January 10, 2012

MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Bowl Final

With its win Monday night, Alabama moved back into the top spot in the MRI to be this season's champion.

It is a far cry from last season when the Auburn Tigers couldn't even crack the top five despite being undefeated and the poll champions.

The win also made Alabama one of the top 10 teams of the last nine years as rated by the MRI. With so much talent returning, there is a good chance that the next version of the Tide could equal or better the 2011 edition.

Alabama was far from the best team of the last nine years. That still belongs to the Vince Young-era Texas Longhorns.

But this version of the Tide showed that a punishing defense can overcome almost anything. Alabama ended first in the country in defense, allowing just 183 yards per game. They didn't necessarily force a lot of turnovers (just 20 all season), but they also didn't give the ball away.

Then again, if the other team can't move the ball, there is no need to take it away. It will be coming back via the punt quite often.

More important for Alabama was that the team was all-around solid. On offense, the Tide rolled up the No. 16 rushing offense. They had a passing game that kept the defense honest.

And they played a schedule ranked No. 37 in the country by the MRI. Since many in the mainstream media claim that LSU had that much tougher a road, here is your comparison.

LSU was only at No. 23 in the country according to the MRI. Not quite the discrepancy one would expect given the complaints about Alabama. (Oklahoma State took home the tough road title, made even tougher by playing after its women's basketball coaching staff was killed in a plane crash. State rival Oklahoma was No. 2.)

As if there was a question, the best league in the country was again the SEC. The conference went 6-3 in bowl games (with one of the losses coming against the league). Not a bad showing. On average, the league was 2 MRI points better than the next challenger, the Big XII.

And for what it's worth, the MRI finished in the top 10 percent of "America" finishing in the 90th percentile in the ESPN College Bowl Mania. Just goes to show that the computer continues to be smarter than most college football fans. So be careful what you criticize.

Check out all the final rankings in the bowl final football MRI for 2011-12.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Bowl Final"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 12:45 PM | Comments (0)

December 4, 2011

MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 12

I understand the money grab that is the conference championship game.

But I often wonder if conferences are better off not having them.

The Big Ten expanded so they could hold one. The first one was fantastic, especially with Gus Johnson on the call. The Big XII is no longer big enough to have one. The conference might be better off for it.

Here is the thing that bothers me. You can have a team like Houston, who had a great season and probably deserved a huge reward for that season.

It all came undone on Saturday morning. Houston likely won't get a BCS bid now. They won't even go to the best Conference USA bowl game.

The Cougars season is torpedoed because of the championship game.

Talk to Virginia Tech about how they feel. They also missed out, and probably won't get a BCS invite thanks to their loss to Clemson. They had to face the one team that solved the Hokie puzzle this season again. They lost again.

In fact, the ACC Championship game is probably the biggest destroyer of dreams out there. Perhaps it is because the team that usually dominates in the ACC isn't actually as dominant as they seem, but it does feel like there are more upsets in that one game than in any other.

The best SEC team usually wins. The best Big XII team used to win. But not so much in the ACC, and definitely not usually in games like the MAC title game, or the CUSA event.

But enough with that. There are no tears being shed over Houston's loss. It just saves the whiners who would say that the Cougars never got their chance.

As far as this computer is concerned, the two best teams are LSU and Alabama in that order. It took an extra game for LSU to prove it, but they finally got over the hump into first place.

Oklahoma State did everything it could to crash the SEC party at the top of the rankings, but it ended up five points short.

That the difference is less than nine points is important. It means that Alabama and Oklahoma State are essentially even. The real difference in a game between the two would be whomever had home-field advantage.

Even on a neutral field, the Tide would have just a small percentage edge over the Cowboys.

Gundy's gunners tried. They just missed doing enough.

Here is the almost regular season final MRI (save the Army-Navy game). Enjoy the bowl selection show, if you can keep from being too disappointed in the rematch.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 12"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 12:34 AM | Comments (0)

November 27, 2011

MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 11

Oh Akron. All season long the folks at Hustle Belt (including me) have been laughing at how bad you are.

The school found a way to make things worse. It fired coach Rob Ianello on the way to his mother's funeral.

Insult to injury.

Well, add another insult to the list. Akron could end as the worst team ever in the MRI. That is the worst team of the last nine years.

And Akron won a game. It could have been worse if the Zips had managed to screw up the game against VMI.

The team ended 118th in scoring offense, 116th in scoring defense, 105th in passing yards and 103rd in rushing.

The only worse quartet might be Nickelback.

A lot will depend on how the Zips opponents do for the remainder of the season.

Let's say Ohio loses in the MAC title game. That sends Akron even further south.

But then it becomes a question of how Ohio State, Temple, Cincinnati, Western Michigan and Ohio will do in their bowl games. It is going to take a lot of wins by those teams to pull Akron up past the futility shown by North Texas in 2008.

Things at the top are a little more jumbled. Alabama still leads, but Houston has pulled ahead of LSU. Oklahoma, which still has another game (as do the Cougars and Tigers) could also move up into that top duo. The Cougars and LSU even have a shot at taking the top spot away from the Tide, at least until the bowl games begin.

Every other team is essentially out of the running for the MRI championship. Despite Wisconsin's big gain this week, getting another 20 points in two games will be a difficult feat, especially when whomever is No. 1 will be playing at least one more game.

The same logic applies to Stanford, who will not be in the PAC-12 title game, or Boise State which has no title game.

The complaints will come, especially if Houston takes the title. People will say they don't deserve it because they don't play anyone (although they will get a test in a BCS game now).

But that shouldn't take away from what they would have accomplished, being one of the possibly only two teams to win every game this season.

Outside of Oklahoma, which may have played the strongest slate of any of the contenders, no one has exactly scheduled 12 tough games. LSU might win the "ranked team" battle, but games against Northwestern State and Western Kentucky drop the overall profile.

Alabama soured its own achievements with games against Kent State (allowable some years, but not this one), Georgia Southern and North Texas.

Here is a thought for you. Houston at the end of the year will have a win over UCLA (which may win the PAC-12 thanks to USC's "troubles"), and strong teams in Louisiana Tech and Tulsa.

That is a pretty good showing for the Cougars. Not as impressive as Oklahoma or Alabama or LSU. But still a pretty good year.

A BCS win wouldn't be a bad addition.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 11"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 3:00 PM | Comments (0)

November 23, 2011

MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 10

All the upsets have people talking.

But all they complain and complain about are the lack of playoffs.

Well, maybe we should look at how this computer sees the world first.

The facts here say that you can lose a game and still be considered the best. Now, you shouldn't go losing to a really bad team, say an FCS team. But you can lose. Heck, you can lose twice and still be considered a good team.

Texas has made an art of that. Four times, and still a top 25 squad (although not for long now that they can't move the ball).

Here is something else to keep in mind if you are a top team: playing an FCS opponent makes you look cheap. Alabama won handily against theirs and yet it cost them much of the lead in the MRI that it had built.

Lots of teams have done their bit to "help" out the FCS teams. But all it has done is water down what those teams have accomplished over the course of the season.

There is a reason why the SEC is no longer the top conference in this computer. Almost half the league took a big hit in its ranking by playing a team outside of the FBS.

That doesn't make the league better; that doesn't make the sport better. All it makes is a lot of money for the school off the backs of its fans, who have to -- for the most part -- watch blowouts.

Play a real team, and get some real respect for it.

But aside from that, here is what we are left with this season: Alabama, LSU, Houston, Oklahoma.

Those are the teams that have "separated" themselves from the rest of the FBS. Even with two losses from Oklahoma; even with a less than stellar schedule from Houston.

Look at those four and tell me why one of them doesn't belong.

You could harp on Houston, but the Cougars can't control their league. They can only control their performance, which has been record setting.

You could say Oklahoma lost twice, but that is why it is last among those contenders. It has proven that it can beat almost anyone else in the country.

And you can say you don't want a rematch. Oh well. Sometimes, those are the breaks. Would anyone really be complaining about a rematch if the two teams weren't in the same conference? I doubt it. Because it would have been almost 3 months since we saw the game.

And it can be even better the second time.

I do have one last gripe before unleashing the rankings. A lot of people are down on the BCS because it may give us that rematch of Alabama and LSU. Or Alabama might sneak in the back door without playing for the SEC title and play another contender out there, like a Stanford in the Championship.

The complaint this time around is that a team that doesn't win its conference shouldn't be playing for the National Championship.

OK, fine, but then if there is a playoff, you can't make the playoff without winning your conference. Does that seem like the playoff you want?

Oh, is that a no? You want there to be more than one team from a conference in the playoff picture?

I am sorry. That isn't what I just heard from you. You said you didn't want a team that didn't win its conference to play for the National Championship, something that might happen if a non-conference winner was allowed into the playoffs as an at-large team.

It is hard to understand why this is such a big deal to have a non-conference champion win the National Title in football, but in basketball it is OK. Conferences aren't the tidy little packages they used to be any longer.

Teams in the Big Ten, ACC, Pac-12 and SEC don't play every other team in the conference. You can't even say that the winner of the Championship games in those conferences is really the best team from that conference. Upsets happen. We like upsets. That is partially why you want a playoff. That is partially why everyone loves college football.

So disregarding a team because they didn't win their conference, even if they might have been the second best team in that conference and just not in the correct geographical, or metaphorical alignment to play for the conference title is silly.

Alabama is good. Alabama is damn good. Who else has stopped LSU like they did this season? They just didn't come out on top because the kicking game let them down.

You want to look me in the eye and tell me that they aren't among the top teams in the country and maybe still the best team out there, even with a loss?

Fine, but you would be wrong.

At least, that is what my computer thinks.

Check out all the rankings in Week 10 of the football MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 10"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 3:00 PM | Comments (0)

November 16, 2011

MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 9

The rankings love teams. The rankings hate teams.

The truth is that the rankings don't actually care.

The rankings care about the results on the field, and by results, we mean everything that goes into the win, or loss, including yardage and turnovers.

You don't get to squeak by in the MRI and think it is OK (unlike in some of the other computer rankings).

You have to lay it out there on the field each week.

And so that is why Alabama returns to the top this week. They have an offense. They have a defense (tops in the country). They just have a silly loss because they can't kick field goals.

Then again, they haven't needed to kick field goals very often.

Behind them is Oklahoma, who also lost. Oklahoma has maybe the toughest game remaining, against Oklahoma State. One of the SEC West teams will need to face Georgia in the championship, but right now, the Bedlam game could decide who goes home with the top spot in the MRI.

Then again, Alabama will do itself no favors this week. Playing Georgia Southern will destroy its strength of schedule, and likely push Oklahoma to the top of the chart anyway (assuming the Sooners can get past Baylor, which isn't a given).

To answer a few quick questions for the week:

• Notre Dame is now 22.
  
• Arkansas State is an FBS team. They play in the Sun Belt. They are 8-2 and lost to Illinois and Virginia Tech (no slouches). Despite that, they have the No. 23 scoring defense in the country. If they win Saturday, they essentially clinch a spot in the New Orleans Bowl.
  
• No, I can't explain Texas. They are only going to get worse too, as they have a ton of injuries. But yes, somehow, they are still ranked.
  
• Yes, Wisconsin is still the best team in the Big Ten, even if they won't get a chance to play in the championship game for the Non-Paterno Trophy. Two flukes at the end of games don't change that. Losing again might.
  

One final thought. The Big East was considering a plan to combine with the Mountain West and Conference USA to form a super playoff for the BCS spot that belongs to the conference now.

If you look at the rankings, five teams from the other conferences in that consortium would have a better claim to the BCS spot than the highest ranked Big East team, West Virginia.

And that doesn't count the MAC and Sun Belt teams ahead of the Mountaineers.

Time to blow up the Big East, and take away any claim it had to football superiority. It already lost its shred of respectability on the field.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 9"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 12:22 PM | Comments (0)

November 15, 2011

MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 8

Only one note on the rankings this week.

I do all of these rankings by hand, and I have a lot of other things that I contribute to, including the job that pays me all the money that I earn (MRISports is not the money maker you would expect).

One of the aspects of the rankings that used to be a big part of my original newsletter was the "Teams people might care about".

Well, sorry, but you will have to hope your team does well enough to crack the Top 25 from now on. That section takes longer than assembling the top 25 each week, and the time is frankly not there any longer.

Plus I am not even sure some of the people who originally read that section for their team even read this anymore.

So from now on, we will list the top 25 with the related stats, and the teams dropped. We will also list the next 10 teams in the rankings in order, with no stats.

At least then you will know if your team is getting close.

Sorry if this offends anyone, but given that a lot of sites have gone pay in the last few years, and I have resisted, although added more ads, I think it is a fair trade-off.

Enjoy all the rankings in Week 8 of the MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 8"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 3:26 PM | Comments (0)

November 1, 2011

MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 7

Way to go Oklahoma.

You had to go and destroy the hopes and dreams of all the players on Kansas State.

You had to beat up on the shakiest undefeated team and in the process, move back into No. 2 in the MRI.

And in the process, screw up the showdown between LSU and Alabama which seemed to be for all the marbles in the computer rankings. Now it seems that Saturday's game will only squeeze Oklahoma between the two powers in the SEC West.

It is almost impossible to determine what the results of a single game will do to a team's standing in the MRI. A team's first loss can send them spiraling down, or it could barely affect them.

Chances are that if the game is close the latter will be the truth and the losers will barely move in the rankings. But if the unthinkable blowout happens -- as in the Oklahoma-Kansas State game -- well, say so long to a top ranking.

There is always a chance to rebuild, as we have seen with Michigan, South Carolina, or Oklahoma. But it is pretty late in the season to start catching up again.

It isn't too late to see how all the other teams in the FBS are faring though. Some of them still have opportunities to make noise, as Ohio State did this weekend.

Check out all the rankings in Week 7 of the football MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 7"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 12:37 PM | Comments (0)

October 26, 2011

MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 6

As predicted, an Oklahoma loss would knock back the Sooners, but wouldn't take them out of the running for the MRI title.

The rest of the season had been too good up until the point that they lost.

Ahead of them now are Alabama and LSU, both of which have a week off before meeting in a game that should decide who goes to the SEC Championship game, and potentially the National Championship.

That leaves the rankings open to having a big Sooner win over Kansas State -- now ranked No. 23, although the lowest ranked undefeated team -- vault Oklahoma back into one of the top two spots.

The interesting thing about the loss was it was the type of game that Bob Stoops has become known for losing. It was the type of game we predicted at the beginning of the season would happen to the Sooners and keep them from playing for the National Title.

It was why the MRI didn't think that Oklahoma was going to be able to win it all this season.

After all, Texas Tech was no longer hanging around the bottom rungs of the MRI Top 25. It had already faded.

But as with the 2003 team, this Oklahoma squad is good enough to give itself a huge boost and potentially earn its spot back. It will just take a winning a few big games, and proving it is better than an undefeated Stanford (tough call, but Pac-12 down) or Boise State (easier argument).

Either way, the final six weeks of the season should be very interesting as the teams jockey for position and poll votes.

Check out what this computer has to say in Week 6 of the MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 6"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 9:39 AM | Comments (0)

October 13, 2011

MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 4

If you win 55-17 you had a good week. When you win 55-17 against the No. 3 team in the MRI, you had a great week.

That is why Oklahoma was the biggest gainer for the second week in the row. That is an impressive feat in itself.

But thanks to those two weeks, Oklahoma has taken over the No. 1 spot in the rankings, jumping Alabama on a week when the Tide took out Vanderbilt 34-0.

The two teams have begun to separate themselves from the pack, and that includes LSU, which is firmly in at No. 3.

Before the season began, we posited that the Sooners could potentially make a run at the all-time MRI mark, a record held by the 2005-6 Texas Longhorns.

Only fitting that Oklahoma would crush their rivals on the way to that title.

Even if they don't set the mark, the way they are playing, it is possible that Oklahoma could perform the feat of a previous Oklahoma team, that being the one back in 2003. The Sooners that year took such a big lead on the rest of the country, they were able to lose the final two games of the year and still lead the MRI.

With the lead that Oklahoma and Alabama have on the rest of the field, it is entirely possible that it could happen again for one of the two contenders.

On the other side of the coin, the MAC had a dreadful week.

The conference was No. 9 going into the week, but a number of games served to drop the league into last place this week. Buffalo took out Ohio, who had been headlining the conference (including grabbing them a spot in the top 25). Bowling Green took a hard loss to Western Michigan, dropping one of the conference's best team in the MRI far down. The same happened to Ball State in a 42-0 loss to Temple.

And Eastern Michigan was sent spiraling down by another loss, this time to Toledo by 38 points.

That placed the MAC below the Sun Belt in the conference standings.

Things have gone badly for the MAC before in the MRI. They have never been near the top of the conference rankings. But they usually aren't last either, a spot reserved for the Sun Belt. Except in 2009, when the Directional Michigans and Ohio State tackling dummies combined for the worst conference mark.

Check out where the MAC teams lie, and how far back the country is from Oklahoma and Alabama with all the rankings in Week 4 of the MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 4"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 2:30 PM | Comments (0)

October 3, 2011

MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 3

And just like that, Saturday provided the MRI with a new leader and a new No. 2.

Alabama's virtual destruction of Florida cemented them as one of the favorites for not only the SEC crown, but the National Title. The only team that looks like it can stop the Crimson Tide from drowning the world of college football is LSU.

The Tiger defense is good enough to slow down Alabama, but the question will be if LSU is good enough to score against the No. 1 scoring defense in the country (8.4 ppg). Given the year so far, it is tough to imagine more than a 10-point performance out of the Tigers come November 5.

Moving into second place is Oklahoma who took out Ball State. Sure Ball State is usually at the bottom of the MRI rankings (except for that one glorious season back in 2008), but entering the weekend, the Cardinals had the best record in the state of Indiana.

But this is Oklahoma, not Indiana or Buffalo. And the Cardinals did what the Cardinals do. They gave up 60 points and went tumbling in the computer rankings.

The big win moved Oklahoma ahead of Texas, a team that is lucky to still be No. 3 as Stanford put the heat on with its late night win over UCLA.

That means this weekend's Red River Shootout/Rivalry/Pac-16 battle will establish one of these two teams as the real challenger for the National Title. Given the results so far, this looks like a no-brainer. But the computer would say otherwise, based on Texas' top 15 defensive performance against the second-ranked strength of schedule so far.

It is only because Texas was so bad last season (and its continuing quarterback confusion) that the Longhorns are being seriously considered a contender.

So when they challenge -- or beat -- Oklahoma next week, it will be this major upset in the eyes of the national media.

All while the computer was saying that the Longhorns were a good team all along.

The other thing happening in the rankings this week was tumbling. Teams like the formerly No. 22 Temple Owls fell after big defeats at the hands of some teams that were not highly regarded in the rankings.

Temple fell all the way to No. 64 after a 20-plus point defeat by Toledo. The Rockets might be better than their record suggested, but Temple had also just defeated Maryland by 31 points. That made this one a shocker to say the least.

The same was true for South Florida which came into the week at No. 3. A 27-point loss on Thursday night to Pittsburgh pushed the Bulls down into the bottom of the Top 25.

The result of that prime time game should have people questioning the just how lucky South Florida was to defeat Notre Dame. After all, the Irish self-destructed multiple times in the game, and it wasn't until later in the contest that Brian Kelly realized Tommy Rees was the better quarterback.

This season looks a whole lot different if just that contest goes the other way.

Also dropping was Texas A&M, which managed to throw away another late lead, this time to Arkansas. This game doesn't prove that Arkansas was better than its big loss to Alabama, or that Texas A&M is worse than the contender everyone thought it was to begin the year.

It just proves that Mike Sherman still doesn't understand how to coach a winning football team.

Actually Arkansas is better than the loss it took to Alabama, although the computer numbers have the Razorbacks at just No. 39. This is mainly due to two factors.

The Razorbacks can't run the football, and the they turn the ball over.

Obviously, these two traits are going to be magnified when Arkansas really gets into the heart of SEC play. Even Auburn might be able to exploit these weaknesses.

Yes, that is a diss on the Tigers, who somehow are 4-1 when it looked like this season was headed to a 3-9 mark. But Auburn is copying their formula from last season, when they were just good enough to win.

So far, Clemson has been the only team to figure out how to overcome this seemingly magical ability, an illusion that has confounded every other team this year, despite the departure of master magician Cam Newton.

You would think karma would have caught up with the Tigers by now. But they keep winning, and making Steve Spurrier throw his visor down in the process.

The computer definitely gives them no love. Auburn is 97th in the country in passing yards, and can't crack the top quarter of teams on the ground

They have the No. 74 scoring defense, despite playing Utah State and Florida Atlantic. And the Tigers are giving up an average of almost 440 yards per game, putting them No. 106 in the country. That is out of character for an Auburn team that lived for the last decade on being strong defensively (until last season when Newton was able to outscore every opponent by himself).

But there is no Newton this year, and this will catch up with them. When the numbers were slightly better on offense last season, the Tigers were able stick in the MRI top 25. Without him, Auburn can do no better than No. 50 currently, despite a 4-1 record.

A run of Arkansas, Florida and LSU could make that the high water mark for the remainder of the year.

Check out all the rankings in Week 3 of the Football MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 3"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 11:03 AM | Comments (0)

September 26, 2011

MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 2

By Texas taking a week off, they avoided the fate of conference mate Oklahoma this week. The Sooners had a scare game -- something that the Longhorns have already faced -- and managed to take a nice dip in the MRI rankings.

Texas saw no such drop, and actually watched their score go up by staying off the field.

That isn't to say that Texas was safe in the No. 1 spot.

Alabama, one of the best teams by the eye test, absolutely destroyed Arkansas in a game that many thought would be close.

The Crimson Tide shot up the rankings and took over the No. 2 spot, while approaching the coveted top spot in the rankings.

Big moves this early in the season are expected. It is a part of doing business in a league whose regular season is just 12 games long.

Once a quarter of the season has gone by for most teams, you almost need to put out the rankings. But it is still a small sample size overall, and some teams could be wildly misrated in one direction or another.

The result is a big jump or drop in the rankings, especially after a particularly good win, or a scary close one.

Here are a few teams that took a tumble this week:

• Wisconsin - Screwed themselves by playing an FCS team. It probably wouldn't have been an issue, except that the opening part of the schedule hadn't exactly been strong to this point. Plus, the results of their previous opponents this week also hurt them. UNLV lost to its FCS foe. Oregon State dropped a conference game in its quest to be the worst team in the PAC-12. And Northern Illinois struggled against its FCS opponent. So while Wisconsin romped against South Dakota -- and got help in is weighted MOV because the FCS now has 6 wins against the FBS -- the strength of the Badgers' overall schedule went way down (Now officially the easiest schedule in the league according to the MRI's numbers). This is why you are better off never playing an FCS opponent in this computer system.
• Oklahoma - One of the consensus contenders for the national title dropped out of the top 10 after struggling against Missouri. The Tigers are one of the teams fighting for their football lives in the Big XII, and need ever data point on their side to show they are still an important team to have on the schedule. So even if the conferences don't blow up after this season, a few big wins in the past couple of years would help immensely. With the stiff competition that broke Oklahoma's streak of 20 games without trailing at home, the Sooners' offensive numbers took a hit. They lost the rushing battle Saturday and turned the ball over twice without a takeaways. The passing numbers are still strong, but it is a lot harder to make a big move in the passing rating because of the high number of teams running a spread air attack offense.
• Illinois - The Illini are another team that took a hit offensively. They lost the passing game on Saturday, and the bump from almost 300 yards on the ground wasn't enough to counter a sub-200 yard performance in the air. Illinois also lost the turnover battle. That they came away with the win was also somewhat of a shock, and it won't help their weighted MOV when they posted just a 3-point win over what should be an eight or nine win Western Michigan squad. Also an issue for Illinois on Saturday was the defense that allowed over 300 yards, moving the Illini out of the truly elite category. It may have been just a matter of time before this happened to Illinois, but when you win, you don't expect to get knocked back like this.

Other teams took hits from their first loss. USC and Arkansas both dropped out of the top 25 after their defeats. The Razorbacks truly tumbled after a the previously discussed Alabama matchup.

Last week's surprise in the top 10, Ohio, also fell after losing to Rutgers. It was a game that based on the results so far this year, the Bobcats should have won. But losses on the field -- to both the personnel and the ball -- led to big gains from the Scarlet Knights.

Ohio still managed to hang in the top 25 overall, along with the MAC's Temple which may mark a high point for the conference in the history of the MRI. That is how well the Bobcats had played so far this season. Now it is just a matter of which of the two MAC teams can stay in this, as both are in the Eastern division.

And for those looking for the upset, outsider teams, South Florida -- yes, we are considering a Big East team an outsider -- is still hanging at No. 3 in the rankings after dismantling UTEP. And Boise State jumped up to No. 12 after shutting down a high powered Tulsa squad.

But outside of the two MAC teams, which won't be contenders, and the Boise State team which will be, there are no real outsiders challenging for the title this season in the MRI. There is still time for someone to make a big move, but it is unlikely that anyone could put up the types of numbers that would be required to fly up to the top 10 in the rankings at this point, let alone the top two spots.

Even Boise State might have a hard time cracking the top five given that the teams running at that high of a level right now have a good lead on the Broncos.

Unlike in years past when Boise started highly ranked, they are now climbing uphill, and don't really have the kinds of opponents would would provide the boost remaining on the schedule.

And so this could be the first season in a while where no non-AQ team challenges for the top spot in the rankings. That is a sad development in college football overall, because it actually sets the cause back for a playoff.

If there are no teams routinely challenging for the title, that will lessen the noise about including anyone outside of the big conferences. And that will lead to more of the nonsense that took place over the last couple of weeks, and the superconferences could prevail.

On that happy note, check out all the rankings in week 2 of the MRI football rankings.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 2"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 2:00 PM | Comments (0)

September 18, 2011

MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 1

With a quarter of the season gone for most teams, it is time to release the first edition of the MRI rankings.

The computer is now in its ninth year of ranking teams based on their performance on the field. The formula takes into account strength of schedule, weighted margin of victory, offensive performance, defensive performance and turnovers.

All of that is wrapped into a neat little formula that generates a number that makes about as much sense as the quarterback efficiency rating. But we here at MRISports like it anyway.

Last season finished with the Boise State Broncos and TCU Horned Frogs taking the top two spots, a major win for the non-AQ teams. The two teams logged two of the top 10 rankings of all time in the MRI, not an easy feat considering that during the 2009 season, no team managed one of the best 10 marks.

The Big XII is the big winner this season so far. Leading the pack is Texas with Oklahoma, Oklahoma State and Texas A&M, all finding a spot in the top 10. Texas Tech, Baylor and Kansas State also made it into the top 25, and the Big XII looks to have the deepest and best conference by the numbers right now.

Obviously things will change. There is no way that Iowa State can keep up its fast start on the year. And once the teams get into the conference slate, the losses will affect someone. But as of now, as the conference appears on the verge of dividing permanently, the league is sure making a strong audition.

Not to be outdone, the SEC put four teams in the top 25, three from the West and one (Florida) from the East.

But the biggest shock in the rankings might be the non-AQ team that is up in the top 10. It is not one of the usual suspects. It is not Boise State. It is not TCU. It is not even Central Florida, which took a hit losing to Florida International (which came in at a strong No. 39) this week.

No, it is Ohio from the MAC.

It probably goes without saying that the MAC doesn't often land a team this high in the rankings. There may be a ranked team overall, but the helmet zone is usually free of the MAC. The last team to break through was Miami back in 2003. Not even Ball State's amazing run in 2008 (12-2, No. 25) was good enough.

Ohio does benefit from one of the easiest schedules in the country, and the first three weeks were no exception. New Mexico State, Marshall and FCS' Gardner-Webb may be among the worst teams in college football. The real test will be against Rutgers next time out.

But a win there could firmly plant Ohio in the top 25, or maybe the top 10 all season long. Not that they will get any BCS love, or even votes from the human pollsters. It is a great start to the year so far, including almost 470 yards of offense and a defense allowing less than 300.

Another team that made its mark in the the first three weeks is Georgia Tech, who crashes the party at No. 7. The Yellow Jackets were propelled to the top by a 607 yard rushing effort against Kansas. (On a MAC note: Where was that defense when Northern Illinois was in town? The Huskies should have scored 80 against the Jayhawks.)

But have no fear, fans of tradition and expectations ruling your football. Oklahoma and Alabama, the two favorites to be playing for the National Championship, are still in the running. Then again, it is just for the MRI championship, which went to Boise State last season.

Take what you will from that.

Enjoy all the rankings in Week 1 of the MRI.

Big Ten 3, Big East 2, Pac12 3, ACC 3, MAC 1, MTW 1, CUSA 1

Continue reading "MRI Football 2011 - Rankings Week 1"

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November 28, 2010

MRI Football 2010 - Rankings Week 11

For the first season since the football MRI began, it looks likely that neither of the two teams that will play for the national title will be ranked in the top two spots at the end of the regular season.

It is still possible for Oregon to move into that hallowed ground, but would take a dominating win in the Civil War against Oregon State and a shaky victory (or another loss) by Boise State against Utah State for it to happen.

Auburn, for its part, has no shot at moving that high, even if they managed to trounce South Carolina next week. Considering they almost didn’t win the first time around against the Gamecocks, it seems unlikely the second meeting will go that differently.

Then again, Auburn could do its part and lose in the SEC championship. Were that to occur, TCU will likely move into the title game.

And they would immediately be the favorite, at least as far as the MRI is concerned.

The Horned Frogs closed out their regular season as the MRI leaders, and with a comfortable margin on Boise State (who despite the loss remained No. 2), Ohio State and Oregon. There is almost no chance that the final weeks of action will change that ranking before the bowl season.

As for Oregon and Auburn, there is a clear reason why they are not among the top two, or even three teams: Defense.

In the past, the MRI leaders have been a combination of offense and defense. They may have scored 50 points per game, but they didn’t need to. They were dominating on the defensive side of the ball to such a degree that maybe three touchdowns would have sufficed.

You see, most MRI leaders ranked among the best in defense and scoring defense.

That list includes TCU, by the way. The Horned Frogs are No. 1 in defensive yards allowed and No. 1 in scoring defense.

Oregon is at least close at 29th in the nation in defense and 15th in scoring defense, which has helped them to a No. 4 ranking.

But Auburn isn’t even in the conversation, ranking 57th in both categories. If there was any question as to why the undefeated Tigers were No. 10 in the MRI this week, they can look at those two numbers as the main reason.

It takes strength in all phases of the game to be considered great. You can’t just outscore your opponent. You have to dominate them on both sides of the ball.

And so while we might end up with a very entertaining title game, with a Las Vegas over/under opening near triple digits, it won’t be showcasing the two best teams in the country.

Check out all the rankings in week 11 of the football MRI.

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November 24, 2010

MRI Football 2010 - Rankings Week 10

Normally the photo that accompanies the MRI rankings is one of the team in first place.

This week it more represents what that team is going to do to its opponent for its 12th and final game, New Mexico.

The Lobos are unfortunate enough to draw TCU just as the Horned Frogs need to make their biggest statement of the season.

With only this game left to impress the voters, New Mexico quarterback Stump Godfrey might soon be resembling his name.

Since Boise State has two games remaining and is already creeping up TCU, impressing everyone involved, including the other BCS bowl reps has to be at the top of their minds. If the Broncos pass them in the standings, the only hope is that someone, anyone thinks that the Horned Frogs will make a decent game in a BCS bowl.

There is only one guaranteed spot for the non-automatic qualifiers. And then the case becomes a hard one to make, even if the eye test would tell BCS bowl rep otherwise.

Without the weight of 50 years of college football history behind them, there is little short of being forced to do it that will get another outsider into the money games.

So all TCU can do is beat up on lowly New Mexico as badly as possible (70?, 80?, A century?), and root for like heck for Nevada and Utah State.

Check out all the rankings in week 10 of the football MRI.

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November 14, 2010

MRI Football 2010 - Rankings Week 9

Enough ranting on the insanity of the polls. Honestly, it was pretty obvious this week after TCU was passed by Boise State again.

This shouldn’t have happened. If the voters were watching for a second, they would have realized that San Diego State was far superior to Idaho.

San Diego State was a borderline top 25 team. Idaho is lucky it isn’t considered among the worst 10 teams in the country.

San Diego State should have challenged TCU. Idaho shouldn’t even have been on the same field as Boise State.

How do you justify the votes that you move away from TCU because of that? You can’t.

There are more important things to tackle this week, such as the proliferation of major upsets.

Illinois was poised to enter the top 25. How does a team like that lose to Minnesota?

Oregon State was supposed to be good. No top 25 team, but good. That is what Boise State and TCU have been counting on.

So how does that team go out and lay an egg against a team that had lost 19 straight Pac-10 games? There is no answer when you have the weapons the Beavers do.

Should we add in Notre Dame trouncing Utah (another way to discredit the power of TCU)?

Or maybe Tennessee taking out a solid, if middle of the pack, Mississippi team, by 38 points?

This was the week when everything you thought you knew just went out the window.

Even with the close win, TCU stayed at No. 1 in the MRI. The Horned Frogs are just too good and Idaho is just too terrible to lend that much to Boise State’s score.

It helped that Oregon struggled to fend off Cal, and that Auburn is still terrible at defense.

Yup, TCU is that good.

You could compare them to the Oklahoma team in 2003 that lost both the Big XII championship game and the BCS championship, and still remained No. 1. But that wouldn’t be fair.

TCU hasn’t lost a game yet. And other computer champions have had difficult game at the end of their seasons.

The Horned Frogs still have two more games left: the season finale against New Mexico which should be as simple as Boise’s victory over Idaho, and then a bowl game.

For all our sanity, let’s hope it is a BCS game. Anything less would be a severe insult to all our intelligence: computer or otherwise.

Check out all the rankings in week nine of the MRI rankings.

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November 10, 2010

MRI Football 2010 - Rankings Week 8

If TCU was the best team in the country according to the MRI before last weekend, it all but cemented its place at the top after its dismantling of Utah.

Now no one apparently watched this, because Auburn’s beating of Chattanooga was valued more highly by the voters than the previously No. 3 team beating the previously No. 5 team.

It seems that maybe we should have been ranking the Mocs all season long. After all, if a win over them deserved that much praise, they certainly had to be a good team, right?

Obviously the voters think so. One of them, Kirk Herbstreit, even said after the game at it seems Utah just wasn’t that good.

Funny that no one seemed to have a problem with the Utes when they were climbing up the rankings. Or did Herbstreit just admit that the voters are poor judges of talent?

After all, they had Pittsburgh ranked at No. 15 to start the season. How is that one working out?

Utah probably wasn’t as good as everyone thought, but it was good. The bigger truth is that TCU is really that good.

Without a star to attract attention, the Horned Frogs have quietly been destroying the competition.

And among the teams that they have beaten are four teams that have been ranked at some point this season. They have beaten them by an average of almost 30 points.

The time has come to start respecting the Horned Frogs.

It is possible that in three more games, TCU could become one of the top three teams in the history of the MRI (since 2003).

That isn’t just champions of the MRI, where at its current score, it is already the fourth best of those if the season ended today.

This is every team from the past eight years.

This isn’t a team to just be admired; this is a team to be celebrated alongside the 2005 Texas Longhorns and 2004’s USC Trojans.

If they win that is.

Check out all the teams that come after the Horned Frogs in week eight of the football MRI.

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November 2, 2010

MRI Football 2010 - Rankings Week 7

The year of the little guy continues.

That is the only way to explain it as six spots in the top 25 in the MRI are filled with non-automatic qualifiers for the BCS.

Count ‘em: Three teams from the WAC, two from the Mountain West (both in the top 10) and even one from Conference USA.

Yes, you may have missed it last week when Central Florida snuck in at No. 25 in the rankings. This week, thanks to some defensive woes by other teams, a big win over fellow contender East Carolina, plus a little boost to their schedule strength, they have jumped to No. 16.

‘But how can this be?’ you cry.

This is Conference USA. This team has two losses. What is going on?

Two losses by a combined 11 points to teams have fairly good seasons.

North Carolina State barely beat them by seven. The same North Carolina State team that lost to East Carolina, who Central Florida just beat, and who just took down Florida State.

Yes, that North Carolina State team, who could still win their division in the ACC.

Granted the ACC is the worst of the BCS conferences, but they are a contender for the best team in the conference, so that is still something.

Then Kansas State beat Central Florida by four. Yes, Kansas State is a middle of the pack team in the Big XII, but then maybe Central Florida would be a middle of the pack team in the Big XII this season.

Kansas State isn’t bad. They just aren’t great. They were even looking pretty good until Nebraska walked all over them. They challenged Baylor and Oklahoma State (albeit minus Justin Blackmon).

They might even beat Texas this coming weekend.

So Central Florida is a few snaps away from being 8-0 and in the talk.

Here are some numbers for you:

• 22nd in rushing yards per game.
• 30th in scoring.
• 11th in scoring defense.
• 9th in defensive yards against.

If there were any other jersey putting up those numbers, we wouldn’t think twice if they appeared among the top teams in the country, especially at 6-2 and when their losses were by 11 points total.

The one troublesome number is Strength of Schedule. Central Florida gets no help playing in Conference USA, where most of the teams lose two of their non-conference games to begin the year (much like the Knights).

But they ring in at No. 86 according to the MRI. For comparison, TCU is at No. 70. That Florida State team comes in at No. 87.

So it hasn’t been the toughest schedule in the country, but it is on par with what a nationally ranked Seminoles team had done. And it will get better before it gets worse, with games against Houston and Southern Mississippi in the next two weeks.

Plus, the Knights are on track to face Houston to SMU in the conference title game, another potential boost.

Note that we aren’t saying they are the best. They are just among the better teams in college football. A number 16-ranking isn’t even in the top 10 percent!

So it may be unconventional, but don’t count out Central Florida just because you can’t name their starting quarterback.

Check out all the rankings in week seven of the football MRI.

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October 27, 2010

MRI Football 2010 - Rankings Week 6

Is it time to bash the computers? They are the most hated component of the BCS after all.

Forget that the human voters often make more mistakes than their microchipped counterparts. Forget it because you won’t ever hear one of those talking heads on television criticize a voter.

Forget it because there is no way that the coaches have any idea what happens across the country every week, yet are expected to form an opinion that we have learned from years past is often passed on to someone else in the athletic office.

Forget it because the qualifications for voting in the Harris poll are that your mom’s cousin once went to school with someone who knows someone and mentioned you at a party.

But we all love to hate the computers, which sounds like sacrilege when it appears alongside the weekly MRI standings.

Admittedly, the MRI isn’t the most accurate tool out there. Usually it predicts about 70 percent of the games correctly.

But it seems to be correct more often than what we are seeing out of the BCS computers.

The New York Times took a preemptive shot at the computers prior to the initial BCS rankings. And they may have a point, frankly admitted to by one of the computer rankers themselves.

“You’re asked to rank teams that don’t play each other, that don’t play long seasons, and you can’t include margin of victory?” said Massey, who provides a “better version” on his Web site, masseyratings.com. “It’s a very challenging problem from a data-analysis standpoint. It does require sacrificing a bit of accuracy. It’s not the best way to do it.”

And lacking accuracy is something all too clear two weeks into the Blasted College System.

How else do you explain Oregon have almost 99 percent of the highest score in both human polls yet they are unable to sniff the No. 1 spot in the overall BCS?

How can two teams that don’t even get 10 percent of the first place votes in the human polls lead the BCS based on the computer rankings (Oklahoma last week and Auburn currently)?

It doesn’t make sense.

Maybe it is that missing component, the margin of victory. After the first few seasons of the BCS, the computers were asked to remove it from their formula.

The was college football after all. The players and coaches were supposed to be civilized. They aren’t supposed to run up the score to improve their rating on a computer.

Those computers that couldn’t make the cut were cut themselves, and the nation was left with just six boxes left standing.

But when one of their own admits that the rankings are flawed without some margin of victory component, shouldn’t someone take notice?

The MRI uses a weighted margin of victory to help rank the teams. You can blow out a bad team, but it won’t necessarily matter as much as if you win by 10 against a good team.

And there is a cap of 35 points on the raw margin before weighting. After a five touchdown lead, even the humans have stopped paying attention, so the computers should do the same.

With the margin of victory added in, perhaps the BCS rankings would resemble reality, where Auburn has had to squeak out almost all of its wins.

Or Boise State and TCU would have a little more love after they trample their admittedly softer schedules. A simple weighting would tone that down, but it would show how much better they are than their schedule alone suggests.

Or maybe Oregon would manage better than an average ranking of eight in the computers. They couldn’t process the Ducks’ 47 point victory over Pac-10 conference foe UCLA as anything more than just a simple check mark in the win column.

The MRI gave Oregon an additional 9.3 points for the dominating win, on top of any other gains from other components, almost 11 percent of its total MRI score.

So what is holding back Oregon (currently 4th) from the top spot in the MRI?

Part of Oregon’s issue may be their strength of schedule to this point. According to the MRI, the Ducks have played the 117th ranked schedule in the FBS, counting among its vanquished an FCS team, two-win Tennessee, winless New Mexico and one-win Washington State (whose one victory was over an FCS school).

Meanwhile Auburn has played the sixth hardest slate in the country. That will change in two weeks when the Tigers face FCS Chattanooga.

If Auburn can hold it together against Mississippi and are still undefeated at that time, it will be interesting to see how the computers react to that scheduling blip. Chances are the BCS microchips will punish them for it (as will the MRI to a degree).

For those out there wondering about the supposedly cream puff schedules of Boise State and TCU, they come in at 39 for the Broncos and 66 for the Horned Frogs.

Plus Boise will not play an FCS school this season and has two good games remaining on their schedule in Hawaii and Nevada. TCU (which did play an FCS opponent) will still get bumps from Utah and San Diego State, although they finish with a cake walk over New Mexico to bring them back to earth.

There is still quite a bit of football left, but the computers have shown one thing so far. Without all the data, you can make any assertion you want.

It just doesn’t make you correct.

Check out all of the (flawed?) rankings in week six of the football MRI.

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October 19, 2010

MRI Football 2010 - Rankings Week 5

Did anyone notice that? Boise State didn’t capture the No. 1 spot in the first BCS standings.

This despite ESPN’s BCS expert Brad Edwards claiming the whole week prior that it was all but a done deal.

Well, some expert. Boise State came in at No. 3 when the first rankings were released, not even close to the top spot, taken by Oklahoma.

Or was that what ESPN intended all along?

Although Oregon didn’t play this week, they benefited more from Ohio State’s loss to Wisconsin that Boise State, who dominated San Jose State to the tune of 49-0.

The Ducks gained more points in the coaches’ poll and a greater share of the first place votes taken from Ohio State.

But more importantly, Oklahoma stole a few of those top votes in the shakeup following the Ohio State loss. Stole them from a surging juggernaut that was looking to steal more than its now yearly place in the BCS picture.

Boise State was poised to break into the biggest game of the year. So why not put a stop to that before it begins.

When the BCS comes out for the first time, it is important to be placed in the top two, despite what the experts say. One of the top two is almost guaranteed to be in the championship game at the end of the season.

It has happened 10 out of the 12 years the BCS system has been in place and only one time in the past ten years hasn’t it been true.

So it is actually really important to be in the top two at the beginning of the chase.

And can you imagine how the ESPN brass felt about Boise State potentially being not just in one of those positions, but the top spot?

They had just shelled out $495 million for the broadcast rights to these games, and now the crown jewel, the National Championship game (sponsored by Tostitos) was going to be invaded by the boys who play on a blue field?

Not while they can help it.

So they get the coaches and the Harris poll voters scared by plastering their mock BCS rankings on the screen every chance they could get, including during the biggest games of the night.

And maybe, just maybe, enough votes changed to make a difference.

At least that is how I see it.

The computers (which don’t count margin of victory, much to the chagrin of some mathematicians) might be Boise’s only hope, and even that is a long shot.

Unless you are talking the MRI, where for the second straight week, the Broncos top the rankings along with their BCS busting pal, TCU.

It is looking like TCU might eventually come out ahead in the MRI as Boise’s schedule tapers off, but there is still a lot of football to be played and upsets to be had.

Check out the two high-flying westerners and all the rankings in Week five of the football MRI.

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October 13, 2010

MRI Football 2010 - Rankings Week 4

If you want the most outrageous idea, sometimes you have to go to the person least likely to give it.

On Monday morning’s Tony Kornheiser show, Mr. Tony mentioned that he would now be alright with a Boise State - TCU championship game.

Yup, even Tony Kornheiser, probably the last person you would expect to say it, believes that the two small fries in the college football box have proven themselves.

This confession was immediately greeted with the response that if anything could bring about a playoff, it would be TCU and Boise State in the championship game.

And that is probably true. If the big six commissioners couldn’t get the voters to put at least one of their members in the big game, you can bet your bottom dollar (and about 15 million more of them) that their tune would change about the playoff.

They wouldn’t have any trouble convincing university presidents that they couldn’t risk another year without a name school headlining college football.

The change would happen even before the kickoff on January 10, 2011.

So maybe those commissioners should look at the MRI this week, because topping the chart are the TCU Horned Frogs and Boise State Broncos.

There is no guarantee that this will continue for the remainder of the season and Boise State achieved the top spot with a dominating victory this past week (the largest gain of the week). Any automatic qualifier school could easily leapfrog either team with its own dominating win at the right time.

So the challenge for the two schools will be to keep applying the pressure and gaining those style points (the ones the computers don’t see).

Meanwhile, those conference commissioners should begin to worry about who the other computers have topping their lists as the first official BCS rankings approaches.

Check out the high-flying scores for TCU and Boise State and all the rest of the rankings in week four of the football MRI.

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October 5, 2010

MRI Football 2010 - Rankings Week 3

There is something in the MRI this week that I have seen only once before in the 10-plus years of basketball and football.

The system was originally created to identify those mid-major teams in basketball that deserved more recognition, teams like a George Mason or a Kent State in basketball (both big time MRI favorites during their respective runs).

But when it was changed over for football, non-automatic qualifiers for the BCS has a hard time breaking though.

There might be one or two teams, like a Boise State or a TCU, but there was never a glut of teams in the top 25.

Until this week.

Six of the 25 teams in this week’s rankings come from outside the six top conferences (if the ACC and Big East can still be called that).

There are more teams each from the WAC (2) and Mountain West (4) than the Big East (0) and ACC (1).

And the Mountain West has the same number of teams ranked as the Big Ten, SEC and the Pac-10, all three conferences thought to be the toughest in the country this season.

Can it be explained?

Perhaps there is just more parity this season than ever before in college football. Unlikely though. It is more accurate to think that there are just fewer really superior teams than in years past.

There is probably less of a claim on greatness this year and before, so everyone else really does have a shot just be noticed.

Or maybe this is just the Mountain West’s year.

The only previous time this happened was during the 2005-2006 basketball season, when the Missouri Valley dominated the top 25 in the MRI. We all know what happened that season during the NCAA tournament.

We don’t have a playoff system in college football to see the same thing occurring this year.

But we do have two very strong contenders for the National Title game in TCU and Boise State. Having a solid cadre of teams behind them in their conferences should only help bolster their credentials for the big game.

Now it will just take a movement by the voters to wake up and see that the conferences they love to ignore are playing some good football, at least at the top, much like the conferences that they love to love.

After all, no one believes that Minnesota or Washington State is really adding to the profile of their leagues now, do they?

Check out all the madness and rankings in week three of the football MRI.

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September 27, 2010

MRI Football 2010 - Rankings Week 2

It was quite a week for the MRI with so many of the top teams facing their first real tests of the season.

The big winner was Stanford, who quietly put away Notre Dame and took over the top spot in the rankings for the week.

Oregon and Arizona, the two other Pac-10 heavyweights so far, both struggled to wins.

Oregon’s may have been a gift from Arizona State as the Sun Devils committed seven turnovers. The drop in offensive production for the Ducks definitely hurt their MRI score this week and sent then sliding back to No. 4.

Arizona played a slugfest deep into the night against Cal. The Bears will continue to be a dangerous team this season, and as we said last week, should pull off a few upsets during the year.

It was not to be on Saturday night as a late missed field goal by normally automatic Giorgio Tavecchio gave the Wildcats the ball in great position for a late drive. Add in a gorgeous 51-yard pass from Nick Foles to Juron Criner and you have enough ingredients for an Arizona gut-check win.

The two other top five teams last weekend also struggled, with Alabama needing Arkansas’s Ryan Mallett to basically give them the game late, and Nebraska taking it easy against 1-AA opponent South Dakota State.

And so with the refresh, we have a few new teams flying high this week. Who can maintain the momentum the rest of the season?

Check it all out in week two of the football MRI.

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September 21, 2010

MRI Football 2010 - Rankings Week 1

It has finally reached the time to release the first MRI rankings of the year. Ahhh can you smell the hopes and dreams of the top 25, most of which will be dashed by the time that November rolls around?

The most striking item in this set of rankings is the dominance of the Pac-10 over the first three weeks of the season. At the end of the year, it may not be the best conference, but over the first three weeks, three leaders have definitely emerged: Oregon, Stanford and Arizona.

Those three west coasters occupy the top spots according to the bits and bytes this week and for good reason. They have outscored their opponents by a combined score of 471-89.

Add in all the offensive numbers that those three teams have put up and you have a juggernaut. It will be interesting to see how their defenses hold up when they all finally meet each other.

Alabama and Nebraska round out the top five in this week’s rankings.

If you are looking for sleeper teams, check out Cal (oh look, another Pac-10 team) and Iowa. Despite one loss each, both teams made the top 25 in the initial rankings. Both losses came this past week so maybe a trend is starting in the wrong direction, but both teams did enough in the first two weeks to show they are contenders.

As you move down the rankings, a couple of things are worth noting.

First, Utah is outside the top 25 and all the way down at 42. Despite being ranked at 13 in the latest AP poll, the Utes haven’t really impressed the computers yet.

Their last season in the Mountain West could be very disappointing come January if this keeps up. They would be the first team in a while that could actually blame the computers if they don’t make a BCS bowl.

Finally, the grand BYU independence experiment, while not officially underway, isn’t looking like it will have a good act to follow. The Cougars are 1-2 and currently sit at 110 in the MRI rankings after finishing last season at No. 14.

That is currently below MRI doormat Washington State. Those Cougars know a thing or two about being really bad, and it is not something the BYU wants to emulate.

Check out all the rankings in week one of the football MRI.

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July 20, 2010

MRI Football 2009 - Rankings Bowl Final

Alabama’s big win in the National Title game allowed the Crimson Tide to overtake Texas and capture the 2009-2010 MRI crown.

Florida, a team that lost only a single game all season — Alabama in the SEC Championship, — finished second. Texas fell to third with their loss.

In the context of history, the Alabama final ranking didn’t even place the Tide in the top 10 MRI scores since the 2003-4 season (the first season for the football rankings).

It was good enough to finish at No. 5 in terms of “champions” of the MRI, the BCS, or the AP (only teams that “won” the championship are ranked on those lists).

Check out all the final rankings in the bowl final edition of the MRI.

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MRI Football 2009 - Rankings Regular Season Final

The final regular season rankings from 2010 for your viewing pleasure.

According to the computer, Texas should have faced TCU in the title game.

The other BCS bowls may have been filled as follows:

• Rose Bowl: Ohio State vs. Oregon
• Orange Bowl: Georgia Tech vs. Penn State
• Sugar Bowl: Alabama vs. Cincinnati
• Fiesta Bowl: Florida vs. Boise State

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July 19, 2010

MRI Football 2009 - Rankings Week 10

Week 10 of the MRI for your archival pleasure.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 5:15 PM | Comments (0)

MRI Football 2009 - Rankings Week 9

Football is starting again soon, so I thought it might be nice to finally put up the tail end of last year’s rankings.

They have been done for a while, but just not published to the site, partially because of a back-end upgrade and partially because I was swamped.

Check out all the rankings in week nine of the MRI

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November 18, 2009

MRI Football 2009 - Rankings Week 8

A few weeks ago, the lament began.

Never had a season this blah been in front of the nation. The rabid fan base that follows college football everywhere was in for a massive letdown.

Not even the playoff that everyone seems in chorus for could save this one.

And now the season appears to be in an even worse state than before, given the latest MRI numbers.

This is no offense to Texas, who have done what has been expected of them coming into the year.

And this is no offense to TCU who has the first legitimate chance to do something no other non-automatic qualifier has done and make an appearance in the National Championship game. (Didn't everyone think it would have been an overrated Notre Dame? )

But this year's crop of teams is terrible. Does anyone honestly believe that Ohio State might be the 6th best team in the country? Or that Oklahoma deserves a spot in the top 10?

Yet, those are the numbers that shake out of this thing.

This season could have the nation looking at the worst top 10 teams ever. Last year was bad. This year looks like the pee-wee leagues that provide halftime entertainment.

It is no surprise that this season is the year of the BCS busters. TCU and Boise State are both legitimate candidates for BCS bowls.

And beyond the one of the pair that will likely earn an automatic spot in the BCS, the other will possibly be left on the outside.

Now that would be a joke. If the standings hold, TCU would earn the automatic spot and Boise State would be left in the snow -- probably literally given the bowl choices the WAC has.

Does anyone believe that Boise isn't more deserving than a second team from the Big Ten, or the Pac-10?

Yet, the bowls will go for the big name rather than give another underdog a shot at the big boys, all but guaranteeing a lackluster affair that will draw more snores than viewers, especially given the drawn-out schedule. Despite the projections out there, college bowl officials just are creative enough to step out of their comfort zone and pick a wildcard.

There are more shocks in the MRI this week -- just try to find USC in the top 25 this week -- but that is best left for the reader to savor themselves.

Check out all the surprises in week eight of the football MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2009 - Rankings Week 8"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 3:05 PM | Comments (0)

MRI Football 2009 - Rankings Week 7

For your archival pleasure, the MRI rankings from week seven of the season.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2009 - Rankings Week 7"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 1:02 PM | Comments (0)

MRI Football 2009 - Rankings Week 6

For your archival pleasure, the MRI rankings from week six of the season.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2009 - Rankings Week 6"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 11:23 AM | Comments (0)

October 28, 2009

MRI Football 2009 - Rankings Week 5

I can't remember a football season this disappointing. It isn't that the games are exciting. But the lack of depth at the top of the rankings is just sad.

I am reveling in the race for the top spot as much as anyone. However, we only have three teams to root for.

Everyone else is officially an also-ran right now, and that is not making for an exciting season.

Even the leaders leave something to be desired. They don't put teams away. They don't distinguish themselves. They are just the best of a mediocre pack.

Take this week's top 25 in the MRI. I can't remember the last time that we had a ranked team with a losing record.

But there one is this week -- Tennessee at No. 22. The whole country is so blah that teams can't knock out a less than .500 squad.

And back at the top, we have our three blind mice, who can't see that putting a little distance on the rest of the group might be a good thing sooner rather than later.

It is as if they are waiting for the upset to happen, so they don't have to carry the mantle of the best team in the country. And the way they all are playing, that upset is coming.

Poised to take their spots are the George Masons of football: TCU and Boise State, who are putting opponents away, but boast schedules that leave something to be desired.

Otherwise, the debate we would be having is not 'Who is No. 1?' but rather 'What happened to the perennial powerhouses?'

At this point, I am hoping that one of the outsiders can crack that top group.

Better yet, I hope they both do.

Check out all the rankings in week 5 of the MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2009 - Rankings Week 5"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 2:32 PM | Comments (0)

October 20, 2009

MRI Football 2009 - Rankings Week 4

What happens when the No. 1 and 2 teams both win, but neither looks great doing it?

Chaos!

No, not chaos, but close enough. Alabama and Florida both lost ground this week in the MRI. Neither particularly deserved to gain any points after their lackluster wins against South Carolina and Arkansas.

But neither did they deserve to lose those top two spots given that Texas had its hands full taking out Oklahoma in the Red River Shootout.

They could still switch places though, and that is exactly what happened. And while these two have a little spat to decide who is really No. 1, the rest of the country is mired in mediocrity.

No one seems to want to step up and move toward the front of the pack. Whether it is because of poor scheduling, or just parity in the league, every team from Boise State down to No. 25 Pittsburgh is within 20 points of each other.

Teams are changing places in the rankings like they were shuffling inside a crowded elevator. Only right now, that elevator doesn't get any higher than the fifth floor from the top and no one seems to want to stay on that floor for any length of time.

Time to check out all the rankings in week four of the MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2009 - Rankings Week 4"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 2:22 PM | Comments (0)

October 14, 2009

MRI Football 2009 - Rankings Week 3

LSU tried its best. But maybe Tim Tebow really is superman?

After all, the kryptonite that was his own lineman's knee didn't seem to slow him enough to drop the Gators, either on the field or in the MRI.

Alabama did close the gap again between themselves and their SEC foes but given the way the two teams are playing, it looks like it will take until the SEC championship before this one gets sorted out.

And it appears that one of the SEC competitors for the title has fallen aside, leaving the path even more wide open. Auburn took a tumble against Arkansas, taking at least a little of the pressure off the Iron Bowl game at the end of November.

While Texas waits for one of the two teams to slip up, Boise State is battling a less-than-stellar schedule and hoping that it will be enough. The Broncos face a tough test against Tulsa, but will it be enough to improve their MRI standing?

Check out the gap that they need to overcome in this week's MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2009 - Rankings Week 3"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 12:16 PM | Comments (0)

October 7, 2009

MRI Football 2009 - Rankings Week 2

Florida sat at home and watched their lead in the MRI dwindle.

Now they have to worry about it totally going away. With Tim Tebow still in doubt for Saturday, the Gators have the spectres of Alabama and Texas looming.

Alabama had little trouble with Kentucky last week and now Mississippi is on the calendar, a game that if the Tide can win should bolster their MRI points by quite a bit.

Texas prepares to take on Colorado, who is looking like the doormat of the Big 12 this season. Following that, the Longhorns will have three-straight ranked teams on the slate, which could mean a big move in terms of SOS for Texas.

That normally translates into big points in the MRI formula.

Further back are Boise State and Auburn, still undefeated, and still hungry to make some noise.

Auburn will have its chance to show off against Alabama later in the year, if they survive. But Boise State will be an interesting case this season if they can go 12-0. They may have a Utah-like beef against the BCS if they are left out, especially if Oregon continues to play well, and maybe knocks off a USC later in the season.

But there is still a lot of football to be played. Until then, you can see all the rankings in week 2 of the MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2009 - Rankings Week 2"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 10:58 AM | Comments (0)

September 27, 2009

MRI Football 2009 - Rankings Week 1

After four weeks of supposed upsets, the computer has crunched the numbers and the MRI has returned.

Now we will get to see where the true upsets are occurring in college football.

One place that they have not been occurring is Gainesville, Fla. The carry-over from Tim Tebow's heartfelt speech has lasted at least through the first four weeks this year.

But we finally found the Kryptonite to the Gators' Superman. Who knew it was his own lineman's knee?

Now with Tebow sidelined, will Florida be able to hold onto the top spot that they have owned since the eighth week of last season?

It might be difficult because SEC conference mate Alabama has been solid over the first quarter of the season. Where was the upset that so many were calling for this past week?

Not at Alabama.

Instead the trip-up occurred out at Penn State, where for the second year in a row, Iowa ruined the Nittany Lion BCS championship dreams.

Prior to the loss, it looked as if Penn State would be near the top of the MRI rankings again. Instead, they are No. 25.

Check out all the rankings in week one of the MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2009 - Rankings Week 1"

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January 10, 2009

MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Bowl Final

The MRI would like to congratulate its 2008-2009 champion, the Florida Gators. Florida cemented its hold on the No. 1 spot in the computer rankings with its 24-14 victory over Oklahoma.

By losing the Sooners fell to third in the rankings, still ahead of a Texas team that is probably still smarting since it beat Oklahoma by the same margin as Florida managed in the championship game.

Moving into the No. 2 position was not Utah as in the AP poll. Instead, it was a USC team that proved itself against Penn State in the Rose Bowl.

The upstart Utes only improved to No. 8 moving ahead of the Alabama Crimson Tide that it beat in the Sugar Bowl.

And for those BCS lovers out there, Virginia Tech also moved up into the rankings... that's the entire rankings since even the ACC winner was unranked after the season ended. The Hokies managed a No. 24 rankings after beating Cincinnati in the Orange Bowl.

The MRI correctly predicted the winner of 21 of the 34 bowl games, a 61.8 percent mark. For the season, the computer predicted 72.92 percent of the games. All-time, the computer has chosen 70.92 percent of the winners.

Check out all the rankings in the bowl final edition of the MRI:

Continue reading "MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Bowl Final"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 1:03 PM | Comments (0)

December 8, 2008

MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Regular Season Final

Don't blame the computers if you are unhappy with the BCS championship match (although the MRI agrees that Oklahoma and Florida should be the participants).

They didn't have Oklahoma and Florida. They had Oklahoma and Texas in a rematch.

Instead, blame the humans.

Yes, those same humans who used to pick the national champion when all of the contending teams played in different bowl games and you didn't have a head-to-head game to judge on.

Yes, those humans, who were randomly picked to vote in the Harris poll. There isn't even as much nepotism in the federal government when if comes to jobs like this.

Yes, those humans, who are easily swayed by things like margin of victory, style points and let's not forget impassioned speeches which end up firing up a team to the tune of nearly 50 points per game after them.

Yep, the humans are who put Florida into the title game.

There is the requisite amount of whining this morning. Florida's loss came at home. USC and Texas both lost on the road.

Florida played in the SEC which wasn't its normal self this year. Texas played in the toughest division in college football, the Big XII South, and should have gotten more points for that (You can leave out the Pac-10 from that discussion. Only 5 of the 10 teams qualified for bowls in a league with two of the worst teams in D-1. With two gimmee wins, they should easily have had 7 teams into bowl games.)

Everyone is hating on Florida; my guess is that they win the whole thing.

The MRI correctly picked 75 percent of the games this weekend, finishing the season at 73.85 percent. All time, the MRI has correctly predicted 71.09 percent of the games, and it doesn't even pick during the gimmee non-conference slate.

Check out the final regular season rankings in this week's MRI:

Continue reading "MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Regular Season Final"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 10:33 AM | Comments (0)

December 1, 2008

MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 11

Dear BCS --

I don't blame you for being a little gun shy after this weekend. I would advise not going to Texas anytime soon.

But you should be let off the hook, at least for now. You don't control the voters. You don't control the computers. And you most definitely don't control the Big XII athletics directors who signed up for a tie-breaker that they never thought would happen, let alone decide a potential National Championship participant.

The problem is that your biggest controversy is yet to happen.

I know you can sit back now and believe that the SEC champion and Oklahoma will make the title game lack its requisite controversy, but I wouldn't rest easy yet.

Things happen...

• Like injuries -- Will a bad non-throwing hand have an effect on Sam Bradford in the Big XII game? Yeah, you bet. One sack (although they have been rare against Oklahoma this season) could end his game fairly quickly. And that might be enough emotional fodder for Missouri. Then what?
• Like close games -- If Florida beats Alabama by five or less points, then what? Alabama has been a favorite No. 1 (even if the MRI doesn't believe in them). Could people believe that Alabama is still No. 2?
• Like leftovers -- Texas is not happy. And you can bet that anything that would give someone the chance to move Texas back ahead of Oklahoma will be more than jumped at. Texas could come ruin your party, even if Oklahoma wins against Missouri. It would take a lot of human votes to move them, but it is a possibility.
• Like outsiders -- What if the football gods (those are those mythical creatures not also known as the BCS conference commissioners) decide that USC should really make it? What if Missouri wins and no one likes Texas enough to push them up? What if the No. 5 USC Trojans make it? Then what is the explanation this year? The MRI thinks that USC is the No. 2 team in the country right now. Could the computers in your formula make the same determination after the final weekend?

Plain and simple, the Big XII making a poor choice turned the race for the championship into a mess. This is not the your fault.

But you could take the brunt of the blame when the weirdness that always infects college football takes hold in its final weekend.

And you should be fearful starting when the ball kicks at 4 p.m. Saturday. It can only go downhill from then on.

Sincerely,

The MRI

The MRI struggled this week and only predicted 68.3 percent of the games correctly with home field advantage. All time, it has predicted 71.07 percent of the games.

Check out all the rankings in week 11 of the football MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 11"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 12:52 PM | Comments (0)

November 24, 2008

MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 10

Florida's smashing victory over The Citadel kept them in the lead this week, but lost them points overall. So can anyone catch Florida at this point for the MRI title?

For sure, if Florida loses. Oklahoma has at least one more game, USC has two more games remaining. Either of those two teams is playing well enough to make the leap over a losing Florida team.

But the best shot of that loss would be coming against Alabama, and that is still two weeks away. If Florida is able to make a significant convincing win against Florida State, it could put itself far enough ahead that an Oklahoma team not playing in its championship could be left out.

That leaves USC, who many see as an also-ran in this year's crowded field. But since its loss to Oregon State, which is the only thing keeping them from the No. 1 ranking right now, the Trojans have been sneaking their way back into the championship hunt.

A lot would have to fall their way for USC to make the title game, but it is not out of the realm of possibility. The SEC championship eliminates one contender. If Florida also loses to Florida State, both could be out of it depending on the outcome in Atlanta.

A loss by Oklahoma to their rival Oklahoma State could send the Big XII spiraling out of control. Texas Tech could then be the team in the title game. Yes, even after the shellacking they took.

So USC needs help, but it is something we have seen before on the final week of the season.

If Florida keeps winning, I don't know if there is a way for anyone to catch them in the MRI, even if they lose the BCS championship game. It would depend on their opponent. Oklahoma would have the best shot, but USC and Texas are close enough that an extra win could propel them over the Gators.

So, nothing is ever easy or clear in the BCS, but it is sure interesting.

To be sure, the major conferences did themselves no favors by fastening their tie-breakers to the system. I think the Big XII would rather that some other system were choosing the representative from the South than the voters and computers.

And even with the over-reliance on the BCS, the championship game this year is being decided through the regular-season and that is most of what you can ask for. As one person said to me today, the dirty little secret of the BCS is that most years, it gets it right.

I would contend that even when it doesn't get it right, the best team does come out the champion.

I can't wait to see how this one ends.

The MRI correctly predicted 73.5 percent of the games this week when factoring home field advantage. Since its inception, it has predicted 71.1 percent of the games correctly.

Check out all the rankings in Week 10 of the football MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 10"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 11:52 AM | Comments (0)

November 17, 2008

MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 9

I respect being undefeated. It isn't an easy task to run through all 12 games on your schedule and not lose one of them.

With only a couple of weeks left, Alabama and Texas Tech have defeated every opponent that has been put in their way. Some of the wins haven't been pretty, others have been dominant. But the fact remains that they found a way to overcome every obstacle.

Though, ask me who the best team in the country is and you will get an answer that isn't either of those two teams.

Florida is the hands down answer to that question.

The absolute shellacking of South Carolina should have cemented that in everyone's mind. Alabama should be looking ahead to a few weekends from now and wondering how they ever have a shot at holding the Gators under 30 points.

Yet, while Florida is lighting up scoreboards again and again, no one seems to be watching.

How else can you explain that only two AP voters and one coach have the Gators at No. 1 on their ballots?

Have they not watched Florida completely humiliate every opponent since their one-point loss, a loss that took place in September?

Have they not seen Texas Tech and Alabama struggle in wins, wins where they should have been putting 50 or 60 points on the board?

Have they not seen how Tim Tebow has gone from having a down season coming off his Heisman Trophy victory to catapulting into the top five contenders for the award, and potentially becoming a repeat winner?

Does their television set not receive CBS, or ESPN?

Apparently not.

Florida extended its lead in the MRI this week, and with a game against The Citadel this weekend, they could move out even further another week from now. My computer has no trouble seeing what team is No. 1, even if the voters can't (the other computers also disagree, but they place a higher value on not having lost).

It is the picture behind Florida that is a little muddy in the MRI. USC, Texas, Penn State and Oklahoma all have a claim to the second spot in the rankings right now.

You read that right. Texas Tech and Alabama have a lot more work to do in order to get to being in that list.

The Red Raiders can do it by beating Oklahoma. Alabama can do it by embarrassing Auburn next weekend.

They both need some help from other teams to make it to the top two in the MRI's book, but winning big next week could go a long way to curing some of their MRI ills, such as Tech's two 1-AA victories, or Alabama's passing offensive woes and tiny average margin of victory in its SEC games.

Until then, they have to look at their other performances this season, and wonder what could have been while they watch Florida take in all of the glory.

The MRI correctly predicted 72 percent of the games this week after factoring in home field advantage. It has predicted 71.06 percent of the games correctly since its inception.

Check out all the rankings in week 9 of the football MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 9"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 8:15 AM | Comments (0)

November 10, 2008

MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 8

The toxic No. 1 bug finally hit Penn State over the weekend. If there was a team left on the Nittany Lions' schedule that could have taken them out it was Iowa.

The Hawkeyes may not be the most impressive team in the country, but no team has played its opponents harder this year, and gotten beaten by fewer points than Iowa.

Sure, four losses don't look pretty, but there is a pretty good team in the yellow and black each week, ready to take out some tough opponents.

That is why the Hawkeyes have a coveted spot in the MRI rankings at No. 23.

Penn State, feeling the unlucky mojo, took a steep drop down the ladder to No. 5 after the loss. Their drop was assisted by big wins from some of the other contenders for the MRI crown.

With only a month remaining in the season, the race at the top is very tight, and the stuff that BCS nightmares are made of.

Look at the MRI No. 1, Florida.

The Gators are probably the team that scares the BCS, Alabama and Texas Tech, the most right now. With a single loss by a single point, Florida might be in the best position to sneak into the title game with a single loss, and a single loss which could have them jumping Texas Tech by the end of the year in the computers and the human polls.

Since the loss, Florida has been unstoppable, and teams have just fallen aside in their wake.

If the Gators can win against South Carolina, they will move on to the SEC championship against Alabama. If Florida can not stumble against its final two opponents, there is nothing keeping them from the title game if they beat Alabama.

The question is who would they play. Texas Tech looks like the most likely candidate at this point, but the computers -- and the voters -- can be fickle.

Can Texas Tech, currently No. 6 in the MRI, make it the rest of the way undefeated?

Oklahoma looks like the toughest test for the Red Raiders, and Oklahoma, despite a let down against a Texas team that was better on that day, is again rolling like they did earlier in the season.

Perhaps Oklahoma will end the Texas Tech run. That is on the verge of forcing a three way tie for the Big XII South, which could end up falling to Texas after all the tie breakers are run.

The bottom line is that this season could end up being just as much of a mess as last season was with all the losses by the Nos. 1 and 2 teams in the BCS.

The biggest hope for conference commissioners is that Alabama and Texas Tech are able to stay without a loss the rest of the way. Neither has an easy road, and the MRI predicts that at least one game on each team's schedule could trip them up.

Basically, neither has a guaranteed run to the title by any standard.

So, time will tell, and have the commissioners pulling their hair out until Dec. 6 has come to a close.

The MRI correctly predicted 77.8 percent of the games this week when factoring in home field advantage. Since its inception, the MRI has correctly predicted 71.04 percent of the games.

Check out all the rankings in week 8 of the football MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 8"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 9:38 AM | Comments (0)

November 3, 2008

MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 7

I can only imagine what life was like in the Paterno house on Sunday. Penn State coach Joe Paterno opens his paper, turns on the television to watch a little football, and sees that he gets jumped in the polls.

Something tells me that the Paternos are in the market for a new television.

I can see the shoe flying across the room now, shattering the screen as the AP, the coaches and the BCS show Penn State in third, jumped by Texas Tech.

I can partially understand the vote. Texas Tech beat the top team in the country, and that could mean they were better than a team that didn't play.

Yeah, something like that.

Sorry, this one doesn't make sense to me. Alabama ahead of Penn State makes little sense to me, as Alabama (the Arkansas State game not withstanding) has struggled to prevail over many of its SEC opponents.

If it is any consolation to Penn State, they still lead in the MRI.

Early in the day, it looked as if Penn State were destined to slip to second, but that would have required a win by Texas, something that eluded the Longhorns.

Instead, the idle Nittany Lions held on to the top spot.

They managed to stay ahead of what may be the hottest team in the country, Florida. The Gators rolled another opponent over the weekend, this time in the form of Georgia.

Since its 1-point loss to Mississippi, Florida has outscored its opponents 201 - 43 in four straight wins. The team's performance has been so hot that Tim Tebow has pulled himself from an also ran back into the Heisman Trophy conversation, something that in the first few weeks of the year looked like another failed repeat attempt.

Holding in third place is USC, a team that had the pleasure of destroying one-half of the joke in the Northwest, Washington.

The Trojans will have a tough case to make in the BCS this year though. Unlike years past, the PAC-10 has struggled, and not just against BCS competition, but against teams from the Mountain West too.

So the men from Troy still have a long way to go to erase their performance against Oregon State from the minds of the voters.

The now once-defeated Texas Longhorns fall to fourth this week. Despite a very poor defensive performance, the close loss kept them from falling even further in the standings. Texas now has to hope for an Oklahoma victory over the Texas Tech Red Raiders to have a hope of winning the Big XII South division.

Rounding out the top five this week is TCU, who took out UNLV. While TCU has the loss against Oklahoma, they remain firmly in the hunt for consideration of who is the best non-automatic qualifier team.

The Horned Frogs record might have a blemish but that can quickly be kept from the voters' minds if they can defeat Utah on Thursday night. The win would secure the conference for TCU and place them in the same conversation with Boise State for a BCS slot.

The MRI correctly predicted 72 percent of the games with home field advantage factored in last week. The system has predicted 70.88 percent of games all-time.

Check out all the rankings in week 7 of the football MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 7"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 8:31 AM | Comments (0)

October 27, 2008

MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 6

A lot of people have asked how Alabama could be so low? The answer is close wins.

The Crimson Tide have struggled to put away their opponents this year, leaving them in games and leaving Alabama on the verge of losing, even if their record is still without a blemish.

The two leading MRI teams got a taste of what the Tide have been feeling during their games this week.

Texas held on late against Oklahoma State in order to squeak out a 4-point win. The victory gives them another signature win and sets up another tough high-profile game right away with Texas Tech.

Barely surviving to win though doesn't translate into a big move in the MRI and so Texas remains at No. 2 this week.

Penn State had the opportunity to extend its lead going into the night game against Ohio State. Yet the Nittany Lions had the same struggles with a tough Ohio State team.

So, Penn State's lead remains slight over Texas and the rest of the pack is beginning to close at a faster pace.

Perhaps both teams got a little luck on their side this week as USC also was only able to beat Arizona by seven. That victory was enough to stay in third and close the gap, but the results could have meant much more had a blowout been in the works.

Tulsa took its opportunity on Sunday night to run over Central Florida. And so in typical controversial style, the MRI keeps the Golden Hurricane at No. 4.

Rounding out the top five again this week is Florida who set itself up nicely for its game against Georgia this weekend. Combined with the performance of the Gators in the actual BCS so far this season, this upcoming week could mean a lot in terms of putting Florida right back in the title game with the smallest slip in the leaders.

The MRI correctly predicted 74 percent of the games this past week with the home field advantage.

Check out all the rankings in week 6 of the football MRI:

Continue reading "MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 6"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 9:43 PM | Comments (0)

October 20, 2008

MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 5

Despite what the BCS might say, Texas is not the No. 1 team in the country. That is, at least according to the MRI.

Penn State continues to run out ahead of the Longhorns in the MRI computer rankings, although it is unclear how long that might last. Penn State has played one extra game than Texas and with Ohio State and a bye week next on the Nittany Lion schedule, its lead could quickly evaporate.

This week though, Texas has only themselves to blame. After jumping to a 35-3 lead over Missouri, Texas allowed the Tigers back into the game, trading touchdowns with their northern opponent over the second half. The Longhorns just failed to continue stopping Missouri.

Despite the second half scoring, Texas was able to draw to within a single point of the Nittany Lions, who used a safety to spark a triumphant win over Michigan in Ann Arbor.

Still dropping in at No. 3 is USC, who had its largest shutout victory since 1931 and handed Washington State its worst blanking ever.

USC would likely have made more of a claim for the top spot, or even a leap to No. 2 had Washington State not been one of the five worst teams in bowl subdivision.

Still hanging in the top five at No. 4 is Tulsa who had no trouble trouncing UTEP. Tulsa is still lacking respect in the polls that count though.

They are no higher than 15 in any of the computer polls and the human have given them even less credit. Tulsa is No. 19 in the Coaches Poll while the Harris voters have them at No. 21.

Again, it is likely their schedule which holds them back. While they did improve to No. 114 in the country this week, they are still among the bottom ten in terms of strength of opponent.

Rounding out the top five is Florida, who was idle this week after taking out LSU in grand fashion the week before. Florida continues its quest in the jumbled SEC East this week when they take on Kentucky.

The MRI correctly predicted 80.7 percent of the games last week when factoring in home field advantage.

Check out all the rankings in week 5 of the football MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 5"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 10:11 AM | Comments (0)

October 13, 2008

MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 4

Remember that game that was going to decide the No. 1 spot in the MRI? It did, only not in the way that was expected.

Despite the "upset" victory by Texas over Oklahoma (The MRI had it right), Texas couldn't hold its lead. Penn State's destruction of Wisconsin made sure of that.

The Nittany Lions were able to do what Michigan and Ohio State couldn't -- a beat down of the team that many thought would be one of the contenders in the conference. While others were able to squeak by the Badgers, Penn State had no such worries.

And so they fly to the top of the rankings this week, knocking down the Longhorns to the No. 2 spot despite the impressive victory over the very tough Oklahoma Sooners.

Coming in at No. 3 is USC, who probably has the inside track to the National title game if they win out. While it wouldn't seem that way being in third, the Trojans do not have a conference title game to contend with, and they still have the easiest part of their schedule ahead. While I expected slightly more against Arizona State over the weekend, I am not shocked that the Trojans are where they are overall.

Florida may have had the most consequential victory of the weekend. Beating previously unblemished LSU led to a big jump for the Gators, especially after their squeaker of a loss the week before. The loss by LSU dropped them far out of the top 25, making hopes for a repeat chance at the title looking unlikely. Despite Florida's struggles this season, they still look like a possible contender, but as always, the road from the SEC to the title game is much more difficult.

Still looking for that BCS buster? Maybe Tulsa should get a longer glance. The Golden Hurricane are undefeated but are not feeling the love in the polls.

The most likely reason is their 117th ranked schedule, according to the MRI statistics. It hasn't stopped Tulsa from breaking up into the top five but it does make it harder for them to continue to stay there. Just witness Tulsa's drop to fifth from fourth in the last week. A close victory over SMU is not the same as a close victory over a team ranked higher than 117 in the MRI.

Being a paper heavyweight also means that a loss will be all the more damaging for the team. The next three games against UTEP, Central Florida and Arkansas could be the undoing for the high fliers.

The MRI correctly predicted 75 percent of the games last weekend when factoring in home field advantage.

Check out all the rankings in week four of the football MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 4"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 7:57 AM | Comments (0)

October 8, 2008

MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 3

If there was anything needed to make this weekend's game between Texas and Oklahoma even more important, try putting the top spot in the MRI into the mix.

Oklahoma might only be in the No. 6 spot, but they can make a big move depending on the result of the game on Saturday and potentially make the big jump into first. They will have a tough time doing that though considering the teams on the list that lie ahead of them.

Penn State lies in the way. At No. 2, they take on a Wisconsin team which has had two very difficult defeats in two weeks. While they still remain in the MRI top 25, they can only thank their small margin of loss in those games. Wisconsin might decide to actually step it up this week and take out the high flying Nittany Lions.

Or they might just roll over and be beaten like they were against Michigan and Ohio State. Maybe the loss of their band has something to do with it.

Also in the way is another Big XII team, Missouri. The Tigers have a tough test of their own in Oklahoma State. The Cowboys (MRI #10) have shown the offense that they only showed glimpses of last season is still out there. That means Missouri's defense will really get a test this time out, not like how Nebraska "tested" it. If the Tigers can win, they will definitely be standing in the way of a Sooner bolt to the top.

Or how about another team from Oklahoma. Not Oklahoma State. I am talking about Tulsa. The Golden Hurricane have lit up scoreboards in a way that has their Athletic Director worried that he might have to install a third digit on the scoreboard. Tulsa will likely get knocked back a little this weekend as they take on SMU and given the Mustang record, it will be difficult for Tulsa to continue gaining points the way it has.

And then there is USC. Can anyone tell me which USC might show up this week? Against Oregon State, it was the choke USC team.

Looking at the game, you would have expected USC to beat Oregon, but for the game to have been close.

You would have been wrong, as the Trojans rolled over the Ducks. (Maybe I should start using the Balki "Perfect Strangers" method of picking my games.)

So does Arizona State have a chance? It is anyone's guess.

Check out all the rankings in Week 3 of the Football MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 3"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 7:04 AM | Comments (0)

September 28, 2008

MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 2

Remember all of those comments from last week's rankings? Ignore them.

It is obvious that being in or near the top of the MRI rankings was poisonous for a number of teams.

Take USC. There is no explaining how a team that looked as good as it did in its first two games could look as bad as they did in the next game, against Oregon State of all teams. I have watched USC look poor in the past, but this team was supposed to be beyond all of that. Maybe my hesitation at putting Mark Sanchez in the top five of my Heisman Rankings was well grounded.

USC may react badly to being at the top and almost guaranteed a No. 1 ranking, but one team didn't and never does.

Welcome back Texas to the top spot in the rankings, all on the back of their signal caller, Colt McCoy. McCoy is turned in one of the most dominant performances of the weekend, and his wasn't against some Sun Belt team, or Division 1-AA squad.

This was against Arkansas. Granted the Razorbacks are not supposed to be at the top of the SEC this season, but at the same time, this is an SEC squad. They are not supposed to be this bad.

With four games under his belt, McCoy has thrown for over 1000 yards, 14 touchdowns, and run for 278 yards and four scores. He leads his team in rushing, he is the No. 2 rated quarterback in the country and he is set to break almost every record at Texas.

I think this guy is good (Wait until Wednesday's Heisman rankings), and his team is a deserved No. 1.

Penn State, last week's leader, drops to No. 2 despite a win against Big Ten foe Illinois. They may not look like the best and brightest at all times, but JoePa's squad is playing like they have a shot to sweep through the conference without a blemish.

Alabama shocked a lot of people with their win over Georgia, but the MRI thought it was almost a given. The tide move into the top five at No. 3.

Utah remains the top team from the Mountain West, which keeps its No. 4 league rankings this week. The Utes get tricky Oregon State on Thursday night, which might just make or break their season.

Rounding out the top five is another Big XII squad, the Oklahoma Sooners, who creep up after beating down upstart TCU (still in the top ten). The Sooners showed top-spot ability, including another huge game from Sam Bradford.

Check out all of the rankings in Week 2 of the Football MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 2"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 5:22 PM | Comments (0)

September 22, 2008

MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 1

Four weeks have gone, and for some teams, that is a third of their season. And after four weeks, we have a new team at the top of the MRI football rankings.

Welcome to the Penn State Nittany Lions, who hold the No. 1 ranking for the first time ever in the MRI.

Penn State hasn't exactly beat the top teams to get here, but they have taken down their foes convincingly. Coastal Carolina, Oregon State, Syracuse, Temple: all casualties of the machine that Joe Paterno has built to try and move ahead of Bobby Bowden on the all-time win list for good.

Despite holding the top spot, Penn State isn't the story, and will likely fade as the season continues (it is just the nature of the beast, especially the Big Ten schedule). The big story is the Mountain West, which has been beating up on the PAC-10 and has two teams in the top five and three teams in the top 11. Utah and TCU are Nos. 2 and 3 this opening week.

At four is a Texas team which currently is tops in the Big XII, but doesn't look like they have what it takes to really play past Oklahoma in three weeks.

Rounding out the top five is USC, who is No. 1 in most polls. The difference in the MRI is that they have only played two games to most teams' three or four. On pure average, the Trojans are the top team. Given the way they are playing, they should be flying up the rankings to the top in the coming weeks, starting with what will likely be a big win on Thursday night.

But enough of the formalities, let's get to the rankings.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2008 - Rankings Week 1"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 9:31 PM | Comments (0)

December 3, 2007

MRI Football 2007 - Rankings Week 11

It is the end of the regular season, and amazingly, if the MRI had its way, the opponents in the National Title game would be Oklahoma and LSU. Both schools won their conference championships, knocking the former #1 team in the MRI, West Virginia, down to #3.

For its part, West Virginia lost what was the biggest numerical upset of the year. That is not measured by the point spread in the game (almost four TDs), or some perceived disadvantage by the 'stached one's team. This is purely measured by the difference in MRI score between the two teams, along with a home field advantage. Prior to that game, the biggest upset of the year was Notre Dame beating UCLA, back when UCLA was still playing somewhat decent football.

The BCS has given us Ohio State (MRI #6) and LSU (MRI #1) for its title game. I haven't heard much moaning about the actual title game, yet. I am sure it is coming. Everyone believes that this season is the perfect reason to move to a playoff system in college football. While I used to be on the playoff side, the BCS has somewhat won me over.

I am not saying the system is perfect, but it is the best thing we have. With a playoff, I see too many upsets occurring, too many teams that are "hot" at just the right time, that didn't prove themselves during the full season, making their way to a "championship". No matter how mythical you think the LSU-Ohio State winner is a champion, you could have to say that a team like a Georgia winning the entire thing would be just as crazy. Georgia would for sure be in the playoff, they made the BCS games after all. However, they didn't win their own division in the SEC, and therefore, they didn't even have a chance to win the title of the conference. How (and I will allow you to look back at 2003 here) can a team that doesn't win its division or conference expect to be considered the National Champion, in a sport that has a season so short?

People have often pointed to college basketball, where March Madness entrances the nation. Keep in mind that March Madness would be a shadow of itself if it weren't for the massive amounts of betting on the tournament in the form of the ever present "brackets". While I have no doubt that betting on the college football tournament would also be as huge, it is not the same. You would not have 6 games in 3 weeks, or a massive first weekend of 48 games. You would have 4 games stretched over 4 weeks. The ever present nature of the basketball tournament allows it to stay in the public eye over 3 weeks, not like a college football tournament which would be over-analyzed and dull by the time each week's games came around.

People seem to think that there are a number of teams who should have access to the championship each season. They think that most years, there could be 9 - 12 teams which deserve a chance to win it. I pick out 9 - 12 because that would, as some people say, equate to the #3 seed in the NCAA tournament winning it all. I disagree. While 9 - 12 sounds like a #3 seed in the brackets in football, it really isn't. With 3 times as many teams in college basketball as in football, the top 16 teams equate to only the top 4-5% of teams in the country, a reasonable number which probably deserves some shot at winning the title. Since 1985 when the tournament expanded to 64 (now 65) teams, there have only been two occurrences when the champion has not come from those 16 top teams. Both of those occurred early on after the expansion. I could almost contribute that to the committee not being familiar with how to expand and seed the tournament properly. Most of the champions have been from the top 4 teams in the tournament, the top 1% of the teams in the country over the course of the season.

The top 5% of the teams in football would be only 5 or 6 teams. The top 1%, only 2. Two teams, picked to play for the championship, by a committee of men, and augmented by some computers. That sounds very similar to a process which would pick a tournament of teams, aided by some computer statistics, and seed them appropriately, putting the best teams at the top.

You can see, we have our tournament, picked in a similar manner to the NCAA basketball tournament.

Yes, I know there are other games which give out a ton of money to the conferences of the teams that are picked for them. Remember though, that past the top 2 teams, the other bowls have quite a bit of leeway in how they pick their participants, much like the other bowls in the country. They can pick, other than their tie-ins and some win restrictions, however they want to get the best game they want. Otherwise, we would never see a modern Notre Dame team in those bowls. Sure, there is a disproportionate amount of money in those games because of the BCS, but there is a lot of money in other bowl games which never gets spoken about. If you really want to complain about money, talk about how Notre Dame, at 3-9, is still being paid $1.3 million dollars by the BCS this season (look at the decisions in 2005 to see details).

And so I will stand by the BCS process for now. Until someone comes up with a better system (not a playoff) for picking the two top teams (our top 1%), it is the best system we have. It is a system that has only been in its current format for picking those 2 teams for the last 3 seasons, including this one. I don't think it has been wrong yet, even if this season, I could have seen any of 3 championship games, and still thought it was a good decision (Ohio State-LSU, Oklahoma-LSU, or LSU-Virginia Tech (again)).

And with that, let's go to the full rankings in this, the final regular season rankings, of the football MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2007 - Rankings Week 11"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 1:30 PM | Comments (0)

November 26, 2007

MRI Football 2007 - Rankings Week 10

Just when you thought it couldn't get any stranger, you have #1 and #2 go down in the same week. Of course, LSU had such a lead, that they didn't fall very far, but Kansas picking up their first loss of the season sure hurt them.

Yes, we are in for a wild last week, with massive repercussions if a number of upsets occur in the championship games. This has been the season for the upset so I am not ruling anything out. If Oklahoma wins (they are favored), and Tennessee wins over LSU, and Boston College beats Virginia Tech, you are going to definitely have one of those BCS groups which leave people scratching their head. Imagine even further that somehow, Pittsburgh figures out how to beat West Virginia in Morgantown, and you have two teams playing for the National Championship, who didn't play on the final week of the season.

Yes, it is a mess this year, and even with West Virginia winning, and playing in the title game against... well, someone, I am not sure that the coaches should have to vote for the winner of the National Championship game as the #1 team. Mostly I feel that way because I can't honestly say that there is a #1 team this season. There are a bunch of #3 and #4 teams (since #2 always loses, I would say Notre Dame should just be #2). And please don't tell me that there should be a playoff because of this year. If anything, I would rather see us go back to the way it was before where everyone just took a guess at the end of the season at the #1 team.

If you want to know the extent of the mess, just keep in mind that there is a scenario on the table which would put Kansas and Oklahoma both in the Fiesta Bowl, playing a conference game!

Since I can't stop that, let's look at what happened because of LSU losing this weekend in the MRI.

West Virginia clinched the Big East title and also most likely a spot in the BCS championship game with their crushing of Connecticut on Saturday. They only have Pittsburgh between them and a shot at the National Title. My guess is that we have our #1 MRI team for the remainder of the season. And don't say I didn't tell you that West Virginia would be in the title game a few weeks back. I knew it then, I just felt I needed to remind you given my bad picks in the Big XII this season.

Dropping into the #2 slot is LSU. The team hasn't lost a game in regulation all season, so they are at least as good as Kentucky (not a good sign), or Arkansas (an even worse sign). Eh, what can you do? They proved to be better than most of the SEC, which is something, although their actual conference record was the same as Tennessee (again, not good) and Georgia (ok, now we are getting somewhere). Seems like a waste of talent, but Ryan Perrilloux can only carry you so far when used sparingly.

#3 brings us Florida, who is the odd man out despite only losing by 19 total points this season in their three losses (which contributes to their high ranking overall in the MRI). They will not be in line for a BCS bid, either being hopped by LSU or Georgia based on the outcome of the SEC title game. It is too bad. There is not a more interesting team to watch on the field this season, especially with the "should be" Heisman Trophy winner Tim Tebow at quarterback. Instead they are likely to get the Outback or Cotton Bowl. I would love to see them trounce Missouri in Dallas, as opposed to a weak Wisconsin or Michigan team in Orlando.

At #4 we have Oklahoma who has a chance to redeem itself with a repeat win over Missouri. Something tells me that this one is destined towards a different outcome, or at least a closer score than the last time. But again, my picks in the Big XII this season have been all over the place. Look for Oklahoma to be #2 in the MRI next week.

Closing out the Top 5 is Kansas, who despite its loss stayed in the hallowed "recap group". Todd Reesing basically played himself out of the Heisman race with the loss. However, Kansas probably endeared themselves to a few bowl committees based on their not quitting when down big (28-7) at the end of the 3rd. Heck, I even give them credit for that. This is the best season for a Kansas team in over 100 years. They deserve at least a nice bowl out this one. And that shouldn't be a conference game against Oklahoma.

And with that, check out all the rankings in week 10 of the football MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2007 - Rankings Week 10"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 11:50 PM | Comments (0)

November 19, 2007

MRI Football 2007 - Rankings Week 9

Another week and the battle for the National Championship may be as clear as it is going to get. It will basically come down to this week's game between Kansas and Missouri.

Why is that?

If Missouri beats Kansas, West Virginia is the #2 team in the MRI if they win out, and likely will be the #2 team overall in the BCS when the season ends.

If Kansas wins, they will cement another game for themselves against a decent opponent. And with that win, they could be putting the Mountaineers securely in the rear view mirror. However, they would still need to win the Championship of the Big XII to make it official.

And while that little decision still has to be made, it seems as with another win, LSU has pulled safely into the #1 position, and may with 2 games remaining, be there to stay, even with another loss.

At #3, West Virginia is sitting and becoming the biggest Missouri Tiger fans there are. The Mountaineers took another step towards the Big East title with a win on the road over Cincinnati. The Bearcats were anything but an easy win this season, and are still at #15 in the MRI even with the loss. West Virginia still has Connecticut and Pittsburgh to clinch the title, but with the way they are playing, it looks like only a miracle would change their "team of destiny" look. I mentioned it a few weeks ago. It just keeps stacking up like West Virginia will be playing in that National Championship game. And the games keep moving in that direction too.

#4 sees Ohio State staying in the hunt, but with their season done, they can only slide backwards at this point, unless something very interesting happens. A win over a Michigan team that ended 8-4 and with some bad losses, did not help Ohio State do anything to impress, especially when the score was 14-3. If Ohio State really wanted to make a statement, they would have needed to win the game by at least double what they did manage. With the close score, the Buckeyes look like just another mediocre team in the Big Ten, even if they are the one with the best record.

Closing out the top 5 this week is Missouri who took care of Kansas State while keeping their eyes on the other team in Kansas. The Tigers will need two big wins, and by big I am talking about the margin of victory, to both impress voters and the computers and get to New Orleans. I don't see that happening given the likely competition in the Big XII title game, but this season is not normal. For now, they can be content to be the best of the rest.

Check out all the rankings in Week 9 of the Football MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2007 - Rankings Week 9"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 3:17 PM | Comments (0)

November 11, 2007

MRI Football 2007 - Rankings Week 8

All it took was one big win and now LSU looks like they are running away with the MRI title. Of course, the big win was against Louisiana Tech, not exactly the Floridas or Auburns of the football world. That win has LSU comfortably in charge while the race behind them for #2 gets more interesting.

Ohio State, last week's #2 team lost to Illinois, at home, which dropped them down to #5 in the pack of teams which had separated themselves from the rest of the nation. That pack has one more team this week as Oklahoma has climbed back into the #2 picture at #6, just behind the Buckeyes.

With a week off, Oregon couldn't do anything to improve their standing. They stay dropped a spot to #4 this week. The Ducks also have the worst schedule of the teams remaining in the lead pack. That could hurt them even more as things move forward. They will have to definitively beat their opponents in order to keep pace with the rest of the teams.

Into the #3 spot this week is West Virginia, who was able to take care of Louisville after a little scare on Thursday night this week. West Virginia still seems like the dark horse in this whole race, and could surprise by sneaking into the title game.

Our new #2, which seems like the revolving position in the MRI, is Kansas, who had another big victory in conference this week. Most surprising about this Kansas team is that they seem to be able to overcome all of the troubles that they have had in the past. They can win on the road, and they are winning against the South Division. This week, the slowdown of Oklahoma State's offense was enough to catapult them into that #2 spot. They will need to keep playing well to stay there. They face a hot Iowa State team next week (who would have thought you could refer to Iowa State as hot), and then finish against MRI #7 Missouri, before maybe a shot at Oklahoma in the Big XII title game.

Check out all the rankings in week 8 of the Football MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2007 - Rankings Week 8"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 4:45 PM | Comments (0)

November 5, 2007

MRI Football 2007 - Rankings Week 7

Last second victories seem to be patented by Les Miles and LSU. That doesn't stop on the football field. It continues in the MRI, where their hold on the top spot continues to be tenuous at best.

This week, they are challenged by Ohio State at #2, whose win over Wisconsin was yet another hurdle covered on their way to the showdown with Michigan on the last week of the season. The win puts them within two points of LSU, although with one more game played.

More of a challenge might be coming from Oregon, who grabbed a nice boost from their win over previously undefeated Arizona State. With the same number of games played, the Ducks are just over 3 points back. What could hurt them is their schedule coming up and also that LSU will likely be headed to the SEC Championship game.

The MRI race has basically come down to 5 teams, as teams continue to lose near the top. Those 5 teams include idle West Virginia who the potential to make a huge run over their last four games. Their schedule is definitely filled with some resume builders, those teams that are pretty good, but not excellent. Those teams can really help their MRI score.

Rounding out the top five list of challengers is surprising Kansas, who put a huge hurt on Nebraska, and Bill Callahan's chances to still be coaching next week. Kansas as the top team in the Big XII has a few tough games still remaining, including the championship for the conference if they can get there. However, they seem to be on a mission this year, and should warrant some consideration for a huge bowl game.

Check out all of the rankings in Week 7 of the football MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2007 - Rankings Week 7"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 2:30 PM | Comments (0)

October 30, 2007

MRI Football 2007 - Rankings Week 6

A week off, some time to sit back and relax, and time to thank goodness you are still #1. That is what Les Miles had over the weekend. Despite a week off, no team was able to make up the distance between the LSU Tigers and the rest of the pack to move them out of the #1 rating. Now, with a few players out for the coming week against Alabama, that may change, but for now, LSU is still sitting pretty.

One of the most interesting things in this week's ratings is that the Top 10 have all the same players, but a little different order. The biggest shock will be that Florida was able to stay in that lead pack despite another loss over the weekend, this time to Georgia. Despite only dropping to #10, they did leave the majority of the lead pack which now looks to be about 6 teams before a drop off to Oklahoma and Boston College in the #7 and #8 spots..

Moving up to #2 this week is West Virginia, whose only blemish was against South Florida. The Mountaineers may want the Bulls to stop losing so that loss continues to be one of quality. However, with Pat White appearing to return to his good form (read not hurt), it looks like West Virginia can put a serious challenge to the Tigers.

Also moving up was Ohio State who got what could be considered maybe their first big win of the season against Penn State. The Buckeyes may not have the offensive power of last year's team but you wouldn't know it from the way they played on Saturday. The schedule continues to be a little tougher the rest of the way out for Ohio State so don't expect them to fall away.

Rounding out the Top 5 are two PAC-10 teams which garnered big wins over the weekend. Oregon got over the USC hump while Arizona State took down a Cal team which is just spiraling out of control. Wouldn't you know it, Oregon and Arizona State meet this weekend in Eugene. Look for major shake-ups from that game in next week's rankings.

Since their are 6 real leaders here, you have to give mention to Kansas who overcame another obstacle which they seemed destined to trip over. The Jayhawks defeated Texas A&M and in doing so, cleared what might have been the toughest game left before they face MRI #9 Missouri to close out the season. I have to keep reminding myself that this is not the basketball MRI ratings when I see Kansas up there. This is truly the "upset" special of the year.

Check out all the rankings in Week 6 of the football MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2007 - Rankings Week 6"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 1:40 PM | Comments (0)

October 22, 2007

MRI Football 2007 - Rankings Week 5

LSU likes to make things interesting, don't they? Another last second score keeps the Tigers in the top spot in the MRI for now. However, that top spot is going to have some competition.

While the Tigers enjoyed a comfortable lead last week despite their loss, that lead got a little smaller this week. The new contender? Last week's #7 team, now #2, Oregon. The Ducks put together a huge fourth quarter to put down Washington, and continue to stay alive in the PAC-10 race. More importantly though, they had a big 10 point gain in the MRI. That move jumped them into second place, within striking distance of the LSU Tigers.

Their gap with the Tigers being so small is important because LSU has a bye this coming week. Meanwhile, Oregon will be taking on the MRI #12 USC Trojans, and they have USC at home. Autzen Stadium will be jumping with the chance for them to take their first week at the head of the MRI rankings (oh, and there is that BCS thing going on too).

Also still in the hunt for a #1 spot in the MRI, the West Virginia Mountaineers and the Ohio State Buckeyes, holding strong at #3 and #4, their same spots as last week.

Dropping down to #5 this week from #2 is Arizona State, who had this week off. This may not be a good sign for the Sun Devils. Having a drop that large on a week off often means that you are ready for a fall. It could happen this coming week with Cal in the desert.

Check out all the rankings in Week 5 of the Football MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2007 - Rankings Week 5"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 6:35 PM | Comments (0)

October 16, 2007

MRI Football 2007 - Rankings Week 4

It seems fitting that LSU managed to lose, but still hold on to the top spot in the MRI. Come on, this shouldn't be too much of a shock. Jon Wilner did the same thing in the AP poll this week with his vote. And it is not like this kind of the thing hasn't happened before in the MRI. Oklahoma lost two games to end the 2003 season, and still finished #1.

This year is a year unlike any other in college football, so we should be ready for anything, like an LSU staying #1. As they come back into the pack, it just means, we are ready for a few more upsets. All of the top 5 teams kept their place this week in the rankings, while 3 teams took a jump into the Top 10.

Most interesting of those is the one everyone is talking about this week. While South Florida is #2 in the BCS, they are only #10 in the MRI. Why? Perhaps it is their 63rd ranked schedule as determined by the MRI. This is a big difference from some computers/other rankings, which have their schedule rank as high as #9. But they have overcome what is a big handicap in the MRI to achieve a #10 ranking, which is a far cry from Hawaii who seems to be having trouble overcoming two games against D-1AA teams and stays stuck at #15.

More interesting? The two teams with no losses that people still think are more deserving than the Bulls are still ahead of them in the MRI. Both Ohio State and Boston College have slightly better rankings.

One more thing to look at as you move on to the full rankings: Check out the drop in MRI score as you move from South Florida down to #11 Texas Tech. That is a huge margin which could mean that we have seen 10 teams really separate themselves from the rest of the country.

One last note: Nebraska has now been on the receiving end of two major defeats, and their opponent in both of those has had the largest gain the last two weeks in the MRI. Ouch.

And now, check out all the rankings in Week 4 of the Football MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2007 - Rankings Week 4"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 6:20 PM | Comments (1)

October 8, 2007

MRI Football 2007 - Rankings Week 3

Before you think that this week was a little more calm than last week, take this stat into consideration. Of the top upsets this season, seven of the top 10 were actually this week, instead of the week before (as measured by the MRI).

This week was actually more damaging to the ratings, as we saw three games where the favorite had an over 95% chance of winning lose. Three! Since 2003, there have only been 14 games total, and three of them were this week.

Most damaged in all of this was the West Coast. USC losing to Stanford and UCLA losing to Notre Dame means that LA should have been in mourning by the time their hang overs on Sunday morning were gone. Both teams were heavily favored at home, both teams looked really bad against inferior opponents. While USC barely lost, and is still probably among the better teams in the league (turnovers were really what did them in, and too much pride in themselves), UCLA is in bad shape.

This is their second loss this season to a team that should have had no chance against them. Notre Dame could barely manage 150 yards of offense but they still won. Why? 7!!! turnovers by the Bruins. Karl Dorrell, do yourself a favor. Don't read the papers, don't watch television, don't get on the internet and read the message boards. You will cry, and cry, and cry. There is no reason for a team to lose the ball seven times. After 3, you sternly talk to them, after 5, you yell. After seven, you resign, especially when you coach at UCLA and were playing a Notre Dame team who only have 9 takeaways all season coming in.

In other news, how great a game was the LSU-Florida game? Give the "Onions!" award to Les Miles for a number of gutsy calls throughout the game. Miles has the LSU Tigers pushing towards a National Championship and Saturday night's coaching was a good example of why that will happen. The real question will be who is their foe as most of the favorites for that place have fallen off the radar.

The MRI has the money on Arizona State right now, who came back to beat a scrappy Washington State team. I think I wrote that here first. The Sun Devils are in the #2 spot this week after their close win.

Moving back up into the Top 5 is West Virginia who did what Louisville couldn't do, beat Syracuse. The Mountaineers ran all over the Orange. The real question will be how much longer Pat White can continue to take the beatings he has the past weeks and still play. If there is a team in jeopardy right now, it is this one.

Rounding out the Top 5 were two teams who came up with big wins this week. Ohio State became the last undefeated team in the Big Ten by knocking off Purdue. Oklahoma dropped a few spots after defeating rival Texas in the Red River Shootout.

With that, let's see all of the rankings in Week 3 of the MRI.

Continue reading "MRI Football 2007 - Rankings Week 3"

Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 1:00 PM | Comments (0)

October 1, 2007

MRI Football 2007 - Rankings Week 2

With casualties left and right on Saturday, you might expect a huge shake-up in the top 25 of the MRI. Not so fast.

While leaders did take falls, they had some pretty inflated numbers in the grand scheme of things. The losses have brought them back into the pack. Oklahoma, for example, was flying high at #1, but the loss dropped 14% of their MRI score off. That moved them back, but thanks to other teams taking major losses, they only fall to #2.

Taking advantage of the loss was LSU, who slept through the first half against Tulane, leading only 10-9. However, they rebounded with 24 points in the second half as they shut out the Green Wave. LSU jumps from #3 back to the #1 spot they held at the end of last season. Keep in mind that LSU has not played the toughest part of their SEC schedule yet, which starts next week with games against Florida, Kentucky, and Auburn over three straight weeks.

Moving to #3 is Ohio State who didn't really sweat anything against Minnesota on Saturday night, taking a 30-7 victory. As I said in Saturday morning's "MRI Says" article, this Ohio State might be better than last year's version. Moving up into the #4 spot is Arizona State. The Sun Devils seem like they are for real and they have definitely shaken off all the drama that enveloped that team last season. We all know that Dennis Erickson can coach at the college level, now we just have to wait until Oct 27, when they have their first real test against Cal.

Rounding out the Top 5 is Florida, who took a big hit by losing to Auburn. It seems that the Gators have one game a year they just can't get past, and this Auburn game has been it over the past couple of years. Their game against LSU this weekend will be huge.

Check out all the rankings in Week 2 of the football MRI.

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September 24, 2007

MRI Football 2007 - Rankings Week 1

With a quarter to a third of the season gone for all teams, it is time to release the first MRI rankings.

Before we get to the rankings, there are a few reminders to those who will look at this and say "Huh?":

1. Although so much of the season is gone, it is still very early. Most of the teams have yet to get into their conference season, or only have one game under their belts. That means that the real competition for these teams is still heating up. For example, last season, we saw Missouri get out to a huge 6-0 start... that is before they had to play the South Division in the Big XII. Then Missouri had trouble keeping up. Can the same fate befall the current Big XII North team riding high in the rankings, Kansas? We will have to wait and see, but chances are that the Big XII will put up a tougher fight to the Jayhawks than Southeastern Louisiana or Florida International.

2. The rankings are based totally on the numbers. While you may not want to think of a Cincinnati or a Connecticut as one of the top teams in the country, with the numbers turned in so far, they are. And some of that may come from just a temporary boost based on having beaten a non-D1-A team. Over time, that boost will be eaten away as teams which got great records against poor teams start to lose within their own conference.

3. It may seem like there are a lot of new names in the Top 25, but it is only 11. Last season, we had 9 teams new into the Top 25 which did not end the season there the year before. Will these teams be able to do what Missouri and Rutgers were able to do last season and stay in the Top 25 all year? Or will they stumble, much like Michigan State or Houston did last season? Again, time will certainly tell.

The season opens with Oklahoma on top, a spot they held the entire first season of the football MRI rankings. They moved into that spot this week, passing an LSU team which had held the spot during the very preliminary first three weeks. Last year's defending MRI champs start the year at #3. Coming in at #2 is Florida, who despite major losses on the team from last year's championship, is still fighting strong in the SEC. Rounding out the Top 5 are Ohio State, and the surprising Kansas.

Check out all the ratings in Week 1 of the MRI.

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January 9, 2007

MRI Football 2006 - Rankings Bowl Final

Dump the Gatorade. It is time to celebrate this year's MRI champion for football. And as in some of the past years in basketball and football, this year's champion is not the one that will be taking home the crystal football.

No, this year, the LSU Tigers, probably the hottest team over the second half of the season, are the champions. It didn't come easy. LSU played their toughest four opponents in conference on the road this year. That gave them room to schedule a little lighter outside of conference, but even LSU didn't expect Fresno State to be as disappointing as the Bulldogs ended up this season.

LSU began to roll after losing their two conference games to Florida and Auburn, defeating Tennessee and Arkansas, before being selected as an at-large selection to the Sugar Bowl to take on Notre Dame. As expected, in the MRI, and across most of the country, LSU defeated the Irish, 41-14, and until Monday night, had the largest gain the rankings.

Their conference foes who are going to be holding onto the crystal football were not going to let LSU get all of the glory. Despite Ohio State being given a 72.85% chance of winning in the MRI, Florida grabbed the victory, coincidentally, by the same score as LSU over Notre Dame. The win catapulted Florida from 7th to 3rd in the MRI, still behind those pesky Buckeyes. How is this possible? The MRI analyzes the whole season, and despite losing their final game, the MRI rated the Ohio State season better than Florida's. Florida did do one thing. Should the game be held again, on a neutral field, Ohio State's percentage chance of winning would be down to 54.72%. Something tells me that if they hadn't waited almost two months before playing the final, the percentage would have been somewhere in the middle.

The rest of the Top 5 belongs to Louisville and Boise State, who couldn't make up any ground towards the top of the charts. Both teams won their BCS bowl games which says something about the changing face of college football. Not too many years ago - two to be exact - only one of the two teams would have been able to get into the BCS, and neither would have qualified for the "Big Dance".

Look for more on the bowl season, and the season in general as the week moves on. Until then, check out all the ratings, in this, the Bowl Final edition of the MRI for football.

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December 4, 2006

MRI Football 2006 - Rankings Regular Season Final

Sorry Lloyd. The MRI doesn't have a say in the BCS. You would have at least gotten a little computer love if it was. Of course, the computers weren't your problem (Florida and Michigan tied in the computer component), but at least you would have gotten some satisfaction.

The MRI has never wavered. Michigan has been the best or second best team all year in the rankings. Ohio State had to work their way up there, but the two teams haven't move from their perch for a while now. Meanwhile, Florida has bounced around like a ping pong ball. The latest win was not even enough to get them to the top 5.

LSU remains strong at #3 on their off week. They get a nice trip to the Sugar Bowl and should be heavily favored against Notre Dame. Moving into #4, Louisville. The Cardinals took care of Connecticut in their final game and got a little help from West Virginia to take the Big East title. They get a trip down to the Orange Bowl to face Wake Forest.

And at #5, Boise State, the only other team without a blemish. The Broncos stray from the blue turf down to Arizona, where they will play Oklahoma in the Fiesta Bowl.

Other BCS participants not in the Top 25: Wake Forest, came in at #27, even after winning the ACC.

Check out all the ratings in the Regular Season Finale of the MRI.

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November 26, 2006

MRI Football 2006 - Rankings Week 10

Ohio State and Michigan may have been idle, but they have cemented a spot as the top two in the MRI, at least until the bowl games.

LSU and Boise State both finished their season with wins. The LSU Tigers held strong to their #3 position, but failed to gain any ground on Michigan. Why? They surrendered too many yards to Arkansas, hurting their defensive rating overall. However, this win may have put them in the best position for an at large bid in the BCS, if the bowls want to take a second team from the SEC.

Boise State made the big jump to #4, based on their nice win over Nevada. The Broncos most likely will be in place to make their first trip to BCS bowl when the final ratings finish.

Finally, USC's crushing win over Notre Dame has jumped them to #5 in the MRI. They are the only team with a chance to move up to #3 or with a huge win over UCLA, #2. However, the more likely scenario is #3 to end the season, provided they play like they did against Notre Dame.

The regular season closes out next week, with the final MRI ratings before the bowls being released on Sunday or Monday. We will once again be attempting to track the MRI's performance against the "World" when picking the winners of the bowl games.

Check out all the ratings in Week 10 of the MRI.

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November 20, 2006

MRI Football 2006 - Rankings Week 9

Game of the century? I am not sure I want to say that, but it was very good.

I think with so much on the line this past Saturday, the game will go down as one of the best of the first 6 years of this century. Does it beat out last year's championship game? Maybe in retrospect at some point, it might, but Texas-USC last year was something special. And the winner of that game got to take home the crystal football.

The winner of this game, Ohio State, still might get that honor. They might have to beat Michigan again to get it though. Looking at the BCS standings right now, I wouldn't be surprised if USC passes Michigan with a win against Notre Dame this Saturday. And after that, only a loss to UCLA would have the ability to move them from the #2 spot.

I personally am hoping that we do not see a rematch. But, you never can tell what will happen, especially when it comes to polls and computers.

For example, the MRI still has Michigan at #2, but the gap between them and the rest of the top 5 has certainly narrowed. With LSU's big game this week against Arkansas, a win might move the Tigers past Michigan into the #2 spot.

Rounding out the top 5 are West Virginia and Louisville. The Big East has been tough to shake this year.

Check out all the ratings in Week 9 of the MRI Football Ratings.

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November 13, 2006

MRI Football 2006 - Rankings Week 8

With all the craziness across the country this weekend, the ratings seemed to jumble a little bit. Auburn took a big spill with their loss to Georgia. Louisville didn't manage to hold on to their lead among the Big East teams with their loss to Rutgers, allowing the Scarlet Knights to inch closer to the top 10. Texas's three point loss to Kansas State didn't drop them from the #4 spot. But their lack of gaining points in the MRI dropped them closer to the now #5 West Virginia.

Ohio State and Michigan moved forward again, but the gap between the two teams narrowed. Based on the current numbers, Ohio State will be favored by the MRI thanks to the home field advantage against Michigan, but the game should be very close. Based on the MRI's history, the percentage chance of an Ohio State win is a little less than 80% which seems high right now, so we will just have to wait and see.

The biggest winner of the week might have been USC who climbs back into the top 10 at #8 and seems poised to make a run at the teams currently running the show. Just like in the BCS, if USC can win out, it is entirely possible for them to move into the #2 spot overall or maybe #3.

Check out all the rankings in Week 8 of the MRI.

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November 6, 2006

MRI Football 2006 - Rankings Week 7

I am guessing that Ohio State didn't think that Illinois would give them much of a challenge. And probably even more after they went up 17-0 against the Illini. However, Illinois scored 10 points in the final quarter and tried to make a game of it at the end.

Add to that one of the worst performances by Heisman front runner Troy Smith, and you have the makings of possibly upset. Not so fast though. The Ohio State team came through it unscathed, getting to 10-0. Despite the win, the Buckeyes lost some of their lead in the MRI rankings this week. They slipped a couple of points, but managed to hold onto the #1 ranking.

Why? Well, Michigan had struggles of their own against Ball State. The Cardinals defense was able to not only hold down Michigan but also caused Michael Hart to fumble for the first time in over 650 carries of the ball. The fumble led to a safety by Ball State. Therefore, while Michigan didn't lose points in their MRI rating, they didn't gain enough to get to the top spot.

Speaking of Cardinals, Louisville did its part in winning on Thursday. However, because of the amount of yardage they gave up to the Mountaineers and the consideration of West Virginia's opponents into their rating, both teams drop from the top five this week. Neither could withstand the charge put up by two of the "1 loss" contenders.

Texas and Auburn move into the Top 5 with their big wins over Oklahoma State and Arkansas State respectively. They are joined at #3 by LSU who pull a big win on the road against Tennessee. The Tigers defense was able to hold down a Volunteers team which was playing without star quarterback Erik Ainge for most of the game. In addition, they overcame three interceptions by JaMarcus Russell. The victory was enough to keep LSU looking strong by the overall numbers.

The other two undefeated teams in the nation are Boise State and Rutgers. The Broncos come in at #8 this week while Rutgers still trails back at #15. The biggest game of the season for Rutgers comes this Thursday as they play Louisville for control of the lead in the Big East conference. It will be interesting to see how the MRI looks on Rutgers should they pull the major upset at home.

Check out all the ratings in Week 7 of the MRI.

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October 30, 2006

MRI Football 2006 - Rankings Week 6

With each week, the race in the MRI is beginning to look like 2003. That was the year that Oklahoma burst out to such a huge lead in the computer rankings that even two straight losses to end the year kept them at #1.

This year, the culprit is Ohio State. Since they took the lead, they have just steadily increased the margin between them and the #2 Michigan Wolverines. The closest anyone has come to beating them has been Texas and they lost by 17. That doesn't give much hope for those out there hoping that maybe Ohio State will go down before the championship game. The Buckeyes have Illinois and Northwestern left on their schedule before the big date with the Maize and Blue. Chances are those games will be equally as impressive as their dismantling of Minnesota this weekend, 44-0.

Of their nine victories, only two teams managed to score more than 10 points, and only three managed to score more than once in the game. That is dominance.

And in case you were wondering, it isn't like Michigan is falling back to the pack either. No one seems to want to step up for a challenge in the #3 spot, much like in the current BCS rankings. With their victory over Northwestern, Michigan stays a solid #2 candidate.

The next three teams in the rankings all had a week off. Probably a good week to have it, as a lot of teams either lost in upsets or had scares. LSU, West Virginia, and Louisville round out the top 5.

The two Big East leaders set up nicely for their showdown this Thursday for control of the conference, although each still have a date with Rutgers on the horizon. The MRI leans towards the Cardinals when you take into account home field advantage. Look for a close one either way.

Check out all the rankings in Week 6 of the MRI.

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October 23, 2006

MRI Football 2006 - Rankings Week 5

The performance of the Ohio State Buckeyes this season was supposed to be of championship caliber. The biggest question coming in was their team defense. Losing nine starters from the year before is never easy. However, the newcomers have lived up to the challenge. The Buckeyes are among the national leaders in team defense, and have a +11 turnover ratio.

That is enough to have them vaulting into 1st place in the MRI this week. The Buckeyes had the largest gain of the week, after crushing Indiana in a very impressive all around performance. They pass by a Michigan team, who although they won, showed a little weakness finally. Perhaps it was the pressure of Iowa being the last big game before Ohio State that got to them.

Talk all week centered around how this game could be their trap, and for most of the game, it very well could have been. While the Michigan defense was clicking, the offense struggled a bit to get it going. The big play possibilities which had been how Michigan had devastated opponents leading up to now, were not there against Iowa. As a result, the crowd was totally out of the game until late when Michigan had all but signed off on the big win. The win keeps Michigan close with Ohio State in the MRI.

After the two Big Ten teams, the rest of the field is quite a way's back. Even if West Virginia were to have played the same number of games as the Buckeyes and Wolverines, they would still be in third place. That is how well that Ohio State and Michigan have played to this point. And that is assuming that West Virginia could keep performing at the pace they have all season. They have had to destroy almost every opponent to keep up due to their weak schedule so far (114 out of 119, based on the MRI calculation). The situation could make it tough for the Mountaineers to stick where they are in the standings. They have a bye week and then face Louisville the week after. They could find themselves slipping quickly especially with how dangerous the Cardinals can be.

LSU remains at #4 with another big win, this time taking out a Fresno State team from whom big things were expected this season. The Bulldogs continue to disappoint, not that LSU is complaining at all. Despite two losses in conference, the Tigers have shown that they can compete with any team in the nation. They will need to keep it up. They have a well deserved week off before traveling to Tennessee to face the surprisingly dangerous Volunteers.

Texas rounds out the Top 5 by virtue of their comeback in Lincoln this weekend. Needing a walk-on kicker to help clinch the victory didn't do much to help improve their MRI standing. They not only lost ground by slipping two places, they also failed to keep pace with Michigan and Ohio State, falling even further back. The Longhorns have a chance to jump back on track against a very schizophrenic Texas Tech team on Saturday.

Check out all the rankings in week 5 of the MRI.

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October 16, 2006

MRI Football 2006 - Rankings Week 4

Michigan's victory on Saturday over Penn State might not have been as pretty as their previous wins, but it was still a win. And that was enough to keep the Wolverines riding high in the #1 spot in the MRI rankings.

Their hold on the top spot might not be so firm though. Conference rivals Ohio State have been slowly closing on them since the opening week of the rankings. This week, the Buckeyes closed the gap by eight points to move into second place in the standings. Another strong victory was the key for Ohio State. Led by Heisman front runner Troy Smith, the Buckeyes never struggled as they beat Michigan State over the weekend. They pass by previous #2 USC in the standings, who fell to #6 this week.

Most of the reason for USC's fall can be contributed to a drop in their strength of schedule. While Nebraska and Arkansas both won this week, neither played strong opponents, which hurts a component of the MRI ratings. In addition, both teams from the state of Washington suffered losses this week, hurting the bonuses that USC received for beating them. Add to that USC's troubles taking down Arizona State on Saturday night, and you have all the makings of a drop in the ratings, even with some of the top teams losing. This is a strong contrast to the current computer components in the BCS standings. I know in at least one system (Sagarin), that USC is listed as #1 in the ratings that are used for the BCS, but #4 in his complete ratings. This is because the BCS does not factor in margin of victory, while Sagarin's complete ratings do. While I can not comment on the other ratings systems, I believe that this may be a similar factor in the high computer score for the Trojans.

Moving up to #3 are the Texas Longhorns. Texas took sole possession of first place in the Big XII South with their crushing victory over Baylor. They face what could be their toughest foe the rest of the way, in Nebraska this weekend.

Also moving up this week is the highest rated SEC team. Surprisingly, it is the LSU Tigers who hold this spot. With two losses, their hold on the spot is tenuous at best. They still have two tough opponents on the schedule in Tennessee and Arkansas, and their defense needs to remain strong for the Tigers to keep their high marks in the MRI.

Rounding out the Top 5 are the Mountaineers of West Virginia. They ran all over Syracuse this week, including a record setting performance by quarterback Pat White. They have a Friday night game this week against Connecticut to again show on National television why they should keep moving up not only here, but also in the polls and the BCS standings.

Check out all the ratings in Week 4 of the MRI:

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October 9, 2006

MRI Football 2006 - Rankings Week 3

Michigan has had a history of letting down after a couple of big wins, especially when things were just starting to look good. Michigan State also had a history of being that team that Michigan let down against. Not this season. Michigan did what it needed to do to remain undefeated, taking down the Spartans, 31-13. The win keeps the Wolverines rolling the MRI, although their lead is not as large as it was last week.

Instead, USC remarkably gained ground, despite having a very close game against the surprising Washington Huskies. The now 4-2 Huskies gave USC everything they could handle, including a last minute drive, that without some very serious clock management problems, could have had Washington tying the game, or even winning. Another thing to keep in mind with USC, is that three of the teams they have beaten all won this week, in some very important games.

One of those games was Arkansas vs. Auburn, a very important game in the SEC West, and one involving the previously #5 team in the MRI. Auburn's loss dropped them from the Top 5, all the way to #12. The other SEC team formerly of the Top 5 was LSU, who faced the #4 Florida Gators in Gainesville. Florida used the home field, and quarterback Tim Tebow, to their advantage, coming out with the win, 23-10. The loss by LSU dropped them to #8 in the MRI.

Coming up to #3 is Ohio State, who beat MAC opponent Bowling Green soundly. Florida stays at #4 with their victory over LSU. Moving up into the #5 spot this week is Louisville, who had a big win over Middle Tennessee State on Friday night.

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October 2, 2006

MRI Football 2006 - Rankings Week 2

Week 2 in the MRI football rankings always seems to mean a huge shake-up in the list. This year was no different. Six teams listed in the opening week rankings fell out after their games this weekend, including Virginia Tech, Iowa, and TCU. That is a pretty stiff penalty for those teams suffering their first loss of the year, but these things have a way of sorting themselves out over the course of the season.

A couple of things did shake out this week to clear up some of the confusion from last week. Purdue, the only team without a loss that was not in last week's Top 25, corrected that. Only they did it by losing to Notre Dame. The Irish were favored over the Boilermakers by the MRI in their game despite not having a spotless record. The win helped Notre Dame move within striking distance of a ranking. A game against Stanford at home next weekend could be just the thing to get them there... assuming they play better than they did last year against the Cardinal.

Missouri, who surprised many by starting the season at #5 in the MRI, fell a bit this week, despite winning against Colorado. The Buffaloes put up 373 yards against Missouri which caused the Tigers to lose their spot as the top rated team defense. As a result of the slip, Missouri moves down to #9 this week. LSU, who now has the top defense in the nation, moves up one spot this week, to #3, off of their strong showing against Mississippi State.

Michigan is still the top ranked team this week. The Wolverines were once again very impressive against a conference opponent, topping Minnesota, 28-14. They actually increased their lead over #2 USC this week. The Trojans struggled for the second week in a row, but still managed a win. This time the victim was Washington State, who even by losing managed to improve their MRI ranking. The SEC is now the second rated conference in the MRI. Part of the reason is their strong presence at the top of the rankings, taking the next three spots. LSU, as mentioned previously, is #3. Florida moved into the Top 5, at #4, on the back of another comeback win, this time against Alabama. Auburn, who had a tough Thursday night game against South Carolina, fell two spots to #5.

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September 24, 2006

MRI Football 2006 - Rankings Week 1

The ratings are back, and I am just waiting for the complaining to begin. Not only is Notre Dame outside of the Top 25, they are below two teams that they beat so far this season: Georgia Tech, and also this week's victim, Michigan State. Oklahoma is still rated above Oregon, even with the Ducks being undefeated. Purdue is the only team without a loss not in the Top 25. It just doesn't get any better than this.

Seriously though, there are good reasons for all of these. Look at Notre Dame's defeat compared to the two wins over Georgia Tech and Michigan State. Those weren't exactly convincing victories, were they, even if thy were maybe key to Notre Dame's continued success this season. Oklahoma was robbed of a victory in Oregon, and they have also played one more game so far. It will be interesting to see what happens once they are back even in games played after next week. And Purdue hasn't exactly looked sharp in their wins against a soft schedule. Purdue's opponents included one Division 1-AA opponent who they struggled to beat, and they rest of the teams have a combined record of 3-9.

You want to know what it takes to be #1? Then just look at Michigan. Other than a little bobble to start the season against Vandy, they have been convincing in all of their wins, and hold the top spot in the rankings. USC holds a familiar spot in the rankings at #2, exactly where they ended last season. Auburn and LSU, who last week played to a 7-3 finish tie up spots #3 and #4 for the SEC. The small loss by the LSU Tigers was enough to keep them in contention for the MRI title at this point in the season. Coming in at #5, we have a surprise for you. A very good defensive squad at Missouri is holding the final spot in the Top 5. The Tigers are probably one of the more underrated teams this season, being under the radar for the so far. It will be interesting to see if they can keep this up entering conference season this upcoming week, and potentially contend for the Big XII North title.

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January 5, 2006

MRI Football 2005: Bowl Final

I am speechless. After three weeks of intense bowl games, you never would have predicted that the final four bowls would have been so exciting. After last season when half of the BCS games were blowouts, including the National Championship, who would have believed that in the final 4 games, three games would be decided by a field goal.

Despite that, Bill Simmons had it right today. After last night's game, every other bowl pales in comparison. Through my bleary eyes, after two nights of 1 AM finishes, I witnessed history and the Texas Longhorns took home the championship for the 1st time since 1970.

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December 4, 2005

MRI Football 2005: Week 11 - Regular Season Finale

Any chance of a team sneaking into the Rose Bowl was squashed yesterday. Texas decided that it didn't beat Colorado badly enough the first time around. This time, they rolled up 70 points. Mack Brown said that he didn't want to leave anything to chance before the game started and that was surely the case. With the crushing win, Texas remains the #1 team in the MRI this week. Texas will need an opponent in the Rose Bowl, and was it ever going to be anyone but USC? The Trojans went out and earned the biggest gain in the MRI this week with a solid victory over rival UCLA. #2 in the MRI and most likely #1 in the BCS will give USC a short bus trip to Pasadena for a chance to win the big crown for a third year in a row.

Virginia Tech stumbled against Florida State, then seemed to right themselves, and finally came up just a little short. The Hokies lost their shot at a BCS game by blowing the inaugural ACC championship game. Instead, they are most likely headed back to Florida to have a shot in the Gator Bowl against Louisville. They still stayed at #3 in the MRI though.

The Big Ten wraps up the rest of the Top 5 this week. Penn State waits to hear which BCS bowl they are headed to while Ohio State waits to see if they have earned one of the two wild card choices. Check out all the rankings in the regular season finale of the MRI.

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November 28, 2005

MRI Football 2005: Week 10 - One Week to Go

Two years ago at this time, we thought we knew who would be playing for the National title, and then Oklahoma screwed everything up causing a split champion. A year ago, a three way tie pushed us through championship weekend before we knew that Auburn would be looking in from the outside. This year, all looks rosy for USC and Texas, but you never can tell. Colorado and UCLA will have a lot to say this weekend about who plays in the Rose Bowl. Texas still holds its lead this week on USC depite its poor play for most of the game against A&M. USC had the week off and holds on to the #2 spot. Virginia Tech's dominance over North Carolina kept them at #3 but have them threatening USC for the second spot in the rankings. Their game against Florida State for the ACC championship could be a trap, but could also help them stake a claim to their shot at the Rose Bowl should the Longhorns or Trojans lose. The Big Ten fills out the Top 5 with Penn State leading the way and Ohio State right behind. Check out all the rankings in Week 10 of the MRI.

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November 21, 2005

MRI Football 2005: Week 9 - Penn State Clinches, Needs Help

With their victory over Michigan State, Penn State is going to its first ever BCS game. It is enough to get them an invitation to the party, but as of yet, not to the big game. The win keeps them in the top five of the MRI this week, but they drop a spot to #4. USC's closer than expected victory, featuring a very impressive game from Reggie Bush, allowed them to close the gap a little bit on Texas. The idle Longhorns remained at the top spot in the rankings. USC still is holding strong at #2. Virginia Tech bounced back from their loss to Miami with a crushing win over rival Virginia. It was enough to get them the biggest gain this week and also to move up to #3. Ohio State's victory over Michigan in the big rivalry game was not enough to get them to the BCS automatically, but keeps them in the running. They share the Big Ten title and hold on to #5 in the MRI this week. Check out all the rankings in week 9 of the MRI.

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November 14, 2005

MRI Football 2005: Week 8 - Only Two Remain

With only three weeks to go in the season, we are down to two undefeated teams, thanks to Alabama falling to LSU. Texas and USC have a strong hold on the top two spots in the MRI, owed in large part to the zero in the loss column. Texas's lead on USC is also growing as the weeks go forward. The Longhorns hold strong at #1 after their win over Kansas. The Trojans are #2 following their victory against Cal. Penn State had the week off and stay strong at #3. Virginia Tech took a much needed rest after their loss to Miami and also stick in at #4. Ohio State breaks into the top five thanks to Alabama's loss and a big win against Northwestern which leaves them still in the running for the Big Ten title should they get some help. Check out all the ratings in Week 8 of the MRI.

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November 7, 2005

MRI Football 2005: Week 7 - Miami Eliminates a Contender

With a huge win, Miami has knocked Virginia Tech out of the second spot in the MRI. They didn't fall far though. Coupling that with a UCLA loss, there remain only three undefeated teams in Division 1-A. The Texas Longhorns keep rolling this week with a huge win over Baylor to keep the #1 spot. Virginia Tech's loss and USC's giant win over Stanford vaults the Trojans into the #2 position. Penn State also moves up to #3 after defeating Wisconsin and all but sealing their Big Ten title. The Hokies only fall to #4. Undefeated Alabama rounds out the top five after another SEC victory. Check out all the rankings in Week 7 of the MRI.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 12:00 PM | Comments (0)

October 31, 2005

MRI Football 2005: Week 6 - The Top of the Pack Separates

With about a month left in the season, the top teams have begun to separate themselves from the pack. There is still room for a major upset to cause some heartache among fans across the country, but the title race is coming down to a short list. Texas still heads the pack this week despite struggling for much of the game against Oklahoma State. Virginia Tech's big win against ACC foe Boston College on Thursday night catapulted them closer to retaking the #1 position. USC moves back into number three after clobbering a Washington State team which has yet to win in the conference. Penn State drops to #4 despite the win at Purdue thanks to their softening schedule. Alabama remains strong at #5 after a crushing win out of conference against Utah State. Check out all the rankings in Week 6 of the MRI.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 12:30 PM | Comments (0)

October 24, 2005

MRI Football 2005: Week 5 - How Far Can USC Fall?

Despite leading the polls, USC is struggling in the MRI. You can't really question it. If you look at the performance of Texas, Virginia Tech, and USC, they have been the least dominating of the group. As a result, they actually drop a spot this week after Penn State's destruction of Illinois. Texas remains on top with their big victory over Texas Tech. Virginia Tech took care of Maryland on Thursday night to remain at #2. Penn State is up a spot to #3 and that drops USC to #4. Rounding out the top 5 is Alabama, who for the second week in a row, needed a last second field goal to finish the job. Catch all the rankings in Week 5 of the MRI.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 10:12 PM | Comments (0)

October 17, 2005

MRI Football 2005: Week 4 - Survival of the Not-So-Fittest

With the MRI leader Virginia Tech on their bye week, this seemed like the perfect time for USC to regain its #1 spot in the rankings. Against a very good Notre Dame team, the Trojans were just not up to the task. They managed to steal a win in the final moments, thanks to a timely fumble by Matt Leinart. This was not enough though for them to gain the top spot. That goes to Texas who dominated against a Colorado team on the rise. Virginia Tech only drops to #2 despite not playing. Alabama's last second field goal was enough to move them to #4 and Penn State's last second loss moves them down a spot to #5. Check out the rest of the MRI in Week 4.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 6:00 PM | Comments (0)

October 10, 2005

MRI Football 2005: Week 3 - Steady Top, Shaky Bottom

Sitting in the top half of the MRI seemed to be a good omen this week, especially within the Top 5. The only team to leave that post was Georgia after Texas jumped into the #2 spot. Still perched above them all is Virginia Tech after they trounced Marshall. USC, after struggling through another first half, couldn't muster enough to take back the lead, but stays at #3. Penn State is going to a bowl game after getting to 6-0 with their victory over Ohio State. Now the question will be if that bowl is one with the letters BCS associated with it. The Nittany Lions remain #4 while Alabama rounds out the top 5. Check out the rest of the rankings in Week 3 of the MRI.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 4:00 PM | Comments (0)

October 4, 2005

MRI Football 2005: Week 2 - Top 5 Shake-up

When three of the Top 5 teams lose and two of them lose badly, there is bound to be some change in the rankings. USC treks toward the top, though they still have a ways to go to catch the hot Hokies of Virginia Tech. They continue to hold the number one spot with USC moving to number 3. Alabama and Penn State make some big jumps to join them at #2 and #4, with Georgia filling out the top. Check out all the rankings in Week 2 of the MRI.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 8:00 AM | Comments (0)

September 27, 2005

MRI Football 2005: Week 1 - If You Want To Be #1, Kick Some Butt

The ratings are back. After what has been a very exciting month of college football, we have the newest leader in the MRI. Virginia Tech takes over the top spot for the first time in the history of the rankings. With their dominating performance so far this season, there can be no argument, unless you went to USC that is. The defending champions begin the season at #5, but have played one less game than all of the schools ahead of them. The Big Ten is the big leader this week with six schools in the Top 25, and two within the Top 5. Check out all the rankings in Week 1 of the MRI.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 12:15 PM | Comments (2)

January 5, 2005

MRI Football 2004: Bowl Final

It's all over and thanks to a blow out win, there is no doubt who #1 is in the MRI. Full final standings will be posted on the archive page for this season. Enjoy the final rankings for football this year and watch for us to come back strong next season to better our 17-11 finish in the bowl games.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 4:55 PM | Comments (0)

December 6, 2004

MRI Football 2004: Week 10 - Regular Season Final

It's all over and with a last game surge, the MRI ends up with the same match-up at 1-2 that the BCS did. Oklahoma needed a big win against Colorado to make it to #2, having to pass Cal, Utah, and a jumping Louisville to do it. Oklahoma did just that and cemented itself firmly in the #2 position. Auburn, the team left out of the title game, finishes 6th in the MRI, and Pittsburgh, the Big East champ finishes out of the Top 25. No Big East team is represented in the final regular season Top 25 either. This will be it from the football MRI until after the Bowl games are complete a month from now. Then I will release the Bowl Final standings.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 4:44 PM | Comments (0)

November 30, 2004

MRI Football 2004: Week 9 - Pressure

West Virginia blew it. Boston College blew it. Texas didn't. USC didn't. Syracuse didn't and now this week Pittsburgh, Auburn, Oklahoma, and Cal better hope they don't either. With only one week left, everything is still in flux and major swings could occur based on the results of any game. Once again, we had some movement at the top, though the top 4 remain the same.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 4:36 PM | Comments (0)

November 22, 2004

MRI Football 2004: Week 8 - Rivalries

Rivalries each year have the chance to change the whole landscape for the bowl season. This year, Michigan almost lost its chance to BCS this year after their loss to Ohio State. They got a little help though from Iowa and will still be smelling the roses. Auburn was able to overcome a lackluster performance to hold off Alabama and keep hopes for a National Championship alive. And the big winner of them all may just be Utah, who with an impressive win against in-state rival BYU have almost locked up a chance to be eating lots of Tostitos in January. A lot of movement at the top this week, making things very interesting from here on out.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 4:29 PM | Comments (0)

November 14, 2004

MRI Football 2004: Week 7 - A Handful of Perfection

Wisconsin lost their first game of the year in decisive fashion to the Spartans of Michigan State. This was something I had guessed was ripe to happen after the way their team had performed all year. The defense finally gave out and the offense couldn't keep up. Auburn and Oklahoma win big games and USC, Cal, Utah, and Texas all survive. The top six remain the same, but shift this week.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 4:23 PM | Comments (0)

November 7, 2004

MRI Football 2004: Week 6 - Leftover Halloween Scares

All the top teams who played this week, except Utah, had a little scare this week saved up from Halloween. Oklahoma and Texas both were down big to start their games, yet came back to win. Oklahoma barely survived a last second Hail Mary to stay perfect. Meanwhile, USC survived a thick fog at Oregon State to win again. Cal comes back late to beat Oregon and a 4th down drop by a wide open Oregon receiver helped to seal the victory.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 4:11 PM | Comments (0)

November 1, 2004

MRI Football 2004: Week 5 - The State of Florida

All three top teams from the state of Florida stumbled on Saturday leading to major shake-ups in the MRI. Add to that a loss by Texas A&M to Baylor, Cal's crushing of Arizona State, and Oklahoma's close brush with Oklahoma State, and you have a wild week to contend with. All of the write up can be seen in On The Field. This week's rankings can be had right here.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 4:04 PM | Comments (0)

October 24, 2004

MRI Football 2004: Week 4 - Blowouts and Close ones

Nine of the top 10 teams in the MRI won this week, some winning big. Still, USC managed to hold on to their top ranking and increase their lead over #2 Auburn based on their impressive blanking of Washington. Oklahoma's strong performance against Kansas moves them up to #3. The only loss among the top 10 was Purdue who lost a close one at home. For the second week in a row, a late fumble was the Boilermaker's undoing as they were once again driving for the go ahead score. As a result, most of the MRI Top 25 will look familiar this week.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 4:00 PM | Comments (0)

October 19, 2004

MRI Football 2004: Week 3 - BCS is out. I am close.

The BCS debuted this week, and again not without someone complaining that they were left out of the top two spots. Oklahoma is sitting 3rd in the new ranking. I would love to see if they would complain if someone from that school read the rankings that I publish when they see that they are not even that high. USC makes the big jump to the top spot this week with their huge win over Arizona State. Auburn does not disappoint and stays strong at #2. The rest of the teams bounce around and make it interesting as half of the unbeatens before this week went down over the weekend. Oh, and yes, Central Florida is still winless, and yet they continue to not be last in the rankings.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 3:53 PM | Comments (0)

October 10, 2004

MRI Football 2004: Week 2 - Showdowns and Stumbles

Another interesting week in college football. Texas and Oklahoma played a tough defensive struggle which saw Texas get shut out for the first time in almost 300 games. The Florida State Sexton experiment continued this week and they survive a close call against Syracuse up in the dome. Purdue holds on also against a tough Penn State team for its first win ever at Penn State. The close game against the lowly Nittany Lions has seen Purdue lose its grip on the #1 MRI spot. Georgia stumbled its way into a loss against Tennessee and Ohio State loses for the second week in a row to a Big Ten foe, essentially knocking them from contention this year. Army, losers of 19 in a row break through to the win column this week with a stunning victory over Cincinnati. This leaves one team winless in Division 1, Central Florida, who lost a close one this week against Northern Illinois, the MRI leader for the MAC conference.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 2:51 PM | Comments (0)

October 5, 2004

MRI Football 2004: Week 1 - And Now For Season 2

Season Two of the Football MRI is upon us. It looks just by date that I am posting this a week early, but I don't expect it to be as fluid as it has been over the first four weeks of the season coming up the rest of the way. I think this is going to be different this year. We have the new On The Field series of articles which will be taking the place of most of commentary which normally appears in this place. I hope that doesn't bother anyone. You might have to make a few more clicks to get to see what I think each week, but hopefully, you are checking there often and it won't be as cumbersome as you think. Enjoy the first rankings of the 2004-5 season.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 2:39 PM | Comments (0)

January 5, 2004

MRI Football 2003: Bowl Final

The new year is upon us and we learned a few things in 2003 that only the MRI could teach us. The first lesson we learned was that you can have an amazing season, jump out to a giant lead in the computers, still lose your last two games, and finish #1 in the MRI. Oklahoma managed to do just that. It took a gusty performance in the Sugar Bowl last night to do it though.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 2:00 PM | Comments (0)

December 8, 2003

MRI Football 2003: Week 10 - Uh, oh. BCS upset

The BCS may be in trouble, or this may be the best thing to happen to college football. That is, except for a playoff. With Oklahoma losing on Saturday, along with Hawaii and Notre Dame, the computers were able to move LSU ahead of USC in the BCS computer systems, and Oklahoma, being so far ahead all season, was able to keep the top spot. This leaves USC at #1 in both human polls and yet, they are not going to the Sugar Bowl. Instead, they will be playing Michigan in the Rose Bowl. This is not something to shake a stick at though. Michigan, at the end of the season, looked just as impressive as LSU and USC. If anything, we have a 4 team race for the national title. The AP writers don't need to vote the winner of the Sugar Bowl to a first place spot, and I have a feeling that if USC beats Michigan, USC will end up #1. This will leave college football once again with a split champion, the very thing that the BCS was supposed to stop from happening after Nebraska and Michigan split back in the 90s. And this may be the best thing that could happen.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 10:29 AM | Comments (0)

December 1, 2003

MRI Football 2003: Week 9 - One Week To Go

With the short schedule this week, and an even shorter schedule next week, most things are looking clearer in the Bowl picture. LSU showed that it will be tough to beat in the SEC championship game by blasting out against Arkansas in what was a close game to start. Turnovers killed the Razorbacks, especially when they fumbled the ball twice within their own 20 yard line. You can't make mistakes like that when you are going against tough teams like LSU. LSU will move on to the SEC championship game and most likely face Georgia based on this weekend's results. With Florida losing, it would leave almost no chance for them to represent the East. Most likely, Georgia's big win over Georgia Tech will allow them to try and exact some revenge on the Tigers for an earlier loss this season. The game should be very close and one to watch in the BCS picture.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 10:09 AM | Comments (0)

November 24, 2003

MRI Football 2003: Week 8 - Ahh, Clarity

And so it happened. The weekend came and went, and I rooted for Michigan. And they won. Now I don't know whether to be mad at myself or not. I don't like Michigan, but this weekend, they were the only choice I could make. I did not want to see Ohio State in the title game, and a Michigan win would be the only thing that would keep that from happening. Michigan was able to move the ball against the tough Ohio State defense. They have been the only team to make any headway against it, and I mean no disrespect to Wisconsin from that comment, but Michigan was much more impressive. They moved the ball on the ground and in the air, and they were able to take advantage of every opportunity they had. As a result, Ohio State falls from the championship game, though in all likelihood, they will still be participating in one of the top 4 bowls.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 4:11 PM | Comments (0)

November 17, 2003

MRI Football 2003: Week 7 - Can It Be Next Week Yet?

I was upset with myself this weekend. I openly rooted against a team for which I harbor no ill feelings, other than their love from the people who vote in the polls each week. And what is going to make it worse is I will do it again next week and do it by rooting for a team which I can't stand. Yes, that team I rooted against this weekend was Ohio State. I ripped them last week, and I am not backing down on that. I still don't think they deserve to be in the Top 5 in the country, and I especially hope that what could happen next week doesn't. First, why don't they deserve where they are? I watched the game against Purdue this weekend with a morbid curiousity. I was definitely yelling at the television when I was able to jinx the kicker into missing the field goal to go into overtime, and I can't tell you how disappointed I was when the game ended. Ohio State has an amazing defense. They are 6th in the country in yards allowed per game, and they have shown the ability over the last few weeks to totally disrupt offenses which have consistently put big numbers on the board. However, despite the strong defense, they don't generate many turnovers, and overall have only taken the ball away twice more than they have given it up. Their offense ranks below average in both passing and rushing and as was shown in the game this weekend, it continues to be a struggle for the team to put points on the board. Next week, the unthinkable could happen. This team could actually move itself into position to play in the title game and defend its national championship. The computer polls this week should move Ohio State up (The MRI doesn't do that this week, and Ohio State actually drops two slots despite the win). This means that a win against Michigan next week has a chance to move the Buckeyes into the #2 slot in the BCS. And this could happen even if USC wins its next two games. I don't like Michigan, and it is going to make me very angry, but next week, I am going to have to root for them to win. If only because it will keep me sane in the long run.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 4:03 PM | Comments (0)

November 10, 2003

MRI Football 2003: Week 6 - Safer Not to Play This Week

This was a good week to take off. More losses by the teams which everyone was watching made this a dangerous week for anyone in the top 10 to have a game. In fact, it wasn't a good week to even for those teams that won, save a few. Obviously, everyone will be talking about the dominace of Oklahoma in their game against Texas A&M. Does anyone at this point think that they are not trying to prove something this year. After losses last year kept them out of what they felt was their title game, they have come back this year to extract revenge on those teams and more. Last week, they had the second largest gain in the MRI, losing out to Texas by a little. This week, they edged out Texas, and it could have been more had Bob Stoops not chosen to run the ball into the line 4 times when they had the chance to score again in the middle of the 4th quarter. Oklahoma has built such a lead in the MRI and in football overall, that even with a loss, they still deserve to play in the championship game, as from what I have seen, there are not 2 teams which are honestly better than them in all of football. They have the top defense in terms of yardage per game, and they rank in the top of the league in both rushing and passing per game. This team deserves to win it all, more than any team since the BCS started. Let's move on to Texas because for a team that was embarrassed 2 weeks ago, they sure have come back strong. Last week, they put a huge hurt on Nebraska, and this week they take advantage of a down Oklahoma State team and win big again, but not before being scared a little in the first half. The win moves Texas into the Top 5 in the MRI, passing a good number of teams. The real question is can they keep it up. The top 5 is rounded out by USC at #2, Michigan at #3, taking up the spot vacated by Florida State, and LSU at #5. All those teams picked a very good week to not play. And all of them have a "gimmie" game next week, though none of their opponents should be looked on lightly as they all have some upsets this year on their record.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 3:56 PM | Comments (0)

November 3, 2003

MRI Football 2003: Week 5 - Big Showdowns, Big Changes

There were a number of key matchups this week, all of which were key to the BCS standings and the rankings in general. What was originally though to be the biggest game of the day, Miami vs. Virginia Tech, ended up being just that, with the Hokies' win causing ripples through the standings. 2 weeks ago, this was going to be the game that decided the #2 team in the country. But, Virginia Tech got caught in a classic look ahead when they stumbled badly against West Virginia last week. All Miami had to do was win and they had virtually guaranteed that they would be the team facing Oklahoma for the title, with neither team's schedule being overwhelming from here on out. They must have taken Virginia Tech's hunger too lightly as they came out and turned the ball over 4 times, losing this key game, and badly. The loss for Miami (which was not rated #2 in the MRI) drops them to 11th in the MRI this week, with Virginia Tech leaping over them into 6th.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 3:50 PM

October 27, 2003

MRI Football 2003: Week 4 - Slight Tweak, Goodbye VA Tech

The big showdown between West Virginia and Virginia Tech was not all it was hyped up to be. In fact the Hokies looked pretty bad on the field, with their only score of the game coming on a fumble recovery from their own team. The loss not only hurt them in the MRI but also the National polls and in their chance for a shot at the title game. In the MRI, they fall out of the Top 10 and were our biggest loser this week.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 9:44 AM | Comments (0)

October 20, 2003

MRI Football 2003: Week 3 - Bounce Back Weekend

This was the big week for teams which lost last week to bounce back. A few of them managed to do just that, including Nebraska with probably the most impressive of these wins. Nebraska went out against Texas A&M and caused 8 turnovers, setting a school record. This translated into a big gain in the MRI and a jump for a team which last week looked pretty well defeated against Missouri. This is shaping up for a big matchup when they will take on Oklahoma later this season. Oklahoma had to face Missouri this week, a team which was looking to continue its string of big knockoffs. Instead, the Tigers were defeated and they showed none of the spark that they had shown the week before. This means that Oklahoma will be topping the MRI list again this week. Our top three remain the same this week with Virginia Tech on a bye, and Georgia picking off Vanderbilt, though they did not look strong.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 9:36 AM | Comments (0)

October 13, 2003

MRI Football 2003: Week 2 - Upset City

A lot of upsets this week. A number of the top undefeated teams got their first losses, mostly at the hands of other top teams. The shakeup in the rankings wasn't great, based on the top teams all playing. Look for more movement next week though.

Was busy a lot of the weekend and didn't get to see a lot of the games. Only heard about the amazing comeback that Michigan pulled on Minnesota. It makes the top very crowded in the MRI, except for Oklahoma who totally dominated at Texas. Enjoy!

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 9:12 AM | Comments (0)

October 6, 2003

MRIF2003: Week 1 - Here It Is

Here it is. I broke down and converted the formula for the MRI so that it would now work with college football. I can't say that the results are entirely promising at this point, but I think I am on the right track and for the first season, I am gonna leave it this way. As with the basketball standings, the formula uses winning percentage, strength of schedule, and turnover differential. New in the football rankings are offensive and defensive yardage per game, standardized against the rest of Div 1-A. And of course, I have the weighted margin of victory, with a cap at 35 points.

The biggest difference in the two formulas is that I will be counting non Division 1-A games in the football rankings. This is due to the fact that a lot of teams have to fill out their schedule with these games, and we need to account for those stats in this ranking. As a result, when a team plays a Non D-1A team, they will have a game against a generic opponent entered into the stat database. They will have the combined record of all the Non D-1A teams added into their strength of schedule. Currently, this is something like 9-55. Therefore, you can see the detremint of playing these lesser opponents. Therefore, when teams like Kansas State play two of these teams in their 11 game schedule, they will be hurting.

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Posted by Benjamin Miraski at 8:30 AM | Comments (0)