Thursday, September 3, 2009

2009 College Football Schedule Strengths

Each year there is the debate of who has the toughest schedule and this factors in to discussions later in the season about if a 1-loss team can be ranked ahead of an undefeated team, and so on.  In order to help answer those questions, or perhaps just to add fuel to the fire, here are the schedule strengths of all the I-A teams for the 2009 schedule using the end of 2008 ratings.

For the purposes of this table, I've simply averaged the ratings of each opponent taking into account whether the game is home/away/neutral.

Now obviously, using last years ratings only gives an indication of schedule strength as each team has changed.  So I'll be updating this throughout the season.

It is interesting to see how many ACC teams appear to have tough schedules.  And the perceived to be tough SEC does not have as many as you might think.  Now, this is likely due to many SEC teams scheduling cream-puffs and that pulling their averages down.  I may play with looking at some stats other than just averaging the opponents later on to help take a better look.

It is also interesting to see Boise State with the #108 ranked schedule which helps explain why they are projected to go 12-1 with a 28% chance of going undefeated.

RankTeamSchedule Strength
RankTeamSchedule Strength
1Florida St77.009
2Baylor76.345
3Virginia Tech76.006
4Miami FL75.936
5South Carolina75.823
6Maryland75.599
7Georgia Tech75.319
8Oklahoma St75.251
9Kansas75.037
10Oklahoma75.028
11Virginia74.962
12Texas Tech74.954
13Oregon74.694
14Texas A&M74.417
15Nebraska74.317
16Vanderbilt74.247
17Wake Forest74.213
18Minnesota74.030
19Washington St73.978
20Washington73.899
21Texas73.896
22Colorado73.882
23Arkansas73.828
24Georgia73.772
25Clemson73.759
26Stanford73.678
27UCLA73.488
28Mississippi St73.484
29Tennessee73.445
30Auburn73.222
31Wyoming73.133
32LSU73.084
33Syracuse73.025
34Southern Cal73.018
35California72.921
36Missouri72.915
37Arizona72.739
38Boston College72.725
39North Carolina72.595
40Indiana72.469
41Iowa72.306
42Illinois72.173
43Duke72.169
44New Mexico71.927
45Iowa St71.913
46Notre Dame71.884
47Brigham Young71.772
48North Carolina St71.716
49Oregon St71.697
50Connecticut71.565
51Michigan St71.483
52Purdue71.438
53Arizona St71.340
54San Jose St71.326
55Florida71.310
56Ohio State71.295
57Louisville71.148
58Kentucky71.144
59Kansas St71.129
60UNLV70.872
61Wisconsin70.723
62Pittsburgh70.657
63Rice70.614
64South Florida70.489
65East Carolina70.373
66West Virginia70.241
67Tulsa69.885
68Miami OH69.866
69Colorado St69.852
69Michigan69.852
71Utah69.718
72Central Florida69.488
73Mississippi69.348
74Alabama-Birmingham69.310
75UTEP69.228
76Cincinnati69.147
77Navy68.896
78Air Force68.837
78TCU68.837
80Memphis68.789
81Florida Int'l68.721
82Tulane68.714
83Utah St68.619
84Houston68.605
85Bowling Green68.565
86Alabama68.520
87Nevada68.246
88Penn State68.206
89Toledo68.078
90SMU67.856
91San Diego St67.760
92Fresno St67.759
93Louisiana Tech67.736
94Eastern Michigan67.718
95Central Michigan67.532
96Northwestern67.466
97New Mexico St67.205
98Marshall67.062
99Idaho66.883
100Temple66.856
101Ohio U.66.508
102Troy66.272
103North Texas66.187
104Southern Miss65.904
105Hawaii65.890
106Army65.867
107Western Kentucky65.712
108Boise St65.529
109Kent St65.471
110Middle Tennessee St65.442
111Florida Atlantic65.325
112Akron65.072
113Western Michigan64.912
114Ball St64.636
115Buffalo64.563
116Louisiana-Monroe64.326
117Louisiana-Lafayette64.130
118Rutgers64.085
119Northern Illinois63.742
120Arkansas St63.036

1 comment:

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