Pelini's Best Wins and Worst Losses

[It'sNotAFakeID]

I'm putting this in here, don't know where else it can go and I don't think it necessarily deserves another thread. I've decided to take it upon myself to figure out some of Pelini's best wins and some of his worst losses. Here are the factors that I will consider:

1) The point differential

2) The opponent's end of the season ranking according to Jeff Sagarin

From there, I'll take a look at how Nebraska fared against teams with respect to where Nebraska wound up, each year.

2008 Nebraska Sagarin Ranking #23

vs. Western Michigan: Won by 23: Sagarin Rating: #79

vs. San Jose State: Won by 23: Sagarin Rating: #105

vs. New Mexico State: Won by 31: Sagarin Rating: #146

vs. Virginia Tech: LOST by 5: Sagarin Rating: #18

vs. Missouri: LOST by 35: Sagarin Rating: #19

@ Texas Tech: LOST by 6: Sagarin Rating: #9

@ Iowa State: Won by 28: Sagarin Rating: #114

vs. Baylor: Won by 12: Sagarin Rating: #66

@ Oklahoma: LOST by 34: Sagarin Rating: #3

vs. Kansas: Won by 10: Sagarin Rating: #31

@ Kansas State: Won by 28: Sagarin Rating #74

vs. Colorado: Won by 9: Sagarin Rating #72

Bowl Game--Clemson: Won by 5: Sagarin Rating: #30

I'm going to arbitrarily say that Nebraska should have been evenly matched and thus the game evenly played against teams +/- 5 rankings from our final spot (18-28). On that criteria, Pelini('s):

Best win came against Clemson in the Gator Bowl

Worst loss came against Missouri

Didn't beat a team that was ranked higher than Nebraska

Didn't lose to a team that was ranked lower than Nebraska

Was 0-4 against teams in the Top 25 losing by a combined 80 points

Was 9-0 against teams not in the Top 25

2009 Nebraska Sagarin Ranking #14

vs. Florida Atlantic: Won by 46: Sagarin Ranking: #114

vs. Arkansas State: Won by 29: Sagarin Ranking: #129

@ Virginia Tech: LOST by 1: Sagarin Ranking: #7

vs. UL-Lafayette: Won by 55: Sagarin Ranking: #123

@ Missouri: Won by 15: Sagarin Ranking #54

vs. Texas Tech: LOST by 21: Sagarin Ranking: #25

vs. Iowa State: LOST by 2: Sagarin Ranking: #66

@ Baylor: Won by 10: Sagarin Ranking: #80

vs. Oklahoma: Won by 7: Sagarin Ranking: #17

@ Kansas: Won by 14: Sagarin Ranking: #62

vs. Kansas State: Won by 14: Sagarin Ranking: #68

@ Colorado: Won by 8: Sagarin Ranking: #91

Conference Championship: Texas: LOST by 1: Sagarin Ranking: #3

Bowl Game: Arizona: Won by 33: Sagarin Ranking: #37

To wrap up 2009, Pelini('s):

Did not beat any team ranked higher than him

Lost to 2 teams ranked lower than him (Iowa State and Texas Tech)

Iowa State was the worst loss

Lost by a combined 2 points to teams ranked in the Top 10 (Texas and Virginia Tech)

Best win came against Oklahoma

Was 1-3 against teams in the Top 25, losing by a combined 23 points, but with a victory over Oklahoma

Was 9-1 against teams outside the Top 25

2010 Nebraska Sagarin Ranking #27

Western Kentucky: Won by 39: Sagarin Ranking #165

Idaho: Won by 21: Sagarin Ranking #89

@ Washington: Won by 35: Sagarin Ranking #28

South Dakota State: Won by 14: Sagarin Ranking #123

@ Kansas State: Won by 35: Sagarin Ranking #59

Texas: LOST by 7: Sagarin Ranking #64

@ Oklahoma State: Won by 10: Sagarin Ranking #11

Missouri: Won by 14: Sagarin Ranking #17

@ Iowa State: Won by 1: Sagarin Ranking #65

Kansas: Won by 17: Sagarin Ranking #119

@ Texas A&M: LOST by 3: Sagarin Ranking #20

Colorado: Won by 28: Sagarin Ranking #68

Conference Championship: Oklahoma: LOST by 3: Sagarin Ranking #10

Bowl Game: Washington: LOST by 12: Sagarin Ranking #28

Summing up 2010, Pelini:

Faced his toughest schedule to date

Was his best season to date

Was 2-2 against the Top 25

Had two back to back quality wins (@Oklahoma State and vs Missouri)

Worst lost came to Texas

Was 8-2 against teams outside of the Top 25

**Looking back at this makes me kind of sad; that lost to Texas A&M really took the wind out of our sails. Had we came out of College Station victorious that night, we more than likely would have won the Big XII and would've made a BCS bowl. But that loss really hurt us.

2011 Nebraska Sagarin Ranking #25

Chattanooga: Won by 33: Sagarin Ranking #127

Fresno State: Won by 13: Sagarin Ranking #105

Washington: Won by 13: Sagarin Ranking #44

@ Wyoming: Won by 24: Sagarin Ranking #84

@ Wisconsin: LOST by 31: Sagarin Ranking #8

Ohio State: Won by 7: Sagarin Ranking #49

@ Minnesota: Won by 27: Sagarin Ranking #88

Michigan State: Won by 21: Sagarin Ranking #18

Northwestern: LOST by 3: Sagarin Ranking #58

@ Penn State: Won by 3: Sagarin Ranking #28

@ Michigan: LOST by 28: Sagarin Ranking #11

Iowa: Won by 13: Sagarin Ranking #45

Bowl Game: South Carolina: LOST by 17: Sagarin Ranking #10

In 2011, Pelini:

Played a very tough schedule

Went 1-3 against teams in the Top 25

Went 8-1 against teams outside of the Top 25

Best win came against Michigan State

Worst loss came against Northwestern

2012 Nebraska Sagarin Ranking #22

Southern Miss: Won by 29: Sagarin Ranking #167

@ UCLA: LOST by 6: Sagarin Ranking #31

Arkansas State: Won by 29: Sagarin Ranking #50

Idaho State: Won by 66: Sagarin Ranking #225

Wisconsin: Won by 3: Sagarin Ranking #23

@ Ohio State: Lost by 25: Sagarin Ranking #13

@ Northwestern: Won by 1: Sagarin Ranking #21

Michigan: Won by 14: Sagarin Ranking #20

@ Michigan State: Won by 4: Sagarin Ranking #34

Penn State: Won by 9: Sagarin Ranking #30

Minnesota: Won by 24: Sagarin Ranking #68

@ Iowa: Won by 3: Sagarin Ranking #70

Conference Championship Game: Wisconsin: LOST by 39: Sagarin Ranking #23

Bowl Game: Georgia: LOST by 14: Sagarin Ranking #4

2012 presented a brutally tough schedule for Nebraska and Bo Pelini. They faced a stretch of 6 teams which finished ranked 35th or higher, while facing 6 teams who were in the Top 25. That being said, here is how the season went for Nebraska and Bo Pelini:

3-3 against the Top 25

7-1 against teams outside of the Top 25

Best win came against Michigan

Worst loss came against UCLA

Overall, judging by the competition he faced, this was probably Pelini's second best season.

___________________________________________________________________________________

So that's that. I'm trying to put to bed the notion that the teams we beat aren't that good, and the teams we suffer blow out losses to aren't that good. Yes, we played much more competitive games against higher ranked opponents in 2008, 2009 and 2010. But we beat more higher ranked opponents in 2011 and 2012. If I had to give a blanket statement trend for this program, it would have to be that we have minimally improved over the past few seasons, but still struggle in the big games, but to a slightly less extent than in the past two seasons. For example, we were up on UCLA 21-10 at halftime before blowing that away. And while we did hold leads against Ohio State (2012) and Wisconsin (2011) and Michigan (2011), those games were moreso blowouts from the start. Add to that the fact that we were behind big time against Ohio State (2011) and Wisconsin (2012) and Penn State (2012) and Northwestern (2012) and it makes this team very difficult to read. We can't seem to put together 4 quarters of quality football when it counts, and that's something that is going to have to change if we are to make a leap forward this season and next season.

 

[It'sNotAFakeID]

Quick follow-up to the games against Top 25 opponents. The Sagarin rankings state that the difference in team rankings should reflect the amount of points the higher ranked team should be favored by; with adding 3 points to the home team. With that, we can look at how Nebraska performed in comparison to how they should've performed to get an approximation of how much Nebraska has over/underperformed against teams from the Top 25.

For this:

2008

Virginia Tech--should've LOST by 2--LOST by 5--PERFORMED AS EXPECTED

Missouri--should've LOST by 1--LOST by 35--UNDERPERFORMED

@ Texas Tech--should've LOST by 17--LOST by 6--OVERPERFORMED

@ Oklahoma--should've LOST by 23--LOST by 34--UNDERPERFORMED

2009

@ Virginia Tech--should've LOST by 10--LOST by 1--OVERPERFORMED

Texas Tech--should've WON by 14--LOST by 21--UNDERPERFORMED

Oklahoma--should've WON by 6--WON by 7--PERFORMED AS EXPECTED

2010

@ Oklahoma State--should've LOST by 19--WON by 10--OVERPERFORMED

Missouri--should've LOST by 7--WON by 14--OVERPERFORMED

@ Texas A&M--should've LOST by 10--LOST by 3--PERFORMED AS EXPECTED

Oklahoma--should've LOST by 17--LOST by 3--OVERPERFORMED

2011

@ Wisconsin--should've LOST by 20--LOST by 31--UNDERPERFORMED

Michigan State--should've LOST by 4--WON by 21--OVERPERFORMED

@ Michigan--should've LOST by 17--LOST by 28--UNDERPERFORMED

South Carolina--should've LOST by 15--LOST by 17--PERFORMED AS EXPECTED

2012

Wisconsin--should've WON by 4--WON by 3--PERFORMED AS EXPECTED

@ Ohio State--should've LOST by 12--LOST by 25--UNDERPERFORMED

@ Northwestern--should've LOST by 4--WON by 1--PERFORMED AS EXPECTED

Michigan--should've LOST by 1--WON by 14--OVERPERFORMED

Wisconsin--should've WON by 1--LOST by 39--UNDERPERFORMED

Georgia--should've LOST 18--LOST by 14--PERFORMED AS EXPECTED

In the past few years we have underperformed or performed as expected many more times than we have overperformed, and that is not due to Nebraska being ranked high. It's just due to us not showing up for the big games. That's problematic, and it undoubtedly has to change.

 

[knapplc]

Good stuff, BB. I thought it deserved its own thread so I split this out from the thread it was in. Thanks for taking the time to put this info together.

 

[VA Husker Fan]

Good information. As a side note, I think calling 2011 and 2012 "very tough" and "brutally tough" schedules are wild overstatements, but it doesn't change the overall message.

 

[TGHusker]

Excellent info. Not sure how to deal with it - it does show we still have a long way to go to be considered relevant - that won't happen until we consistently win those top 25 match ups.

 

[kchusker_chris]

Nice stuff!

 

[Ric Flair]

Nice work.

I disagree about the degree of difficulty of those schedules however. If we're playing 12-14 games and 4-5 are against teams in the Top 25, I don't see that as brutal or even exceptionally tough. That's especially the case when one of those is likely from the conference championship game and one is from the bowl game. So in the regular season, we're playing 3-4 ranked teams.

Your analysis is based on what our ranking happens to be at a given point in time and then how we perform against higher ranked and lower ranked teams. But that does not account for the fact that we're pretty mediocre and not ranked as high as we should be in the first place. So for purposes of your comparisons, you're basically accepting our mediocrity. And I think that's a real issue.

 

[VA Husker Fan]

In the past few years we have underperformed or performed as expected many more times than we have overperformed, and that is not due to Nebraska being ranked high. It's just due to us not showing up for the big games. That's problematic, and it undoubtedly has to change.

That's a little bit unfair to lump "as expected" with "underperformed". By your analysis, which looks reasonable, we had 7 of each (underperformed/as expected/underperformed). We were usually in the top 25, so our opponents should have been up for these games as well, and if both teams "show up" for the game you'll probably have an "as expected" result.

I think what's more disappointing is that we come into most (17 out of 21) of these games favored to lose, and very few of these opponents were top 10 teams. I think most of us are looking for Bo to get us to a point where a 21-25 team should be a game we feel confident of winning, 11-20 at least a toss up, and 1-10 a game we can compete in and sometimes win.

 

[Chaddyboxer]

Definitely nice work!

 

[It'sNotAFakeID]

Good information. As a side note, I think calling 2011 and 2012 "very tough" and "brutally tough" schedules are wild overstatements, but it doesn't change the overall message.

Here's the reasoning:

A lot of posters like to gauge just how tough our schedule was by seeing where the teams we played were ranked at the end of the year. So comparatively, 2011 and 2012 have been our toughest schedules to date; not only because we played more "ranked" teams, but also because the teams we played that weren't ranked were more often in the 40-70 range instead of 71-100+ range. I mean, just look at that stretch in 2012 where we played 6 teams who ended up ranked 35th or higher in Sagarin's rankings; that's a tough stretch.

 

[It'sNotAFakeID]

In the past few years we have underperformed or performed as expected many more times than we have overperformed, and that is not due to Nebraska being ranked high. It's just due to us not showing up for the big games. That's problematic, and it undoubtedly has to change.

That's a little bit unfair to lump "as expected" with "underperformed". By your analysis, which looks reasonable, we had 7 of each (underperformed/as expected/underperformed). We were usually in the top 25, so our opponents should have been up for these games as well, and if both teams "show up" for the game you'll probably have an "as expected" result.

I think what's more disappointing is that we come into most (17 out of 21) of these games favored to lose, and very few of these opponents were top 10 teams. I think most of us are looking for Bo to get us to a point where a 21-25 team should be a game we feel confident of winning, 11-20 at least a toss up, and 1-10 a game we can compete in and sometimes win.

Generally, when we think of good coaches we think of coaches who overperformed. We generally don't think of a good coach as a coach who performs as expected, unless he is a coach who constantly has his team in the top 10/top 15.

 

[Landlord]

Nice work.

I disagree about the degree of difficulty of those schedules however. If we're playing 12-14 games and 4-5 are against teams in the Top 25, I don't see that as brutal or even exceptionally tough. That's especially the case when one of those is likely from the conference championship game and one is from the bowl game. So in the regular season, we're playing 3-4 ranked teams.

Your analysis is based on what our ranking happens to be at a given point in time and then how we perform against higher ranked and lower ranked teams. But that does not account for the fact that we're pretty mediocre and not ranked as high as we should be in the first place. So for purposes of your comparisons, you're basically accepting our mediocrity. And I think that's a real issue.

UCLA had 9 wins and was ranked 17th at the end of the season.

Wisconsin was ranked 23rd.

Ohio State went undefeated and was ranked #2.

Northwestern had 10 wins and was ranked 16th.

Michigan was ranked 25th.

Penn State had 8 wins, not ranked but still good.

Georgia had 12 wins and was ranked 4th.

We played Wisconsin twice, so that's 8 games (not 4-5, almost double in fact) against teams ranked either during or after the very last week of the season.

 

[Bowfin]

Please don't take this as a smart aleck response, but the most important or best win for Pelini will be his next one, and his worst loss will be his next one. I am more of a "Well, where do we go from here?" type of guy. What can Pelini and team do to improve in the NEXT game, and don't fixate on who did or didn't do what in the last game.

Revisiting the past is useful to find out what we might do better in the present so as to make for better outcome in the future.

Dwelling in the past is best left to the professionals who have raised it to an art forum, like those at Shaggybevo and the Longhorn Network.

 

[Ric Flair]

Nice work.

I disagree about the degree of difficulty of those schedules however. If we're playing 12-14 games and 4-5 are against teams in the Top 25, I don't see that as brutal or even exceptionally tough. That's especially the case when one of those is likely from the conference championship game and one is from the bowl game. So in the regular season, we're playing 3-4 ranked teams.

Your analysis is based on what our ranking happens to be at a given point in time and then how we perform against higher ranked and lower ranked teams. But that does not account for the fact that we're pretty mediocre and not ranked as high as we should be in the first place. So for purposes of your comparisons, you're basically accepting our mediocrity. And I think that's a real issue.

UCLA had 9 wins and was ranked 17th at the end of the season.

Wisconsin was ranked 23rd.

Ohio State went undefeated and was ranked #2.

Northwestern had 10 wins and was ranked 16th.

Michigan was ranked 25th.

Penn State had 8 wins, not ranked but still good.

Georgia had 12 wins and was ranked 4th.

We played Wisconsin twice, so that's 8 games (not 4-5, almost double in fact) against teams ranked either during or after the very last week of the season.

For that year, sure. I still don't think that's a very tough schedule. We should be good enough to take teams ranked 15-25 behind the woodshed on a consistent basis. The fact that those are now considered by some to be our benchmark games says a lot about the state of the program...and how we continue to lower our expectations. And that's unfortunate.

 

[knapplc]

Sagarin's rankings of our Strength of Schedule since 2004:

2004 - 55

2005 - 36

2006 - 51

2007 - 4

2008 - 38

2009 - 52

2010 - 39

2011 - 26

2012 - 20