.7	82.7	80.9	81.4
Idaho	2-4	3-7	79.1	80.2	79.9	79.7
Georgia Southern	1-5	1-9	78.6	80.0	78.0	78.9
Texas St.	1-6	2-9	73.6	75.7	72.9	74.1
Coastal Carolina	1-6	2-9	72.4	73.8	73.1	73.1
Sun Belt Averages			83.8	84.5	83.8	84.0

Conference Ratings

#	League	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
1	ACC	113.0	111.9	112.5	112.5
2	SEC	112.1	110.8	111.5	111.4
3	BIG 12	109.7	109.8	109.9	109.8
4	PAC-12	109.8	108.5	109.0	109.1
5	BIG TEN	108.6	108.4	108.3	108.4
6	INDEP.	99.2	98.7	99.4	99.1
7	AAC	97.6	98.1	98.0	97.9
8	MWC	92.2	92.1	92.3	92.2
9	MAC	88.8	89.8	89.7	89.5
10	CUSA	84.0	85.5	84.8	84.8
11	Sun Belt	83.8	84.5	83.8	84.0

Bowl Projections

Bowl	Conferences		Team 1	Team 2
New Orleans	CUSA	SBC	La. Tech	UL-Lafayette
Cure	AAC	SBC	Houston	Troy
Las Vegas	MWC 1	PAC-12 5	Boise St.	Stanford
New Mexico	CUSA	MWC	North Texas	Colorado St.
Camellia	MAC	SBC	Northern Illinois	Georgia St.
Boca Raton	AAC	CUSA	South Florida	Florida Atlantic
Frisco	AAC	MAC	SMU	Ohio U
Gasparilla	AAC	CUSA	[Utah St.]	Marshall
Bahamas	CUSA 1	MAC	Florida Int’l.	Toledo
Idaho Potato	MAC	MWC	Central Mich.	Wyoming
Birmingham	AAC	SEC 8-9	[UAB]	[UNLV]
Armed Forces	Army	BIG TEN 8	ARMY	[Middle Tenn.]
Dollar General	MAC	SBC	Akron	Appalachian St.
Hawaii	AAC	MWC	Central Florida	San Diego St.
Heart of Dallas	BIG 12 6	CUSA	[UCLA]	UTSA
Quick Lane	ACC 7-9	BIG TEN 7	[Utah]	[Western Mich.]
Cactus	BIG 12 5	PAC-12 6	Kansas St.	Arizona
Independence	ACC 7-9	SEC 8-9	Florida St.	[Western Ky.]
Pinstripe	ACC 3-6	BIG TEN 5	Boston College	Iowa
Foster Farms	BIG TEN 6	PAC-12 8	[Southern Miss.]	Oregon
Texas	BIG 12 3	SEC 2-7	Texas	Missouri
Military	AAC 7-9	ACC 7-9	Navy	Virginia
Camping World	ACC 2	BIG 12 2	Virginia Tech	Iowa St.
Holiday	BIG TEN 3	PAC-12 2	Michigan	Washington
Alamo	BIG 12 1	PAC-12 1	Oklahoma St.	Washington St.
Belk	ACC 3-6	SEC 2-7	Wake Forest	South Carolina
Sun	ACC 3-6	Pac-12	Louisville	Arizona St.
Music City	ACC 3-6/B10 4	SEC 2-7	Indiana	Kentucky
Arizona	MWC	SBC	Fresno St.	Arkansas St.
Cotton	At-large	At-large	Georgia	Ohio St.
Taxslayer	ACC 3-6/B10 4	SEC 2-7	NC St.	Miss. St.
Liberty	BIG 12 4	SEC 2-7	West Virginia	Texas A&M
Fiesta	At-large	At-large	Penn St.	USC
Orange	ACC 1	SEC 1/B10 1	Clemson	Notre Dame
Outback	BIG TEN 2	SEC 2-7	Michigan St.	LSU
Peach	At-large	At-large	Memphis	TCU
Citrus	B10 1/ACC 2	SEC 1	Northwestern	Auburn
Rose	Playoff	Semi-final	Miami (Fla.)	Oklahoma
Sugar	Playoff	Semi-final	Alabama	Wisconsin
Nat’l Champ.	Semifinal	Winners	Alabama	Oklahoma
Teams in [Brackets] are at-large selections

Championship Games and Bowl Eligibles By Conference

If you are a fan of a team that will finish 5-6 or 5-7, you can forget your team playing in a bowl with a losing record this season.  In fact, we project two bowl eligible teams to miss out on all the fun this year, as we project 80 teams to be bowl eligible this season.

American Athletic

The UCF-USF winner this week will face Memphis for the conference championship.  It looks like UCF and Memphis will meet in Orlando in a rematch game.  UCF won the first one convincingly, but Memphis is several points better now than then.  The winner of this game almost assuredly plays in the New Year’s Six Bowl as the Group of 5 Representative, and it will more than likely be at the Peach Bowl.

Bowl Eligible: 6 (UCF, USF, Memphis, Navy, Houston, SMU)

5-Wins: Temple and Tulane

Temple must win at Tulsa, which is doable but less than 50-50.

Tulane must win at SMU, which is also doable but less than 50-50 and less then Temple’s chances.

Atlantic Coast 

Clemson will play Miami (Fla.) in Charlotte.  The winner has about a 92% chance of gaining a Playoff spot, while the loser will most likely get an Orange Bowl bid.

Bowl Eligible: 8 (Clemson, Wake Forest, Louisville, NC St., Boston College, Miami, Va. Tech, Virginia

5-Wins: Georgia Tech and Duke

Georgia Tech would have to pull off the monumental upset of Georgia, which they may have about a 3-5% chance of doing.

Duke must win at Wake Forest, and the Demon Deacons are playing like a top 20 team.  The Blue Devils beat Georgia Tech, so they could be peaking at the right time.

4-Wins: Florida St.

The Seminoles were able to reschedule their cancelled hurricane game with UL-Monroe, and now they can become bowl eligible by beating Florida and ULM.  We believe their chances to get to 6-6 are about 70-75% in their favor.

Big 12

Oklahoma has clinched the top seed in the renewal of the Big 12 Championship Game.  TCU needs to beat Baylor this week to get the number two seed.  If the Horn Frogs croak against the Bears, then Oklahoma St. will get the bid with a win over hapless Kansas.  There is a very remote chance that Iowa St. could still get in, but it would require too many things to take place.

Bowl Eligible: 7 (Oklahoma, TCU, Okla. St., Iowa St., Texas, West Virginia, Kansas St.)

5-Wins: Texas Tech

Texas Tech closes the season at Texas, and we believe the Longhorns will handle the Red Raiders and most likely end the Kliff Kingsbury era in Lubbock.

Big Ten

Wisconsin and Ohio State have clinched their divisions and will face off in the Big Ten Championship Game.  The Badgers’ defense may be up to the task to handle an inconsistent Buckeye offense.  If so, UW is Playoff-bound.  A Buckeye win opens the door for a one-loss Miami or one-loss Alabama team to get this bid, or if Miami and Alabama are unbeaten, there will be a big controversy over the #4 seed between a 2-loss Ohio State, Georgia, USC, and Notre Dame, and maybe even an undefeated UCF if they win their last two games.

Bowl Eligible: 7 (but guaranteed to have 8) (Ohio St., Penn St., Michigan St., Michigan, Wisconsin, Northwestern, Iowa)

5-Wins: Indiana, Purdue, Minnesota.

Indiana and Purdue play for the Old Oaken Bucket and a bowl bid, as the winner will be 6-6.

Minnesota must beat undefeated Wisconsin to finish 6-6.  With the Gophers’ offense struggling, and the Badgers defense peaking, UW could win this won in an ugly fashion in the neighborhood of 20-6.

Conference USA

This conference is going to strike it rich this bowl season with a possible 10 teams playing in December.

First, Florida Atlantic and North Texas will square off in one of the potentially best championship games in this league’s history.  Win or lose, we are hearing from sources that the Boca Raton Bowl would love to invite hometown team FAU.

Bowl Eligible: 8 (guaranteed to have 9) (Florida Atlantic, Florida Int’l., Marshall, Western Kentucky, North Texas, UAB, Southern Miss, UTSA)

5-Wins: Middle Tennessee, Old Dominion, Louisiana Tech

Middle Tennessee and Old Dominion play each other in Murfreesboro this week, so the winner will become bowl eligible.

Louisiana Tech hosts UTSA with a slumping offense, and we give the Bulldogs a 70% chance of winning this game and becoming the 10th bowl eligible CUSA team.  There will be slots available possibly for all 10 teams, and it is possible that two CUSA could face off in a bowl.

Independents

Army is 8-3 with the Navy game remaining.  The Black Knights are Armed Forces Bowl bound.

Notre Dame actually counts with the ACC teams, so they are part of the ACC package, and we believe the Irish will  be enjoying Oranges this year, but only if they get by Stanford this week,.

Mid-American

Akron beat Ohio to win the Eastern Division title.  The Zips will play Toledo or Northern Illinois.  TU can clinch the Western Division title with a win at home against Western Michigan or a Northern Illinois loss at Central Michigan.  NIU can win if they beat CMU and WMU beats Toledo.

This league will receive an extra bid and possibly two extra bids.  See Below

Bowl Eligible: 6 (Akron, Ohio, Toledo, Northern Illinois, Western Michigan, Central Michigan)

5-Wins: Buffalo

Buffalo hosts Ohio U this week, and a Bulls win will give them a 6-6 record.  There is a catch.  Buffalo most likely needs Louisiana Tech or Florida State to lose this week to guarantee a decent shot at a bowl.  We have the Bulls as team #79 in a 78-team bowl field.  There is another little possibility that could help Buffalo get over the top ahead of another bowl eligible team.  The MAC has two secondary bowl agreements, with the Quick Lane and the Foster Farms bowls.

Toledo at 10-2 might be attractive enough for the Foster Farms Bowl to invite the Rockets west to face Oregon, Stanford, Washington, or California.  The Quick Lane is most likely going to need a MAC team as well, so Buffalo could sneak in to a bowl through this back door ahead of a 10th CUSA team.

Mountain West

Here is where a conference championship game will not be as exciting as it should be, unless something really interesting takes place this week.  Boise State and Fresno State have clinched berths in the MWC Championship Game, but the two teams close out the regular season facing each other, so it will be an immediate rematch.  The Las Vegas Bowl bid goes to the winner of the second game.  Even if the Conference Champion loses by 50 points this week and wins by 1 next week, that team gets the Las Vegas Bowl bid.

Bowl Eligible: 6 (Boise St., Colorado St., Wyoming, Utah St., Fresno St., San Diego St.)

5-Wins: UNLV

The Runnin’ Rebels must win their rivalry game against Nevada, and they must do it in Reno.  UNLV has about a 50-50 shot at pulling it off, giving the MWC 7 bowl teams for 5 bowls.  Two at-large slots will be waiting for the 6th and 7th teams.

Pac-12

USC has clinched the South Division, and the Trojans hold a very minute chance of sneaking into the Playoffs.  More than likely, they are playing in the Pac-12 Championship Game for a berth in the Fiesta Bowl.

The North Division is still up for grabs between Washington State and Stanford.  If Washington State wins the Apple Cup, then the Pirate Mike Leach will have his team in the Championship Game.  If Washington wins, then Stanford takes the treasure away from the Pirate.

The bigger news in the Pac-12 is the firing of UCLA coach Jim Mora, Jr.  The Bruins still have a game to go at home against California, and the winner will be bowl eligible.  UCLA is actually hoping it can win the Chip Kelly Bowl.  Kelly is rumored to be headed to Westwood, but it is not confirmed.

Bowl Eligible: 7 (but guaranteed to have 9) (Washington St., Stanford, Washington, Oregon, USC, Arizona St., Arizona)

5-Win Teams: California, UCLA, Utah, Colorado

Cal plays at UCLA, and the Bears hope they can swim with the Fisch’s.  Jedd Fisch will be UCLA coach for one or two games.

Colorado visits Utah, so the winner of that game will also be bowl eligible.

Look for the Pac-12 to place 2 at-large teams in bowls back east, most likely the two winners this week.

Southeastern

Normally a league with double digit bowl participants, the SEC is only going to have 9 teams playing in the postseason.

Georgia is waiting for the winner of the Iron Bowl to face off in the SEC Championship Game.  Auburn has become the sexy choice to knock off the number one Crimson Tide, but us old Buccaneers believe this just won’t happen.  We have Alabama set to be the top seed in the Playoffs, hosting team number four in the Sugar Bowl.

Bowl Eligible: 9 (Georgia, Kentucky, Missouri, South Carolina, Alabama, Auburn, LSU, Mississippi St., Texas A&M)

5-Wins: None

Sun Belt

They have 12 teams in this league, but there is no championship game in the SBC.  The Sun Belt is most likely to have extra teams, including team number 80, or the second bowl eligible team left out of all the fun.

There are two weeks left in the SBC regular season, so there are some 4-6 teams still alive in the bowl hunt.

Bowl Eligible: 4 (Troy, Georgia St., Arkansas St., Appalachian St.)

5-Wins: UL-Lafayette

The Ragin’ Cajuns have two games left and need to win just one to most likely get their New Orleans Bowl bid that they always seem to get whenever they are bowl eligible.  ULL hosts 1-9 Georgia Southern this week and should secure their sixth win.  They finish at Appy State, where they are most likely to lose.

4-Wins: UL-Monroe and New Mexico St.

UL-Monroe has less than 0.5% chance of beating Arkansas St. at home this week and then winning at Florida St. the week after.  So, the Warhawks are basically out of the picture.

New Mexico St. has at least a 50-50 chance of finishing the season with wins over Idaho and South Alabama, both games in Las Cruces.  However, the Aggies do not have a great shot at getting into their first bowl since the 1960 Sun Bowl.  NMSU is leaving the Sun Belt and will become an independent next year.  The SBC has a history of being a tad bush league by shunning teams leaving their conference.  The Aggies have already told the league they can only accept bids to bowls close to home, and we believe they will get to spend the holidays very close to home, because they will not be invited to a bowl if they finish 6-6.  Of course, if two from Louisiana Tech, Buffalo, and Florida State lose, and if Duke loses to Wake Forest and Minnesota loses to Wisconsin, then the Aggies will get an invitation at 6-6.  Whether or not they accept it, we cannot predict.

We here at the PiRate Ratings hope you have a festive Thanksgiving holiday.  Don’t let your tummy be the biggest loser this week.  Pace yourself and try to get some exercise.

Our schedule will be a little different this week.  We are putting out our Monday edition today on Sunday.  We will have both the NFL ratings and Money Line picks on Tuesday, and then we will return next Sunday night or Monday morning.

Thank You to all our followers.  You have made 2017 a record year for PiRate Rating readership.  A lot of you came on board back during March Madness, because we were very lucky to successfully pick all 68 teams in the NCAA Tournament.  Our basketball coverage will return just after New Year’s, as our ratings need all the teams to play 8 games before they make any sense.

 

Making College Football Even Better

This is our annual and somewhat repetitive treatise dealing with how to improve the college football game as it pertains to the current status.

College football is thriving since the advent of the 4-team playoff.  Unfortunately, those in charge made a little mistake in previous years when they scheduled semifinal bowls for the PM hours of New Year’s Eve.  Numerous fans across the nation chose (in some cases it was chosen for them by a significant other), to attend other festivities.  The semifinal games belong on New Year’s Day, which is the slot Americans have associated with bowl games for decades.  The ultimate college football experience starts with celebrating the birth of the new year while camping out on Orange Grove Boulevard in Pasadena with hundreds if not thousands of potentially new friends; then watching the most magnificent two hours of the Tournament of Roses Parade, contemplating how much work has gone into the planning of this event (it actually begins on January 2nd every year), and then realizing that the bands will march and play their instruments for 5 1/2 miles.

One of the neat things to do if you have been to multiple Rose Parades is to stake out a spot on Paloma at the end of the route and then to be the first to view the floats as they go on display near Victory Park.

The culmination of a fantastic event should be the Rose Bowl Game, which should not be played on any other date but New Year’s Day at 3PM PST (Jan. 2 if the first is on a Sunday).

That being said, there are a few other changes that we believe will take a great game and shoot it into orbit.

ISSUE 1–The Playoffs (8 is not enough)

The Playoffs need more teams, so that all Power 5 Conference champions get an automatic bid.  How would you feel if the Pittsburgh Steelers won the AFC North and then did not have the opportunity to appear in the NFL Playoffs?  Or what if the Houston Astros would have been cut out of the Major League playoffs because Cleveland had a better resume this year?

Here’s how the PiRates see it at the present time.  We are unanimously in favor of giving all five Power Conference champions an automatic invitation to the gridiron dance, while at the same time, we believe the top four teams should receive a reward.  One method could be that the top four would host the next four in an 8-team tournament, but to us that is not enough reward for the top four teams.  Also, there are going to be years were the number 9 team is as good as the number 4 team, and instead of arguing that number 4 should not have been selected, as number 9 was just as deserving, why not extend it out by a half round?  12 is the perfect number of playoff teams.  Most importantly, a 12-team tournament gives the top four teams a bye to the quarterfinals, and they can still host a quarterfinal round game on their home turf.  That is the proper reward for finishing in the top four.

Additionally, a 12-team tournament gives the Group of 5 conferences a chance.  Guarantee that one of the 12 spots goes to the top Group of 5, just like it receives a New Year’s 6 Bowl bid now.  If Central Florida runs the table this year, rather than receive the last slot in the NY6, at least they could be the #12 seed in a 12-team playoff.  If they really are deserving, then they can prove it by taking out the #5 seed in a road contest.

With 5 Power Conference teams and one Group of 5 Conference team receiving automating bids, it leaves six at-large bids.  In our opinion, these six at-large teams should cover the bases for finding teams worthy of playing for all the marbles.  You are talking about teams ranked around #10 overall at this point.  The #10 vs. #11 team is much less important than the #5 and #4 team competing for a spot.

If we were to look at this season, playing out the remaining games for our purposes in this editorial, the playoffs might look something like this:

ACC Champion–Miami

Big 12 Champion–Oklahoma

Big Ten Champion–Wisconsin

Pac-12 Champion–USC

SEC Champion–Alabama

Best Group of 5–Central Florida

At large 1–Georgia

At large 2–Clemson

At large 3–Ohio St.

At large 4–TCU

At large 5–Penn St.

At large 6–Notre Dame

Top teams left out–Washington, Auburn, Michigan St., Boise St., Memphis, Oklahoma St., and LSU

At the present time, Wisconsin would be left out of the Playoff, even though the Badgers are undefeated.  This would be a travesty if a 13-0 UW team failed to make the playoffs while a 2-loss team sneaked in ahead of the Badgers.  Under our format, none of the teams left out would have any legitimate reason to state a case that they deserved to be in, because in actuality the last two seeds probably should not be in the tournament at all.  However, this actually serves a useful purpose.  If seeds 10, 11, and 12 are not all that worthy of being in the playoffs, then their first round hosts (seeds 5, 6, and 7) get a little benefit that seed 8 does not receive.

Seeding the 12 teams above, you would get something like this:

Opening Round

#12 Central Florida at #5 Georgia

#11 Notre Dame at #6 Clemson

#10 USC at #7 Ohio St.

#9 Penn St. at #8 TCU

Quarterfinal Round

UCF-Ga. Winner at #4 Wisconsin

N. Dame-Clemson Winner at #3 Oklahoma

USC-Ohio St. Winner at #2 Miami

Penn St.-TCU Winner at #1 Alabama

From here the playoffs would be back to where they are now–two bowl games for the Semifinals, followed by the National Championship Game.

 

ISSUE 2–The Games are Toooooooo Lonnnnnng

The NFL realized a few years back that their once 2 1/2 hour games had jumped by an hour, because players believed in going out of bounds rather than absorb contact by a quickly moving 300-pound wall of steel.  They began starting the clock after the ball was brought back in bounds by the side judge or line judge.  Thus, the number of scrimmage plays returned to about where it had been for decades, in the 120-130 per game neighborhood.

College football used to see anywhere from 110 to 150 scrimmage plays per game.  Today, one team might run 100 plays, while the other gets 75, and the game becomes the football version of War and Peace.  The game needs to get to a point where 120-150 plays is the average range.  There is one definite way to make the clock move more than it does today–end the stoppage of the clock on first downs.  The NFL does just fine without the clock stopping on first downs.  The sideline official simply places his lead foot on the spot where the scrimmage stick needs to go, and he keeps it there until the man holding the stick arrives, which is almost always before the ball is snapped for the next play.

If you keep the clock moving after a play results in a first down during a typical college football game today, you are not stopping the clock about 45 times per game.  On games where there are fewer first downs, the clock will keep running any way, so this will basically just keep your 1,000 total yard games under 4 hours, while doing little to the 500 total yard games.

ISSUE 3–We Want Real Overtime

The current mode of college overtime can take a hard fought, defensive gem 13-13 tie at the end of regulation and turn it into a 43-41 4OT game that looks like nobody played a lick of defense.

College overtime should start with one team kicking off to the other, and with a touchdown needed on the first drive in order to end the game without the kicking team getting the ball, just like in the NFL.  Play 10 or 15 minutes, and if the teams are still tied, then let it be a tie game.  Tie games can be just as important as wins and losses.  In today’s world of computer technology, a tie game will not throw a monkey wrench into the works.  Here’s a little secret for you: When the PiRates adjust our ratings after every college football game, we adjust all overtime games back to the tie score at the end of regulation and throw out what happens in overtime, with the exception of factoring in the possibilities of key players being injured and if it could deflate the loser in the future.  What goes on in the current overtime does not tell us anything important.  We need to know how teams perform on both sides of the ball on a 100-yard field and not a 25-yard field.  In actuality, it makes the game a different sport entirely.  How would you like a college basketball overtime only played in the half-court with each team getting a possession per overtime?  That is not real basketball either.

ISSUE 4: A Wet Turf Should Never Be Credited With a Tackle

How many times have you seen a player make a brilliant move to get open in the clear only to slip on wet turf or dive to make a play and then cannot advance the ball, even though no defender has participated in the play?  The NFL totally gets this issue.  A player should not be considered tackle, unless a defender is responsible for downing him or has made contact with him while he is on the ground.  Watching a receiver embarrass a defender, make a brilliant highlight-film catch, and then have to settle for a 6-yard gain, when he could get up and run for 25 yards robs not only the player and his team, but also the fans who want to see action.  When that player dives for the ball and makes the catch today, the turf gets the tackle.  Only vegetation can be happy about that.

ISSUE 5: Pass Interference Should Never Be Allowed to Become a Defensive Strategy

In the early 1980’s, the college football world changed defensive pass interference penalties to a maximum of 15 yards and an automatic first down.  In today’s game, there are times when it is beneficial to clobber a receiver and give up the 15 yards and first down rather than give up the 30-yard pass completion or the touchdown catch.  With less than a minute to go in the game when one team needs only a touchdown to win, but they must go 80 yards, every time the offensive team throws at an attempt to gain more than 35 yards, it is wise to merely clobber the receiver if there is any chance the ball will be caught.  You give up 15 yards and a first down, but now the receiver is hearing footsteps.  The next pass may find him not really extending his arms out to try to catch the pass, knowing that the defender can perform as much unnecessary roughness on him and only suffer the interference penalty.

The right thing to do is to restore pass interference penalties back to awarding the offense a first down at the spot of the foul, just like it has remained in the NFL.  Now, if a team interferes on a Hail Mary pass in the end zone, the offense gets the ball at the opponent’s one yard line, and gets another play, even if the clock shows 0:00.  Pass interference should never be allowed to become a strategy.  It is the equivalent of a flagrant foul in basketball on a breakaway drive to the hoop.

 

PiRate Ratings College Football Forecast for November 14-18, 2017

This Week’s PiRate Rating Spreads

Home	Visitor	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Akron	Ohio	-10.3	-9.0	-10.9
Kent St.	Central Michigan	-18.5	-17.4	-19.0
Bowling Green	Toledo	-17.1	-16.1	-18.2
Miami (O)	Eastern Michigan	-4.6	-2.7	-3.9
Northern Illinois	Western Michigan	1.2	1.9	1.4
Ball St.	Buffalo	-16.9	-17.1	-18.3
South Florida	Tulsa	18.3	17.4	19.4
Western Kentucky	Middle Tennessee	7.0	5.8	6.8
New Mexico	UNLV	1.8	0.1	2.4
Indiana	Rutgers	8.3	9.0	8.7
Georgia	Kentucky	19.6	20.5	20.7
East Carolina	Cincinnati	-3.0	-3.2	-4.3
Duke	Georgia Tech	-7.3	-5.2	-7.3
Virginia Tech	Pittsburgh	17.3	16.8	17.6
Temple	Central Florida	-15.1	-16.0	-15.9
Wake Forest	North Carolina St.	-2.4	-3.5	-2.5
Louisville	Syracuse	6.2	6.8	6.7
Northwestern	Minnesota	7.8	5.8	8.5
Michigan St.	Maryland	9.6	9.2	11.4
West Virginia	Texas	2.3	2.3	2.3
Kansas	Oklahoma	-40.0	-35.4	-42.2
Wyoming	Fresno St.	8.6	8.2	7.4
Boise St.	Air Force	17.1	15.2	17.3
Utah St.	Hawaii	12.0	10.2	11.9
Old Dominion	Rice	14.6	15.6	14.7
Southern Miss.	Charlotte	15.0	13.8	15.2
BYU	Massachusetts	3.3	4.0	2.7
UTEP	Louisiana Tech	-14.5	-13.4	-15.0
Georgia Southern	South Alabama	-9.1	-9.7	-9.9
Texas Tech	TCU	-11.5	-9.8	-12.3
Iowa	Purdue	13.0	12.9	12.2
Oregon	Arizona	0.6	0.5	0.4
Ohio St.	Illinois	46.7	43.4	48.1
Florida	UAB	27.3	23.8	24.4
Oregon St.	Arizona St.	-7.9	-7.5	-9.1
Memphis	SMU	13.2	12.2	13.4
Miami (Fla.)	Virginia	27.4	26.4	26.8
Baylor	Iowa St.	-11.6	-10.3	-12.7
Arkansas	Mississippi St.	-12.9	-13.5	-13.5
Vanderbilt	Missouri	-6.6	-5.4	-7.2
Washington	Utah	25.1	21.7	25.4
Auburn	UL-Monroe	49.5	46.6	50.5
Oklahoma St.	Kansas St.	16.5	15.4	17.3
Colorado St.	San Jose St.	35.2	33.9	35.9
Penn St.	Nebraska	32.1	29.9	33.3
Tennessee	LSU	-14.4	-13.8	-16.5
Notre Dame	Navy	20.9	18.7	21.3
Tulane	Houston	-7.7	-6.9	-7.7
UL-Lafayatte	New Mexico St.	-2.4	0.6	-2.7
Idaho	Coastal Carolina	13.8	13.6	13.9
North Texas	Army	-12.1	-10.2	-11.8
Arkansas St.	Texas St.	24.2	23.1	26.0
Florida Atlantic	Florida Int’l.	13.4	15.1	14.2
Boston College (n)	Connecticut	26.7	24.4	26.5
UTSA	Marshall	0.3	1.3	-0.5
Ole Miss	Texas A&M	-1.0	-0.4	-1.3
Wisconsin	Michigan	11.1	8.6	10.6
USC	UCLA	17.8	17.5	18.3
Stanford	California	16.9	17.3	18.3
San Diego St.	Nevada	16.1	14.2	15.8

FBS vs. FCS Games

Home	Visitor	PiRate
Clemson	Citadel	50.0
Alabama	Mercer	49.0
Florida St.	Delaware St.	50.0
North Carolina	Western Carolina	24.0
South Carolina	Wofford	27.0

This Week’s PiRate Ratings

PiRate Retrodictive Rankings
#	Team
1	Alabama
2	Miami (Fla)
3	Clemson
4	Wisconsin
5	Oklahoma
6	Georgia
7	Ohio St.
8	Central Florida
9	Notre Dame
10	Penn St.
11	Auburn
12	USC
13	Oklahoma St.
14	Michigan
15	TCU
16	Washington
17	Washington St.
18	Mississippi St.
19	North Carolina St.
20	Memphis
21	Virginia Tech
22	Michigan St.
23	Stanford
24	Iowa
25	Boise St.
26	LSU
27	Northwestern
28	Wake Forest
29	Iowa St.
30	South Florida
31	Arizona
32	South Carolina
33	West Virginia
34	Georgia Tech
35	Boston College
36	San Diego St.
37	Toledo
38	Houston
39	Louisville
40	Texas A&M
41	Texas
42	Navy
43	Florida Atlantic
44	Kentucky
45	Army
46	Arizona St.
47	Ohio
48	Oregon
49	Florida St.
50	Northern Illinois
51	SMU
52	UCLA
53	Texas Tech
54	Troy
55	Missouri
56	Utah
57	California
58	Syracuse
59	Fresno St.
60	Wyoming
61	Marshall
62	Purdue
63	Virginia
64	Minnesota
65	Ole Miss
66	Kansas St.
67	Indiana
68	North Texas
69	Maryland
70	Western Michigan
71	Florida
72	Colorado
73	Nebraska
74	Colorado St.
75	Duke
76	Central Michigan
77	Pittsburgh
78	Temple
79	Tennessee
80	Arkansas St.
81	Rutgers
82	Utah St.
83	Arkansas
84	Florida Int’l.
85	UAB
86	Vanderbilt
87	Tulane
88	Akron
89	Southern Miss.
90	Appalachian St.
91	North Carolina
92	Georgia St.
93	Air Force
94	Middle Tennessee
95	Eastern Michigan
96	Buffalo
97	Miami (O)
98	UTSA
99	Cincinnati
100	Louisiana Tech
101	Western Kentucky
102	Tulsa
103	UNLV
104	New Mexico St.
105	South Alabama
106	Connecticut
107	Old Dominion
108	BYU
109	UL-Monroe
110	Baylor
111	Massachusetts
112	Illinois
113	Nevada
114	UL-Lafayette
115	New Mexico
116	Idaho
117	Oregon St.
118	East Carolina
119	Bowling Green
120	Hawaii
121	Kent St.
122	Kansas
123	Ball St.
124	Rice
125	Charlotte
126	Texas St.
127	Coastal Carolina
128	Georgia Southern
129	San Jose St.
130	UTEP

 

 

PiRate Predictive Ratings
#	Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
1	Alabama	137.6	134.0	136.4	136.0
2	Ohio St.	132.7	130.4	133.1	132.1
3	Auburn	129.0	126.9	129.3	128.4
4	Clemson	128.1	125.6	127.6	127.1
5	Penn St.	126.6	125.2	127.1	126.3
6	Washington	126.8	124.3	126.9	126.0
7	Georgia	125.5	125.6	125.6	125.6
8	Miami	126.3	124.4	125.7	125.5
9	Oklahoma	125.0	123.7	125.8	124.8
10	Oklahoma St.	123.1	122.2	123.7	123.0
11	Wisconsin	123.8	121.2	122.6	122.6
12	Stanford	120.2	118.5	119.7	119.5
13	U S C	119.7	118.8	119.5	119.3
14	Virginia Tech	119.6	118.9	119.5	119.3
15	T C U	118.6	116.9	118.9	118.1
16	Notre Dame	118.2	116.8	118.7	117.9
17	L S U	117.5	115.3	117.8	116.9
18	N. Carolina St.	116.9	116.1	116.9	116.6
19	Michigan	115.7	115.7	115.0	115.5
20	Florida St.	116.2	115.3	114.7	115.4
21	Mississippi St.	114.5	114.5	114.6	114.5
22	Georgia Tech	115.5	113.0	114.3	114.3
23	Washington St.	114.9	112.7	114.5	114.0
24	Central Florida	112.7	114.1	113.8	113.6
25	Iowa State	112.6	112.6	113.7	113.0
26	Iowa	112.9	113.0	112.3	112.8
27	Texas	112.1	112.4	112.6	112.4
28	Louisville	112.3	111.4	112.1	111.9
29	Wake Forest	112.5	110.6	112.5	111.8
30	West Virginia	111.4	111.7	111.9	111.7
31	Northwestern	110.4	109.3	110.3	110.0
32	South Florida	110.1	109.0	110.7	109.9
33	Boston College	109.9	109.6	109.9	109.8
34	Kansas St.	109.6	109.8	109.4	109.6
35	Memphis	108.8	108.1	109.4	108.7
36	S. Carolina	109.1	108.1	108.3	108.5
37	Arizona	109.2	107.6	108.4	108.4
38	Syracuse	109.1	107.6	108.4	108.4
39	Kentucky	109.0	108.0	107.9	108.3
40	Texas A&M	109.1	107.1	108.3	108.2
41	Missouri	108.5	106.6	107.8	107.6
42	Boise St.	107.0	105.5	107.2	106.6
43	Oregon	106.8	105.0	105.9	105.9
44	Florida	106.2	105.6	105.4	105.7
45	Minnesota	105.6	106.5	104.8	105.6
46	Michigan St.	104.9	105.8	106.0	105.6
47	Arizona St.	105.8	104.9	105.4	105.4
48	Duke	105.7	105.3	104.5	105.2
49	Pittsburgh	105.3	105.1	104.9	105.1
50	Colorado	106.2	104.8	104.2	105.0
51	Utah	104.7	105.5	104.5	104.9
52	Texas Tech	104.6	104.5	104.1	104.4
53	Ole Miss	105.1	103.7	104.0	104.3
54	California	104.8	102.7	102.9	103.5
55	Houston	103.4	103.0	103.6	103.3
56	Indiana	102.9	103.1	103.2	103.1
57	Purdue	102.9	103.1	103.1	103.0
58	U C L A	103.4	102.8	102.7	103.0
59	San Diego St.	102.0	101.9	102.9	102.3
60	Virginia	101.8	101.0	101.9	101.6
61	N. Carolina	102.1	101.2	101.2	101.5
62	Toledo	100.7	100.8	102.4	101.3
63	Colo. State	101.5	100.5	101.3	101.1
64	Army	100.9	100.6	101.4	101.0
65	Navy	100.3	101.1	100.4	100.6
66	Wyoming	100.7	99.4	100.0	100.0
67	Ohio U	99.1	100.2	100.2	99.8
68	Vanderbilt	99.9	99.1	98.7	99.2
69	Florida Atlantic	98.0	100.0	99.5	99.2
70	Tennessee	100.1	98.5	98.3	99.0
71	SMU	98.5	98.9	99.0	98.8
72	Maryland	98.3	99.6	97.6	98.5
73	Baylor	98.0	99.4	98.0	98.5
74	Arkansas	98.6	97.9	98.1	98.2
75	Western Michigan	97.7	96.8	98.6	97.7
76	Nebraska	97.5	98.3	96.8	97.5
77	Rutgers	97.6	97.1	97.5	97.4
78	Northern Illinois	95.9	95.8	97.0	96.2
79	Eastern Michigan	95.8	95.8	96.2	95.9
80	Arkansas St.	94.5	95.7	95.7	95.3
81	Troy	95.2	95.4	94.8	95.1
82	Central Michigan	94.7	95.1	95.5	95.1
83	Fresno St.	95.0	94.2	95.6	95.0
84	Temple	94.6	95.1	95.0	94.9
85	Tulsa	94.8	94.6	94.3	94.6
86	Oregon St.	94.8	94.5	93.3	94.2
87	Air Force	92.8	93.3	92.9	93.0
88	Tulane	92.7	93.1	92.9	92.9
89	Appalachian St.	93.3	92.1	93.1	92.8
90	Marshall	91.8	93.0	93.5	92.8
91	Utah St.	92.6	91.8	92.2	92.2
92	W. Kentucky	90.7	90.8	91.5	91.0
93	U T S A	89.1	91.4	90.0	90.1
94	Massachusetts	90.3	89.5	90.6	90.1
95	BYU	90.1	90.0	89.8	89.9
96	Nevada	88.9	90.7	90.2	89.9
97	Miami (O)	88.6	90.7	89.8	89.7
98	Illinois	89.0	90.0	88.0	89.0
99	Cincinnati	87.9	89.5	89.0	88.8
100	Akron	86.8	89.2	87.3	87.8
101	N. Mexico St.	87.6	86.0	87.9	87.2
102	Buffalo	85.6	87.8	87.6	87.0
103	Middle Tennessee	86.3	87.5	87.2	87.0
104	U N L V	86.1	87.6	86.1	86.6
105	N. Texas	85.8	87.4	86.5	86.6
106	S. Alabama	85.7	87.7	85.9	86.4
107	Louisiana Tech	85.6	87.4	86.2	86.4
108	Florida Int’l.	86.0	86.4	86.8	86.4
109	New Mexico	84.9	84.7	85.5	85.0
110	Connecticut	84.2	86.2	84.3	84.9
111	Hawaii	84.6	85.6	84.3	84.8
112	Southern Miss.	84.2	85.3	84.7	84.7
113	Old Dominion	83.5	85.9	83.9	84.4
114	Georgia St.	84.0	83.8	84.0	84.0
115	UAB	81.4	84.2	83.5	83.0
116	East Carolina	82.4	83.9	82.2	82.8
117	UL-Lafayette	82.3	83.6	82.1	82.7
118	Kansas	81.9	85.3	80.6	82.6
119	UL-Monroe	82.5	83.3	81.7	82.5
120	Bowling Green	81.7	82.7	82.1	82.2
121	Idaho	81.1	82.2	81.9	81.7
122	Georgia Southern	74.6	76.0	74.0	74.9
123	Kent St.	73.7	75.2	74.0	74.3
124	Texas St.	73.4	75.5	72.7	73.9
125	Charlotte	72.2	74.5	72.4	73.0
126	Rice	71.9	73.3	72.2	72.5
127	Coastal Carolina	70.7	72.1	71.4	71.4
128	U T E P	68.6	71.5	68.7	69.6
129	San Jose St.	69.3	69.6	68.4	69.1
130	Ball St.	65.7	67.7	66.3	66.6

 

American Athletic Conference
East Division
Team	AAC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Central Florida	6-0	9-0	112.7	114.1	113.8	113.6
South Florida	5-1	8-1	110.1	109.0	110.7	109.9
Temple	3-3	5-5	94.6	95.1	95.0	94.9
Cincinnati	1-5	3-7	87.9	89.5	89.0	88.8
Connecticut	2-5	3-7	84.2	86.2	84.3	84.9
East Carolina	1-5	2-8	82.4	83.9	82.2	82.8
West Division
Team	AAC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Memphis	5-1	8-1	108.8	108.1	109.4	108.7
Houston	4-2	6-3	103.4	103.0	103.6	103.3
Navy	4-3	6-3	100.3	101.1	100.4	100.6
SMU	3-3	6-4	98.5	98.9	99.0	98.8
Tulsa	1-5	2-8	94.8	94.6	94.3	94.6
Tulane	2-4	4-6	92.7	93.1	92.9	92.9
AAC Averages			97.5	98.0	97.9	97.8
Atlantic Coast Conference
Atlantic Division
Team	ACC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Clemson	7-1	9-1	128.1	125.6	127.6	127.1
N. Carolina St.	5-1	7-3	116.9	116.1	116.9	116.6
Florida St.	3-5	3-6	116.2	115.3	114.7	115.4
Louisville	3-4	6-4	112.3	111.4	112.1	111.9
Wake Forest	3-3	6-4	112.5	110.6	112.5	111.8
Boston College	3-4	5-5	109.9	109.6	109.9	109.8
Syracuse	2-4	4-6	109.1	107.6	108.4	108.4
Coastal Division
Team	ACC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Miami	6-0	9-0	126.3	124.4	125.7	125.5
Virginia Tech	3-3	7-3	119.6	118.9	119.5	119.3
Georgia Tech	4-3	5-4	115.5	113.0	114.3	114.3
Duke	1-5	4-6	105.7	105.3	104.5	105.2
Pittsburgh	2-4	4-6	105.3	105.1	104.9	105.1
Virginia	3-3	6-4	101.8	101.0	101.9	101.6
N. Carolina	1-6	2-8	102.1	101.2	101.2	101.5
ACC Averages			113.0	111.8	112.4	112.4
Big 12 Conference
Team	B12	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Oklahoma	6-1	9-1	125.0	123.7	125.8	124.8
Oklahoma St.	5-2	8-2	123.1	122.2	123.7	123.0
T C U	5-2	8-2	118.6	116.9	118.9	118.1
Iowa State	4-3	5-5	112.6	112.6	113.7	113.0
Texas	4-3	5-5	112.1	112.4	112.6	112.4
West Virginia	5-2	7-3	111.4	111.7	111.9	111.7
Kansas St.	3-4	5-5	109.6	109.8	109.4	109.6
Texas Tech	2-5	5-5	104.6	104.5	104.1	104.4
Baylor	1-6	1-9	98.0	99.4	98.0	98.5
Kansas	0-7	1-9	81.9	85.3	80.6	82.6
Big 12 Averages			109.7	109.8	109.9	109.8
Big Ten Conference
East Division
Team	BTen	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Ohio St.	6-1	8-2	132.7	130.4	133.1	132.1
Penn St.	5-2	8-2	126.6	125.2	127.1	126.3
Michigan	5-2	8-2	115.7	115.7	115.0	115.5
Michigan St.	5-2	7-3	104.9	105.8	106.0	105.6
Indiana	1-6	4-6	102.9	103.1	103.2	103.1
Maryland	2-5	4-6	98.3	99.6	97.6	98.5
Rutgers	3-4	4-6	97.6	97.1	97.5	97.4
West Division
Team	BTen	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Wisconsin	7-0	10-0	123.8	121.2	122.6	122.6
Iowa	3-4	6-4	112.9	113.0	112.3	112.8
Northwestern	5-2	7-3	110.4	109.3	110.3	110.0
Minnesota	2-5	5-5	105.6	106.5	104.8	105.6
Purdue	2-5	4-6	102.9	103.1	103.1	103.0
Nebraska	3-4	4-6	97.5	98.3	96.8	97.5
Illinois	0-7	2-8	89.0	90.0	88.0	89.0
Big Ten Averages			108.6	108.4	108.4	108.5
Conference USA
East Division
Team	CUSA	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Florida Atlantic	6-0	7-3	98.0	100.0	99.5	99.2
Marshall	4-2	7-3	91.8	93.0	93.5	92.8
W. Kentucky	3-3	5-5	90.7	90.8	91.5	91.0
Middle Tennessee	3-3	5-5	86.3	87.5	87.2	87.0
Florida Int’l.	4-2	6-3	86.0	86.4	86.8	86.4
Old Dominion	2-4	4-6	83.5	85.9	83.9	84.4
Charlotte	1-5	1-9	72.2	74.5	72.4	73.0
West Division
Team	CUSA	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
U T S A	2-4	5-4	89.1	91.4	90.0	90.1
N. Texas	6-1	7-3	85.8	87.4	86.5	86.6
Louisiana Tech	2-4	4-6	85.6	87.4	86.2	86.4
Southern Miss.	4-2	6-4	84.2	85.3	84.7	84.7
UAB	5-2	7-3	81.4	84.2	83.5	83.0
Rice	1-5	1-9	71.9	73.3	72.2	72.5
U T E P	0-6	0-10	68.6	71.5	68.7	69.6
CUSA Averages			83.9	85.6	84.8	84.8
FBS Independents
Team		Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Notre Dame		8-2	118.2	116.8	118.7	117.9
Army		8-2	100.9	100.6	101.4	101.0
Massachusetts		3-7	90.3	89.5	90.6	90.1
BYU		3-8	90.1	90.0	89.8	89.9
Indep. Averages			99.9	99.2	100.1	99.7
Mid-American Conference
East Division
Team	MAC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Ohio U	5-1	8-2	99.1	100.2	100.2	99.8
Miami (O)	3-3	4-6	88.6	90.7	89.8	89.7
Akron	4-2	5-5	86.8	89.2	87.3	87.8
Buffalo	2-4	4-6	85.6	87.8	87.6	87.0
Bowling Green	2-4	2-8	81.7	82.7	82.1	82.2
Kent St.	1-5	2-8	73.7	75.2	74.0	74.3
West Division
Team	MAC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Toledo	5-1	8-2	100.7	100.8	102.4	101.3
Western Michigan	4-2	6-4	97.7	96.8	98.6	97.7
Northern Illinois	5-1	7-3	95.9	95.8	97.0	96.2
Eastern Michigan	1-5	3-7	95.8	95.8	96.2	95.9
Central Michigan	4-2	6-4	94.7	95.1	95.5	95.1
Ball St.	0-6	2-8	65.7	67.7	66.3	66.6
MAC Averages			88.8	89.8	89.7	89.5
Mountain West Conference
Mountain Division
Team	MWC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Boise St.	6-0	8-2	107.0	105.5	107.2	106.6
Colo. State	4-3	6-5	101.5	100.5	101.3	101.1
Wyoming	5-1	7-3	100.7	99.4	100.0	100.0
Air Force	3-3	4-6	92.8	93.3	92.9	93.0
Utah St.	3-3	5-5	92.6	91.8	92.2	92.2
New Mexico	1-5	3-7	84.9	84.7	85.5	85.0
West Division
Team	MWC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
San Diego St.	4-2	8-2	102.0	101.9	102.9	102.3
Fresno St.	5-1	7-3	95.0	94.2	95.6	95.0
Nevada	2-4	2-8	88.9	90.7	90.2	89.9
U N L V	3-3	4-6	86.1	87.6	86.1	86.6
Hawaii	1-6	3-7	84.6	85.6	84.3	84.8
San Jose St.	0-6	1-10	69.3	69.6	68.4	69.1
MWC Averages			92.1	92.1	92.2	92.1
Pac-12 Conference
North Division
Team	P12	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Washington	5-2	8-2	126.8	124.3	126.9	126.0
Stanford	6-2	7-3	120.2	118.5	119.7	119.5
Washington St.	6-2	9-2	114.9	112.7	114.5	114.0
Oregon	2-5	5-5	106.8	105.0	105.9	105.9
California	2-5	5-5	104.8	102.7	102.9	103.5
Oregon St.	0-7	1-9	94.8	94.5	93.3	94.2
South Division
Team	P12	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
U S C	7-1	9-2	119.7	118.8	119.5	119.3
Arizona	5-2	7-3	109.2	107.6	108.4	108.4
Arizona St.	4-3	5-5	105.8	104.9	105.4	105.4
Colorado	2-6	5-6	106.2	104.8	104.2	105.0
Utah	2-5	5-5	104.7	105.5	104.5	104.9
U C L A	3-4	5-5	103.4	102.8	102.7	103.0
Pac-12 Averages			109.8	108.5	109.0	109.1
Southeastern Conference
East Division
Team	SEC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Georgia	6-1	9-1	125.5	125.6	125.6	125.6
S. Carolina	5-3	7-3	109.1	108.1	108.3	108.5
Kentucky	4-3	7-3	109.0	108.0	107.9	108.3
Missouri	2-4	5-5	108.5	106.6	107.8	107.6
Florida	3-5	3-6	106.2	105.6	105.4	105.7
Vanderbilt	0-6	4-6	99.9	99.1	98.7	99.2
Tennessee	0-6	4-6	100.1	98.5	98.3	99.0
West Division
Team	SEC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Alabama	7-0	10-0	137.6	134.0	136.4	136.0
Auburn	6-1	8-2	129.0	126.9	129.3	128.4
L S U	4-2	7-3	117.5	115.3	117.8	116.9
Mississippi St.	3-3	7-3	114.5	114.5	114.6	114.5
Texas A&M	3-3	6-4	109.1	107.1	108.3	108.2
Ole Miss	2-4	5-5	105.1	103.7	104.0	104.3
Arkansas	1-5	4-6	98.6	97.9	98.1	98.2
SEC Averages			112.1	110.8	111.5	111.5
Sunbelt Conference
Team	SBC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Arkansas St.	4-1	5-3	94.5	95.7	95.7	95.3
Troy	5-1	8-2	95.2	95.4	94.8	95.1
Appalachian St.	5-1	6-4	93.3	92.1	93.1	92.8
N. Mexico St.	2-3	4-5	87.6	86.0	87.9	87.2
S. Alabama	3-3	4-6	85.7	87.7	85.9	86.4
Georgia St.	5-1	6-3	84.0	83.8	84.0	84.0
UL-Lafayette	3-2	4-5	82.3	83.6	82.1	82.7
UL-Monroe	4-3	4-5	82.5	83.3	81.7	82.5
Idaho	2-3	3-6	81.1	82.2	81.9	81.7
Georgia Southern	0-5	0-9	74.6	76.0	74.0	74.9
Texas St.	1-5	2-8	73.4	75.5	72.7	73.9
Coastal Carolina	0-6	1-9	70.7	72.1	71.4	71.4
Sun Belt Averages			83.7	84.5	83.8	84.0

Conference Ratings

#	League	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
1	ACC	113.0	111.8	112.4	112.4
2	SEC	112.1	110.8	111.5	111.5
3	BIG 12	109.7	109.8	109.9	109.8
4	PAC-12	109.8	108.5	109.0	109.1
5	BIG TEN	108.6	108.4	108.4	108.5
6	INDEP.	99.9	99.2	100.1	99.7
7	AAC	97.5	98.0	97.9	97.8
8	MWC	92.1	92.1	92.2	92.1
9	MAC	88.8	89.8	89.7	89.5
10	CUSA	83.9	85.6	84.8	84.8
11	Sun Belt	83.7	84.5	83.8	84.0

Playoff and Bowl Projections

Bowl	Conferences		Team 1	Team 2
New Orleans	CUSA	SBC	UAB	UL-Lafayette
Cure	AAC	SBC	Navy	Georgia St.
Las Vegas	MWC 1	PAC-12 5	Boise St.	Arizona St.
New Mexico	CUSA	MWC	North Texas	Colorado St.
Camellia	MAC	SBC	Ohio U	Troy
Boca Raton	AAC	CUSA	Houston	Marshall
Frisco	AAC	MAC	SMU	Western Mich.
Gasparilla	AAC	CUSA	[Boston College]	Southern Miss.
Bahamas	CUSA 1	MAC	Florida Atlantic	Toledo
Idaho Potato	MAC	MWC	Akron	Utah St.
Birmingham	AAC	SEC 8-9	Temple	[Florida Int’l.]
Armed Forces	Army	BIG TEN 8	ARMY	[Western Ky.]
Dollar General	MAC	SBC	Miami (O)	Appalachian St.
Hawaii	AAC	MWC	Central Florida	San Diego St.
Heart of Dallas	BIG 12 6	CUSA	[Colorado]	UTSA
Quick Lane	ACC 7-9	BIG TEN 7	Virginia	[Central Mich.]
Cactus	BIG 12 5	PAC-12 6	[Fresno St.]	Oregon
Independence	ACC 7-9	SEC 8-9	Wake Forest	[Middle Tenn.]
Pinstripe	ACC 3-6	BIG TEN 5	Georgia Tech	Iowa
Foster Farms	BIG TEN 6	PAC-12 8	[Northern Illinois]	Arizona
Texas	BIG 12 3	SEC 2-7	Texas	LSU
Military	AAC 7-9	ACC 7-9	South Florida	Florida St.
Camping World	ACC 2	BIG 12 2	Notre Dame	Iowa St.
Holiday	BIG TEN 3	PAC-12 2	Michigan St.	Stanford
Alamo	BIG 12 1	PAC-12 1	West Virginia	Washington St.
Belk	ACC 3-6	SEC 2-7	Virginia Tech	South Carolina
Sun	ACC 3-6	Pac-12	Louisville	UCLA
Music City	ACC 3-6/B10 4	SEC 2-7	Northwestern	Kentucky
Arizona	MWC	SBC	Wyoming	Arkansas St.
Cotton	At-large	At-large	Georgia	Washington
Taxslayer	ACC 3-6/B10 4	SEC 2-7	North Carolina St.	Missouri
Liberty	BIG 12 4	SEC 2-7	Kansas St.	Texas A&M
Fiesta	At-large	At-large	USC	TCU
Orange	ACC 1	SEC 1/B10 1	Clemson	Penn St.
Outback	BIG TEN 2	SEC 2-7	Michigan	Mississippi St.
Peach	At-large	At-large	Oklahoma St.	Memphis
Citrus	B10 1/ACC 2	SEC 1	Ohio St.	Auburn
Rose	Playoff	Semi-final	Oklahoma	Miami (Fla.)
Sugar	Playoff	Semi-final	Alabama	Wisconsin
Nat’l Champ.	Semifinal	Winners	Alabama	Oklahoma
Teams in [Brackets] are at-large selections

Who Should Be National Coach of the Year
If Alabama wins the National Championship this year with a perfect 15-0 record, Nick Saban would be the odds-on favorite to win the National Coach of the Year Award. Playing in a very tough SEC Western Division and adding a win over Georgia, plus two in the Playoffs, it would be hard to argue with anybody that voted Saban number one on their ballots.

However, we here at the PiRate Ratings not only do not think Saban should be the National Coach of the Year, he shouldn’t be the State of Alabama Coach of the Year!
This is not a knock against Saban. In our opinion, Saban’s coaching job this year would be the same as Swen Nater as the second best center in the nation in 1972 and 1973 when he was at UCLA (unfortunately, number one was Bill Walton).

If you are over the age of 50 like so many of our readers, you remember SMU receiving the death penalty, not being allowed to play for two years. When the Mustangs returned to college football, they suffered through years and years of very weak football seasons. It was a new century before the Mustangs finally returned to a bowl.

What would you have thought of any coach that not only could have quickly taken SMU to a bowl in its first year back in football? That SMU coach that helped bring SMU back to football was none other than the greatest offensive tackle in NFL history–Forrest Gregg.  The job was too hard, and SMU won just four games in its first three years back in business.

A similar instance has presented the college football nation with another team not playing football for two seasons before returning this year. UAB dropped football for financial reasons after finishing 6-6 in 2014. The Blazers were expected to struggle mightily in their first season back in FBS football, being lucky to win a game this year. Except, nobody told Coach Bill Clark that his team was not supposed to come within one game of the CUSA West Division title and become bowl eligible, but that is exactly where UAB sits through 10 games of the season. The Blazers are 7-3, and Clark deserves serious consideration for NCOY; nobody has done a better job than Clark.
The Conference Races & Bowl Eligibility
Around the first of February every year, college basketball fans start looking in earnest at which teams appear to be in the NCAA Tournament, which are on “the bubble,” and which appear to be headed to a lesser tournament or none at all. In the Playoff era of FBS football, somebody should start something similar. So, here is a list for each conference.

Group of 5 Conferences
American Athletic Conference
Bowl Eligible: 6 — Central Florida, South Florida, Memphis, Houston, Navy, SMU
5-Win Teams: 1 — Temple
4-Win Teams: 1 — Tulane
Bowl Tie-ins: 7
Likely Bowl Eligibles: 7 (but the champion is likely to receive the NY6 Bowl bid, leaving this league one team short in its needs to fill its bowl tie-ins.

Central Florida leads the race for the one New Year’s Six Bowl slot that goes to a Group of 5 team, but Memphis has just one loss (to UCF). Should the Tigers beat UCF in a rematch at the AAC Championship Game, then Memphis could take the NY6 Bowl. USF is still in contention for this spot as well.

Temple needs one more win. The Owls host Central Florida this week in what should be a trap game for the Knights. TU closes the year out with a road game against Tulsa, so Temple has a decent chance to pick up win number six in the finale.

Tulane must upset Houston and SMU to become bowl eligible, and we do not see the Green Wave toppling either team.

Conference USA
Bowl Eligible: 6 — Florida Atlantic, Marshall, Florida Int’l., North Texas, UAB, Southern Miss.
5-Win Teams: 3 — Western Kentucky, Middle Tennessee, UTSA
4-Win Teams: 2 — Old Dominion, Louisiana Tech
Bowl Tie-ins: 6
Likely Bowl Eligibles: 9

Florida Atlantic has a two-game lead over Marshall and FIU, and Lane Kiffin has said this is the mosr rewarding season he has experienced as a coach. North Texas has already clinched the Western Division.

The three 5-win teams have excellent chances to get to six wins, and this should give thie league multiple at-large bowl teams. There will be enough open bowls for all nine bowl-eligible teams to receive bids.

Mid-American
Bowl Eligible: 5 — Ohio, Toledo, Northern Illinois, Western Michigan, Central Michigan
5-Win Teams: 1 — Akron
4-Win Teams: 2 — Miami (O), Buffalo
Bowl Tie-ins: 5
Likely Bowl Eligibles: 7 or 8

Akron may or may not beat Ohio this week, but the Zips finish with Kent State, and this should Terry Bowden’s squad to earn their second bowl in three seasons.

Both Miami and Buffalo have okay chances to win their final two games and square their marks at 6-6, but we believe the better prediction would have just one of the pair going 2-0. Miami host Eastern Michigan and closes at Ball State. The Redhawks lost their first six games last year and then won six in a row to earn a bowl bid. They only needed to go 3-0 to repeat the process this year, and they got a good start by upsetting Akron.

Buffalo has to win at Ball State and then upset Ohio in the regular season finale to finish 6-6. If the Bulls and Miami both finish 6-6, it is our opinion that the MAC will fail to place all eight teams in bowls. Seven teams are most likely the maximum that will earn bids from the MAC.

Mountain West
Bowl Eligible: 5 — Boise St., Wyoming, Colorado St., San Diego St., Fresno St.
5-Win Teams: 1 — Utah St.
4-Win Teams: 2 — Air Force, UNLV
Bowl Tie-ins: 5
Likely Bowl Eligibles: 6

It looks like Boise State and San Diego State will face off in the MWC Championship Game, and the winner will be a formidable foe for a Pac-12 team in the Las Vegas Bowl.
Utah State was not expected to compete for a bowl this year, but the Aggies are one win away from bowl eligibility. Hawaii visits Logan this week, and USU should get that sixth win before finishing at Air Force.

As for the four-win teams, it will be a major surprise if either Air Force or UNLV wins out. The Falcons play at Boise State this week, and that should produce loss number seven. UNLV finishes with road games against New Mexico and Nevada.

Sun Belt
Bowl Eligible: 3 — Troy, Appalachian St., Georgia St.
5-Win Teams: 1 — Arkansas St.
4-Win Teams: New Mexico St., South Alabama, UL-Lafayette, UL-Monroe
Bowl Tie-ins: 5
Likely Bowl Eligibles: 6

Arkansas St. is 5-3 with three chances to win one more game. The Red Wolves host lowly Texas State this week and should become bowl eligible, before closing with a road game against UL-Monroe and a home game with Troy.

Two of the four 4-win teams should become bowl eligible, but there is not likely to be six openings for this league with five bowl tie-ins.

UL-Lafayette always seems to find its way to the Superdome in the postseason. The Ragin’ Cajuns have played in five bowls in their history, all of which were New Orleans Bowls. ULL must finish 2-1 against a slate of New Mexico State, Georgia Southern, and at Appalachian State, and their chances are better than 50-50 of winning twice.

UL-Monroe and South Alabama have very tough roads to close out the year. ULM merely must win at Auburn or at Florida State and then take care of Arkansas State at home in order to finish 6-6. USA should win at Georgia Southern this week, but their finale at New Mexico State looks very difficult.

As for New Mexico State, the Aggies need to go 2-1 against UL-Lafayette, Idaho, and South Alabama. We believe NMSU will get those two wins, but then the league will not lobby for the Aggies to get a bowl bid, as they will be leaving the Sun Belt after this season. This league has spurned teams leaving the conference in the past, most recently Middle Tennessee, when the Blue Raiders left for CUSA.

Independents
Note–Notre Dame will not be included in this section, as they count in the ACC bowl section.

Bowl Eligible: 1 — Army
Army is 8-2, and the Black Knights are Armed Forces Bowl.

Power 5 Conferences
Atlantic Coast
Bowl Eligible: 8 — Clemson, North Carolina St., Wake Forest, Louisville, Miami (Fla.), Virginia Tech, Virginia + Notre Dame
5-Win Teams: 2 — Boston College, Georgia Tech
4-Win Teams: 3 — Syracuse, Duke, Pittsburgh
3-Win Team: 1 — Florida St.
Bowl Tie-ins: 9
Likely Bowl Eligible: 10

Miami or Clemson is likely to make the Playoffs.

Clemson and Miami will play in the ACC Championship Game, and the winner stands an excellent chance of making it to the Playoffs. Notre Dame is still alive for a NY6 Bowl, but the slaughter at the hands of Miami has ended the Irish’s chances of making the Playoffs. Notre Dame still has a road game against Stanford, and the home game with Navy is no sure thing, so there is a rather possible chance that the Irish will lose for a third time and be relegated to a non-NY6 Bowl.

Boston College gets a chance to become bowl eligible at the best venue in the Boston area. The Eagles face off against U Conn at Fenway Park. BC finishes with a road game against Syracuse. We believe the Eagles will be bowl bound this year.
5-4 Georgia Tech plays just 11 games thanks to the hurricane. The Yellow Jackets most likely must win at Duke this week, as they finish against Georgia in two weeks.

Syracuse, Duke, and Pittsburgh are all 4-6. We do not believe any of the three will finish 2-0 to become bowl eligible. Syracuse plays at Louisville this week, and the Cardinals should send the Orange to their seventh loss, making the home finale with Boston College inconsequential. Duke has to beat Georgia Tech and Wake Forest to get to 6-6, and even though they would be the top APR team at 5-7, we believe there will be 80 bowl eligible teams for the 78 bowls, meaning no 5-7 teams will get a chance to bowl this season. Pitt is staring at 4-8 with games against Virginia Tech and Miami to close out a forgettable 2017 season.

Florida St. is 3-6, and until they hurried to reschedule their hurricane-cancelling game with UL-Monroe, it looked like they would have no chance to get to six wins. The Seminoles will handle Delaware State with ease this week, and then they must beat rival Florida in Gainesville, before the makeup game with UL-Monroe will mean something. There is a good chance the Seminoles will accomplish the feat.

Big 12
Bowl Eligible: 4 — Oklahoma, Oklahoma St., TCU, West Virginia
5-Win Teams: 4 — Iowa State, Texas, Kansas State, and Texas Tech
4-Win Teams: 0
Bowl Tie-ins: 6
Likely Bowl Eligibles: 7

Oklahoma is heavily favored to win out and earn a Playoff spot. TCU and Oklahoma State could both receive NY6 bowl bids, which would then leave the Big 12 two teams short and allow two at-large teams to fill the last two bowls in the pecking order.

Oklahoma should wrap up a spot in the Big 12 Playoffs with a game against Kansas this week. The other spot is still up for grabs. Oklahoma State, TCU, and West Virginia are tied at 5-2, while Iowa State and Texas are 4-3. Our money is on TCU to win at Texas Tech and at home against Baylor, and the Horned Frogs would hold the tiebreaker over OSU and WVU.

Of the four 5-win teams, one will most definitely fall short, finishing 5-7. Texas Tech and Texas face uphill climbs this week against favored opponents, and the Red Raiders and Longhorns close out in Austin on Black Friday, where the winner will be 6-6.

Big Ten
Bowl Eligible: 7 — Ohio St., Penn St., Michigan St., Michigan, Wisconsin, Northwestern, Iowa
5-Win Teams: 1 — Minnesota
4-Win Teams: 5 — Indiana, Maryland, Rutgers, Purdue, Nebraska
Bowl Tie-ins: 8
Likely Bowl Eligibles: 7

Wisconsin has a good chance of making the Playoffs, while one other team should earn a NY6 bowl bid. This would leave three Big Ten bowls without a league team.

Wisconsin has clinched a spot in the Big Ten Championship Game, while Ohio State is the overwhelming favorite to back into the title game. Michigan could beat the Buckeyes at the Big House in the season-ender, but unless the Wolverines knock off Wisconsin at Camp Randall this week, beating OSU will not get them to the Championship Game.

Minnesota closes with Northwestern in Evanston and Wisconsin in Minneapolis, so it looks like the Gophers may fall to 5-7. As for the five, 4-6 teams, we cannot find a path for any of the quintet to finish 2-0.

Pac-12
Bowl Eligible: 5 — Washington, Washington St., Stanford, USC, Arizona
5-Win Teams: 6 — Oregon, California, Arizona State, Colorado, Utah, UCLA
4-Win Teams: 0
Bowl Tie-ins: 6
Likely Bowl Eligibles: 9

Two from among the current Bowl Eligible teams are likely headed to NY6 bowls, so there should be one extra bowl eligible team to be sent elsewhere to an at-large bid.

If Stanford beats Cal this week, then Washington State would win the North Division with a win over Washington, while Stanford would win the division if Washington beat Washington State. If Cal beats Stanford, then the Wash-WSU winner would win the division.

USC has won the South Division title, and the Trojans have improved enough since October, that they should be considered favorites over any of the three North contenders.

Half of the league currently have five wins. We believe that four of the six will get the sixth win. Oregon finishes with Arizona and Oregon State at home, and the Ducks have a great chance to return to a bowl. Either Colorado or Utah is guaranteed to make a bowl, because one will have to win their encounter. The same goes for UCLA and Califirnia. Arizona State plays at Oregon State before hosting Arizona, and the Sun Devils should get win number six.

SEC
Bowl Eligible: 8 — Alabama, Auburn, LSU, Mississippi St., Texas A&M, Georgia, Kentucky, South Carolina
5-Win Teams: 1 — Missouri (Ole Miss is 5-5 but ineligible)
4-Win Teams: 3 — Arkansas, Tennessee, Vanderbilt
Bowl Tie-ins: 9
Likely Bowl Eligibles: 9

Alabama is almost certain to make the Playoffs, while Georgia is likely to earn a NY 6 Bowl Bid. That would leave the SEC two teams short in their bowl obligations.

Alabama only needs to show up to beat Mercer this week, and then the Tide has to finish at Auburn. Auburn can win the West Division by pulling off the big upset over Alabama.

LSU and Mississippi State should both get to nine wins, while South Carolina is an upset away over Clemson from becoming the sixth nine-win team from the league.

Missouri gets to play 0-6 Vandy and 1-5 Arkansas, so the Tigers should be 6-6 if not 7-5.
We do not expect any of the three 4-6 teams to win out and become bowl eligible.

 

PiRate Ratings College Football Forecast for November 7-11, 2017

This Week’s PiRate Rating Spreads

Home	Visitor	PiRate	Mean	Bias
Miami (O)	Akron	3.4	2.9	4.0
Buffalo	Bowling Green	6.0	7.5	7.6
Western Michigan	Kent St.	26.9	24.5	27.6
Ohio U	Toledo	-6.2	-5.0	-6.7
Central Michigan	Eastern Michigan	-1.4	-0.4	-1.4
Northern Illinois	Ball St.	29.3	27.1	29.4
Appalachian St.	Georgia Southern	21.7	19.1	22.1
Pittsburgh	North Carolina	8.3	9.0	9.1
Cincinnati	Temple	-3.0	-1.6	-1.7
Stanford	Washington	-7.5	-6.1	-8.7
UNLV	BYU	1.1	3.0	1.8
Maryland	Michigan	-11.6	-10.3	-11.2
South Carolina	Florida	5.6	5.2	5.6
Georgia Tech	Virginia Tech	-2.9	-4.7	-4.6
East Carolina	Tulane	-8.2	-7.2	-8.6
Boston College	North Carolina St.	-4.0	-3.5	-4.1
Central Florida	Connecticut	31.9	31.3	32.9
Syracuse	Wake Forest	6.1	5.9	5.5
Penn St.	Rutgers	33.0	31.3	34.0
Army	Duke	-3.3	-2.6	-1.4
Ohio St.	Michigan St.	27.2	23.8	25.9
Illinois	Indiana	-11.6	-10.6	-13.1
Coastal Carolina	Troy	-22.2	-21.2	-20.8
Charlotte	Middle Tennessee	-11.2	-10.1	-11.6
Air Force	Wyoming	-2.0	-0.3	-0.7
Nevada	San Jose St.	16.2	17.7	18.4
Baylor	Texas Tech	-2.2	-0.8	-1.1
Kansas St.	West Virginia	3.1	2.6	2.6
Oklahoma	TCU	6.6	7.2	6.7
Iowa St.	Oklahoma St.	-7.4	-6.6	-7.0
Louisville	Virginia	13.1	13.0	12.7
Miami (Fla.)	Notre Dame	3.1	2.6	1.6
Navy	SMU	4.9	5.4	4.6
Utah	Washington St.	-7.0	-3.8	-6.8
Northwestern	Purdue	10.4	9.3	10.2
Ole Miss	Louisiana-Lafayette	25.1	22.2	23.6
Minnesota	Nebraska	4.0	4.2	4.0
Mississippi St.	Alabama	-22.3	-17.9	-20.8
Louisiana Tech	Florida Atlantic	-5.0	-5.3	-5.9
Rice	Southern Miss.	-9.8	-9.5	-10.0
Colorado	USC	-9.7	-10.5	-11.7
Wisconsin	Iowa	10.0	6.9	8.8
Auburn	Georgia	1.0	-1.2	0.8
Missouri	Tennessee	5.4	5.1	6.5
Texas A&M	New Mexico	22.7	20.9	21.3
UCLA	Arizona St.	-1.0	-0.5	-1.5
Vanderbilt	Kentucky	-1.7	-1.5	-1.8
South Alabama	Arkansas St.	-8.4	-7.0	-10.0
Texas St.	Georgia St.	-8.3	-6.0	-9.0
North Texas	UTEP	15.8	14.6	16.5
Texas	Kansas	37.7	34.6	39.5
Marshall	Western Kentucky	3.7	5.0	4.7
Florida Int’l.	Old Dominion	8.9	6.6	9.9
UTSA	UAB	15.0	14.0	14.0
Clemson	Florida St.	14.4	12.8	15.3
LSU	Arkansas	21.2	19.9	22.5
Arizona	Oregon St.	16.3	15.0	16.8
Colorado St.	Boise St.	-2.2	-1.7	-2.6
Hawaii	Fresno St.	-6.3	-4.5	-7.0

The PiRate Ratings

Retro Rankings

PiRate Retrodictive
#	Team
1	Alabama
2	Georgia
3	Notre Dame
4	Clemson
5	Wisconsin
6	Miami (Fla)
7	Oklahoma
8	Penn St.
9	Central Florida
10	Ohio St.
11	Washington
12	TCU
13	USC
14	Auburn
15	Oklahoma St.
16	Michigan St.
17	Virginia Tech
18	Michigan
19	Iowa
20	Mississippi St.
21	Memphis
22	Washington St.
23	Iowa St.
24	North Carolina St.
25	Boise St.
26	Stanford
27	LSU
28	Toledo
29	Northwestern
30	South Florida
31	Boston College
32	Arizona
33	South Carolina
34	Wake Forest
35	West Virginia
36	San Diego St.
37	Arizona St.
38	Georgia Tech
39	Houston
40	Texas
41	Texas A&M
42	SMU
43	Oregon
44	Navy
45	Louisville
46	Florida St.
47	Syracuse
48	Florida Atlantic
49	Utah
50	Virginia
51	Northern Illinois
52	Texas Tech
53	Kentucky
54	Army
55	Troy
56	California
57	Fresno St.
58	Purdue
59	Kansas St.
60	Pittsburgh
61	Nebraska
62	UCLA
63	Marshall
64	Maryland
65	Wyoming
66	Ohio
67	Arkansas St.
68	Florida
69	Colorado
70	Missouri
71	Duke
72	Minnesota
73	Indiana
74	Tennessee
75	Colorado St.
76	Ole Miss
77	Florida Int’l.
78	North Texas
79	Western Michigan
80	Akron
81	Rutgers
82	Arkansas
83	Vanderbilt
84	Utah St.
85	Temple
86	Central Michigan
87	UAB
88	Air Force
89	Eastern Michigan
90	Tulane
91	UTSA
92	Southern Miss.
93	Cincinnati
94	Appalachian St.
95	Georgia St.
96	Louisiana Tech
97	UNLV
98	Middle Tennessee
99	North Carolina
100	Western Kentucky
101	Buffalo
102	Tulsa
103	Miami (O)
104	New Mexico St.
105	Connecticut
106	Illinois
107	Baylor
108	New Mexico
109	UL-Monroe
110	East Carolina
111	Oregon St.
112	South Alabama
113	UL-Lafayette
114	Bowling Green
115	BYU
116	Idaho
117	Nevada
118	Old Dominion
119	Massachusetts
120	Kent St.
121	Hawaii
122	Kansas
123	Ball St.
124	Rice
125	Charlotte
126	Texas St.
127	Coastal Carolina
128	San Jose St.
129	UTEP
130	Georgia Southern

PiRate Predictive Ratings

#	Team	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
1	Alabama	138.2	134.2	136.9	136.4
2	Ohio St.	130.9	128.5	131.0	130.1
3	Georgia	128.4	128.5	128.7	128.5
4	Washington	128.9	126.1	129.3	128.1
5	Clemson	127.8	125.3	127.3	126.8
6	Penn St.	127.1	125.3	127.8	126.7
7	Auburn	126.4	124.3	126.5	125.7
8	Oklahoma	123.5	122.3	124.1	123.3
9	Oklahoma St.	123.1	122.2	123.7	123.0
10	Notre Dame	122.2	120.8	122.9	121.9
11	Miami	122.3	120.4	121.5	121.4
12	Virginia Tech	120.6	119.9	120.8	120.4
13	Wisconsin	121.6	118.8	120.1	120.2
14	T C U	119.9	118.1	120.4	119.4
15	U S C	119.2	118.4	119.1	118.9
16	Stanford	118.4	117.0	117.6	117.7
17	N. Carolina St.	116.9	116.1	116.9	116.6
18	L S U	117.0	114.9	117.6	116.5
19	Florida St.	116.4	115.5	114.9	115.6
20	Texas	114.6	114.9	115.1	114.9
21	Iowa	114.6	114.9	114.3	114.6
22	Michigan	114.3	114.3	113.4	114.0
23	Washington St.	114.8	112.5	114.4	113.9
24	Central Florida	112.9	114.3	114.0	113.8
25	Georgia Tech	114.7	112.2	113.2	113.4
26	Mississippi St.	112.9	113.3	113.1	113.1
27	Iowa State	112.6	112.6	113.7	113.0
28	Louisville	112.1	111.2	111.9	111.7
29	Syracuse	112.2	110.5	111.6	111.4
30	West Virginia	110.3	110.8	110.7	110.6
31	Kansas St.	110.4	110.4	110.3	110.4
32	Northwestern	110.4	109.3	110.3	110.0
33	Boston College	109.9	109.6	109.9	109.8
34	South Florida	109.8	108.7	110.4	109.6
35	Wake Forest	109.2	107.5	109.1	108.6
36	S. Carolina	109.1	108.1	108.3	108.5
37	Memphis	108.5	107.8	109.1	108.4
38	Arizona	108.8	107.2	107.9	108.0
39	Michigan St.	106.7	107.7	108.1	107.5
40	Boise St.	107.0	105.5	107.2	106.6
41	Pittsburgh	106.5	106.3	106.3	106.4
42	Texas A&M	107.1	105.1	106.3	106.2
43	Arizona St.	106.6	105.6	106.3	106.2
44	Florida	106.5	105.9	105.7	106.0
45	Kentucky	106.7	105.7	105.6	106.0
46	Duke	106.6	105.9	105.3	105.9
47	Oregon	106.5	104.7	105.6	105.6
48	Colorado	106.5	105.0	104.4	105.3
49	Missouri	106.0	104.1	105.3	105.1
50	Utah	104.8	105.7	104.6	105.0
51	Toledo	104.1	104.2	105.8	104.7
52	Ole Miss	105.0	103.5	103.6	104.0
53	Texas Tech	103.9	103.8	103.1	103.6
54	California	104.5	102.4	102.6	103.2
55	Indiana	103.0	103.1	103.4	103.2
56	Houston	103.1	102.7	103.3	103.0
57	Purdue	102.9	103.1	103.1	103.0
58	Tennessee	103.6	102.0	101.8	102.5
59	Minnesota	102.4	103.3	101.6	102.4
60	U C L A	102.6	102.1	101.8	102.2
61	San Diego St.	101.7	101.6	102.6	102.0
62	Vanderbilt	102.5	101.7	101.3	101.8
63	Virginia	102.0	101.2	102.1	101.8
64	Colo. State	101.8	100.8	101.6	101.4
65	Nebraska	101.3	102.1	100.6	101.3
66	Navy	100.4	101.2	100.5	100.7
67	N. Carolina	101.2	100.3	100.1	100.5
68	Army	100.3	100.3	100.9	100.5
69	Maryland	99.7	101.0	99.2	99.9
70	Baylor	98.7	100.1	99.0	99.3
71	SMU	98.4	98.8	98.9	98.7
72	Wyoming	99.3	98.0	98.3	98.5
73	Arkansas	98.8	98.0	98.0	98.3
74	Western Michigan	97.7	96.7	98.6	97.7
75	Eastern Michigan	97.2	96.9	97.8	97.3
76	Rutgers	97.1	97.0	96.8	97.0
77	Florida Atlantic	95.7	97.7	97.2	96.9
78	Arkansas St.	95.8	96.7	97.3	96.6
79	Ohio U	95.5	96.6	96.6	96.2
80	Troy	95.1	95.3	94.5	95.0
81	Oregon St.	95.5	95.2	94.1	94.9
82	Fresno St.	94.7	93.9	95.2	94.6
83	Air Force	94.2	94.7	94.6	94.5
84	Tulsa	94.6	94.4	94.1	94.4
85	Northern Illinois	94.1	94.0	95.0	94.3
86	Temple	94.0	94.4	94.1	94.2
87	Central Michigan	93.3	94.0	93.9	93.7
88	Tulane	92.9	93.3	93.1	93.1
89	Appalachian St.	93.3	92.1	93.1	92.8
90	Marshall	91.6	92.9	93.3	92.6
91	U T S A	91.0	93.1	92.0	92.0
92	Utah St.	92.3	91.5	91.9	91.9
93	W. Kentucky	90.9	90.9	91.7	91.2
94	Massachusetts	90.2	89.4	90.5	90.0
95	Cincinnati	88.5	90.2	89.9	89.5
96	Miami (O)	88.1	90.2	89.3	89.2
97	BYU	89.2	89.0	88.7	88.9
98	Illinois	88.9	90.0	87.8	88.9
99	Louisiana Tech	87.6	89.4	88.2	88.4
100	Akron	87.3	89.7	87.8	88.3
101	Florida Int’l.	87.7	87.9	88.8	88.2
102	U N L V	87.3	88.9	87.5	87.9
103	Nevada	86.2	88.0	87.5	87.2
104	New Mexico	86.9	86.7	87.5	87.0
105	N. Mexico St.	87.4	85.8	87.7	87.0
106	Buffalo	85.4	87.7	87.4	86.8
107	Middle Tennessee	86.1	87.3	86.9	86.8
108	Hawaii	84.9	85.9	84.7	85.2
109	S. Alabama	84.4	86.7	84.3	85.1
110	Southern Miss.	84.2	85.3	84.7	84.7
111	Connecticut	84.0	86.0	84.1	84.7
112	N. Texas	83.9	85.5	84.6	84.7
113	Georgia St.	84.1	83.9	84.1	84.1
114	UL-Lafayette	82.4	83.8	82.5	82.9
115	Old Dominion	81.8	84.4	81.9	82.7
116	East Carolina	82.2	83.7	82.0	82.6
117	Bowling Green	81.9	82.8	82.3	82.3
118	UL-Monroe	82.3	83.1	81.5	82.3
119	Idaho	80.9	82.0	81.7	81.5
120	UAB	79.0	82.0	81.0	80.7
121	Kansas	79.9	83.3	78.6	80.6
122	Georgia Southern	74.6	76.0	74.0	74.9
123	Kent St.	73.7	75.3	74.0	74.3
124	Texas St.	73.3	75.4	72.6	73.8
125	Charlotte	72.4	74.7	72.7	73.3
126	San Jose St.	73.0	73.3	72.1	72.8
127	Rice	71.9	73.3	72.2	72.5
128	U T E P	71.0	73.9	71.1	72.0
129	Coastal Carolina	70.8	72.2	71.7	71.6
130	Ball St.	67.8	69.8	68.6	68.7

PiRate Ratings By Conference

American Athletic Conference
East Division
Team	AAC	Overall	PiRate	Mean	Bias	Average
Central Florida	5-0	8-0	112.9	114.3	114.0	113.8
South Florida	5-1	8-1	109.8	108.7	110.4	109.6
Temple	2-3	4-5	94.0	94.4	94.1	94.2
Cincinnati	1-4	3-6	88.5	90.2	89.9	89.5
Connecticut	2-4	3-6	84.0	86.0	84.1	84.7
East Carolina	1-4	2-7	82.2	83.7	82.0	82.6
West Division
Team	AAC<