How Nebraska Would Have Done Elsewhere

[Big Red 40]

holy crap I have a headache now! lol

[It'sNotAFakeID]

I think it's funny how I post that we would've finished about 7th in the SEC and about 4th in the ACC, and I don't get a whole lot of negative responses about "the statistics don't mean blah blah blah." I post that we would've finished about 2nd in the Big XII and all of a sudden that same statistical test, wrought about by the same process isn't as correct as it was when we were finishing 7th and 4th.

 

I hadn't read a word of this thread until you posted your status the other day. It doesn't matter what the situation is, that's always been my view of stats.

 

Fair enough. The timing was just coincidental then.

[exswoo]

Are you going to do one for the Big Ten as well? Last year was a pretty weird year for the conference so I wouldn't be surprised to see some odd results from an analytics perspective.

[Blackshirt96]

I think we would be above ole miss, but other than that, sounds pretty good to me

 

Statistically, a game between Nebraska and Ole Miss is a toss-up. That sucks to say that, because Ole Miss has been down for...ever, but the way the games were played last year, it would be a toss up. It was also very unexpected that we stuck with Georgia for as long as we did.

I don't see why this gets thrown out there so much. That team was down, like, 6 or 7 starters for that game.

If I remember correctly they were down 4 starters. Their top two WR's & two guys on defense. Off the top of my head, I know NU was down at least a couple. Steinkuhler & Jackson. Also Zaire Anderson would have more then likely been a starter if not injured earlier in the season.

 

I think a lot of people under estimate what Steinkulher meant to the defense. He didn't get many sacks but he was very solid in the run game to the middle.

[Moiraine]

Are you going to do one for the Big Ten as well? Last year was a pretty weird year for the conference so I wouldn't be surprised to see some odd results from an analytics perspective.

 

I would guess he would have tested it out for the Big Ten at the beginning to check the accuracy.

[It'sNotAFakeID]

Are you going to do one for the Big Ten as well? Last year was a pretty weird year for the conference so I wouldn't be surprised to see some odd results from an analytics perspective.

 

I would guess he would have tested it out for the Big Ten at the beginning to check the accuracy.

 

I did, but figured displaying the Big Ten results wasn't what people would be looking for. But since the request has popped up, here were the results:

 

 

Statistically, the worst teams in the Big Ten last year should've been Indiana and Illinois. Taking a substantial leap up from those teams were Iowa, Minnesota, Michigan State, Penn State, and Purdue. Up a step from those schools were Nebraska, Michigan, and Wisconsin. Finally, your two best teams in the Big Ten were Northwestern and Ohio State.

 

Here are how the teams finished last year:

 

Ohio State

Nebraska

Michigan

Penn State

Northwestern

Wisconsin

Michigan State

Purdue

Iowa

Minnesota

Indiana

Illinois

[It'sNotAFakeID]

 

 

These two graphs depict two different offensive philosophies that existed in the Big Ten last year. You had your passing teams (Illinois, Indiana, Penn State, Purdue, Michigan State, Minnesota, and Iowa) and you had your running teams (Michigan, Nebraska, Wisconsin, Ohio State, and Northwestern). In combination with the wins graph above, it is clear which groups of teams had the offensive philosophies that won games in the Big Ten last year.

 

The separating factor between Illinois-Indiana and Penn State-Michigan State-Iowa-Minnesota-Purdue was the fact that the latter teams were more successful in the passing game.

 

There really was no difference between Wisconsin-Michigan-Nebraska and Ohio State-Northwestern with regards to their running games. However, it is clear that the former teams were better through the air than the latter teams.

 

 

 

The above graphs depict the passing and rushing defenses which existed in the Big Ten in 2012. While it's obvious that Illinois and Indiana struggled in both departments last year, it really is unclear what separated the other 10 teams in terms of defense. It really appears that there were 10 effective defenses out of the 12 teams in the Big Ten. The key really seemed to be not allowing plays to go for big chunks of yards, either through the ground or through the air. Perhaps maybe turnover differential is what allows for a clearer separation between these three groups of defenses.

 

 

And there it is. One thing which really separated the defenses in the Big Ten last year was in their ability to force turnovers. Northwestern-Ohio State forced a lot of turnovers while not turning the ball over a lot, creating a huge positive turnover differential. Michigan State-Penn State-Minnesota-Iowa-Purdue didn't force as many turnovers, but it appears that they forced slightly more turnovers than they committed, creating a slightly positive turnover differential. Finally, Nebraska-Michigan-Wisconsin did not create a lot of turnovers, but they sure committed a lot of them, creating a negative turnover differential.

 

 

So it looks like Nebraska-Michigan-Wisconsin and Iowa-Michigan State-Minnesota-Penn State-Purdue should really be interchangeable, but a look at the SOS graph shows that that shouldn't be the case either. Nebraska, Michigan, and Wisconsin played overall tougher schedules than the latter 5 teams, suggesting that, if they played similar schedules, they would be more likely to perform better than those teams.

[It'sNotAFakeID]

So, were I to rank the B1G teams last year, here is how I would rank them:

 

12. Illinois

11. Indiana

10. Minnesota

9. Iowa

8. Purdue

7. Michigan State

6. Penn State

5. Wisconsin

4. Michigan

3. Nebraska

2. Northwestern

1. Ohio State

 

I should caution you that 3-5 and 6 & 7 are highly interchangeable.

[It'sNotAFakeID]

Time to look at the cluster v cluster games from last year:

 

Nebraska-Michigan-Wisconsin vs Illinois-Indiana:

 

Michigan 45 Illinois 0

Wisconsin 31 Illinois 14

Wisconsin 62 Indiana 14

 

Record: 3-0

 

Nebraska DNP either team

Michigan DNP Indiana

Wisconsin DNP Illinois

 

Nebraska-Michigan-Wisconsin vs Michigan State-Penn State-Purdue-Iowa-Minnesota:

 

Nebraska 28 Michigan State 24

Nebraska 32 Penn State 23

Nebraska 38 Minnesota 14

Nebraska 13 Iowa 7

 

Michigan 12 Michigan State 10

Michigan 35 Minnesota 13

Michigan 42 Iowa 17

Michigan 44 Purdue 13

 

Wisconsin 38 Purdue 14

Wisconsin 38 Minnesota 13

Wisconsin 13 Michigan State 16

Wisconsin 21 Penn State 24

 

Record: 10-2

 

Nebraska DNP Purdue

Michigan DNP Penn State

Wisconsin DNP Iowa

 

Nebraska-Michigan-Wisconsin vs Ohio State-Northwestern

 

Nebraska 38 Ohio State 63

Nebraska 29 Northwestern 28

 

Michigan 38 Northwestern 31

Michigan 21 Ohio State 26

 

Wisconsin 14 Ohio State 21

 

Record: 2-3

 

Wisconsin DNP Northwestern

 

 

MSU-Iowa-PSU-Purdue-Minnesota vs Illinois-Indiana:

 

Michigan State 31 Indiana 27

 

Penn State 35 Illinois 7

Penn State 45 Indiana 22

 

Purdue 20 Illinois 17

Purdue 56 Indiana 35

 

Minnesota 17 Illinois 3

 

Iowa 21 Indiana 24

 

Record: 6-1

 

Michigan State DNP Illinois

Minnesota DNP Indiana

Iowa DNP Illinois

 

 

MSU-PSU-Iowa-Purdue-Minnesota vs Ohio State-Northwestern:

 

Iowa 17 Northwestern 28

 

Michigan State 16 Ohio State 17

Michigan State 20 Northwestern 23

 

Penn State 39 Northwestern 28

Penn State 23 Ohio State 35

 

Purdue 22 Ohio State 29

 

Minnesota 13 Northwestern 21

 

Record: 1-6

 

Iowa DNP Ohio State

Purdue DNP Northwestern

Minnesota DNP Ohio State

 

 

Ohio State-Northwestern vs Illinois-Indiana:

 

Northwestern 44 Indiana 29

Northwestern 50 Illinois 14

 

Ohio State 52 Indiana 49

Ohio State 52 Illinois 22

 

Record: 4-0

[exswoo]

Interesting - I never would have guessed that NW would end up #2 but in a way that makes sense. The rest of the rankings seem more or less on target.

[It'sNotAFakeID]

They were really close to finishing the conference season 7-1 and taking our place in the B1G CCG.

[Count 'Bility]

If I could give you a Nobel prize or some sh#t ByeBye, I would. This is some really good stuff. It's been a nice read.

[StPaulHusker]

This was very impressive reading. Nice job BBB12

[It'sNotAFakeID]

So as promised, I have compiled a final rankings of sort for where each of the 124 teams should have finished and to pinpoint who really should have been the elite of college football in the 2012-2013 season as well as figure out where Nebraska should have fallen.

 

The process was the same, except using all 124 teams together allowed for a more precise separation of teams because there are more "like cases". I've finished the bottom half of the rankings, and there are some surprises as to where some of the teams should have fallen.

 

So without further ado, here are teams 124-62:

 

62. Georgia Tech

63. Houston

64. Louisiana Tech

65. Clemson

66. Syracuse

67. Texas Tech

68. Navy

69. NC State

70. Duke

71. Air Force

72. Indiana

73. Ball State

74. UL-Monroe

75. ECU

76. Virginia Tech

77. Nevada

78. Rice

79. Minnesota

80. Troy

81. Marshall

82. Maryland

83. Western Michigan

84. Akron

85. Miami-FL

86. Buffalo

87. Western Kentucky

88. Tennessee

89. Connecticut

90. Colorado State

91. Memphis

92. Boston College

93. Kentucky

94. Utah

95. Iowa

96. Miami-OH

97. Wyoming

98. Wake Forest

99. Arkansas

100. Temple

101. New Mexico

102. Virginia

103. South Florida

104. Army

105. North Texas

106. Florida International

107. UTEP

108. UAB

109. Illinois

110. UNLV

111. New Mexico State

112. California

113. Florida Atlantic

114. Hawaii

115. South Alabama

116. Auburn

117. Kansas

118. Washington State

119. Eastern Michigan

120. Southern Mississippi

121. Colorado

122. Idaho

123. Tulane

124. Massachusetts

 

So there's a pretty nice distribution of teams from each of the Power 5 conferences: 4 from the Pac-12, 9 from the ACC (Ouch!), 2 from the Big XII, 4 from the Big Ten, and 4 from the SEC. The fact that there are fewer Big XII than SEC teams in the bottom 62 lends credibility to the idea that the Big XII was a better "top-to-bottom" conference than the SEC, while the SEC was just "top-heavy." It will be interesting to see if there are more SEC teams in the Top 25 to complete the rest of that idea. Or will the Big XII match the SEC in Top 25 teams and crush the notion that the SEC was far and away the best conference in the nation?

 

No Nebraska in the bottom 62 (hooray!), but there was a surprise. Clemson fell in at #65, despite a stellar season. It seemed that, with the way they executed on both offense and defense, Clemson was a lot like fellow conference teams NC State and Duke, as well as Big XII team, Texas Tech. So they should've finished around the same place as those schools, but whatever randomness exists in college football allowed Clemson to achieve above and beyond what they should have achieved. What it could have been: great coaching? Better athletes? Just a better mindset? Injuries to opposing teams? Who knows?

 

It brought a smile to my face seeing Colorado pop in at #121 and Iowa at #95.

[nebraskan]

I just read through all of your data, and have formulated my own conclusion. I desperatly need a drink, because my brain hurts.