Upsets Move Michigan to #11? Predictions...
Michigan will get the job done at Minnesota easily! Other games to keep an eye on before CFP selection...
It's a decent possibility up to four teams immediately above us get upset this weekend (FPI % and lines):
#12 Oklahoma St @ Texas Tech - only 60% chance to win, 2.5pt line
Georgia @ #11 Florida - only 54.5% chance to win, 2.5pt line
#9 ND @ #21 Temple - 80.5% chance to win, 10.5pt line
#8 Stanford @ Washington St. - 82.5% chance to win, 10pt line
I think all of these have a good shot, since in three of the games the ranked team is on the road. Least likely would be Temple. Watch out Stanford!
October 30th, 2015 at 9:40 AM ^
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October 30th, 2015 at 10:53 AM ^
not correct. If it is a three way tie between these teams with OSU beating State and UM being OSU the only thing that matter is playoff ranking (or in the case of M v. MSU, M would have to be ranked 2 spots ahead of State or State would get in because of head to head).
October 30th, 2015 at 9:40 AM ^
It would then be decided by the CFP ranking. However, if M beats OSU and is within 1 spot of them in the rankings, then M would go to the B1G championship game.
October 30th, 2015 at 9:45 AM ^
Doesn't sound like we getting to the conference title game, but I'll take 11-2 in a 'right the ship' year.
October 30th, 2015 at 10:59 AM ^
a lot of football to be played. If you said me right now that Michigan was going to win out and I had $100 to bet one way or the other, I would bet you that they would go to Indi for the title game either by way of 2 State losses or by way of winning the tie breaker.
October 30th, 2015 at 11:00 AM ^
Post.
October 30th, 2015 at 9:37 AM ^
It is possible that MSU, OSU, and UM all finish with a 7-1 conference record. If we are playing for a B1G championship, then yes, rankings do matter.
October 30th, 2015 at 9:40 AM ^
Tie breakers below, any 3 way tie eliminates us because of our overall record
The following procedure will determine the representative from each division in the event of a tie:
(b) If three or more teams are tied, steps 1 through 7 will be followed until a determination is made. If only two teams remain tied after any step, the winner of the game between the two tied teams shall be the representative.
October 30th, 2015 at 9:45 AM ^
October 30th, 2015 at 9:51 AM ^
Huma is right. 1 through 4 are all conference specific, not tied to overall record.
October 30th, 2015 at 10:21 AM ^
if OSU beats MSU and UM beats OSU and they all finish 7-1 the first 4 tiebreakers wouldn't decide the division winner.
October 30th, 2015 at 9:50 AM ^
October 30th, 2015 at 10:10 AM ^
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October 30th, 2015 at 11:07 AM ^
we are ranked ahead of both, at which time we would have to be 2 spots better than State.
October 30th, 2015 at 9:35 AM ^
that specializes in predicting upsets and also does their own top 25 (based on predicting upsets?) and moved Michigan up to #11 (because we're going to win a lot of upsets?)
October 30th, 2015 at 9:36 AM ^
I think you're failing to account for the fact that if Temple beats Notre Dame, especially by 7+ points, they will likely jump us in the rankings.
October 30th, 2015 at 11:49 AM ^
Temple would have to jump about 10 spots. Rarely ever happens. (Aside from the fact that ND is probably going to beat Temple by 20)
October 30th, 2015 at 9:36 AM ^
The World's Largest Cocktail Party (yeah, Michael Adams, I said it!) takes place annually approximately halfway between the schools - in Jacksonville, FL. It's a home game for Florida in name only.
I like the post, though. It's so freaking nice to be in a situation where what happens to Top 15 teams actually matters to us!
October 30th, 2015 at 10:46 AM ^
While it is a neutral site game, Jacksonville is significantly closer to Gainesville than Athens (it's at least 5 hours from Atlanta, where most UGA fans are) and especially in a year like this (UF surging, UGA floundering), I would expect Florida to have a significant majority of fans present.
My guess would be 70-75% Florida fans.
October 30th, 2015 at 11:01 AM ^
While geographically closer to Gainesville than Athens, that doesn't impact the fan distribution year-in and year-out. Tickets are allotted equally to both schools, and both schools travel to this game extremely well. I would look for a 50:50 fan split most years. You may see that tilt a bit because of UGA's disappointing season so far, but the tickets are sold well in advance.
Also, the schools split game proceeds 50:50 each year, year-in and year-out. In no way is this truly a home game for FL. I pointed it out because it helps explain the roughly 3 point spread - that's not a home-field advantage spread. It's a neutral site spread.
Also, Florida fans wear jean shorts!
October 30th, 2015 at 11:19 AM ^
October 30th, 2015 at 11:21 AM ^
October 30th, 2015 at 9:36 AM ^
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October 30th, 2015 at 9:38 AM ^
So what?
So what if we're 11th now - the "final four" is definitely out of the question and if we win out we'll most likely eitther be in a 3 way tie for first in the B1G East if OSU beats MSU as expected OR tied for second if MSU upsets OSU. And in either scenerio the tie-breaker is the best BCS standing following the final regular season game and no way is Michigan going to move ahead of a one loss MSU team (that beat us) or a one loss OSU team (that we just beat).
So what does it matter if where we are right now Everybody Murders?
October 30th, 2015 at 9:41 AM ^
A "what have you done for me lately" in terms of the playoff polls. An optimist would think that Michigan winning out, beating Penn St on the road and Ohio St would advance up the polls to be just ahead of both Michigan St. and Ohio St. It's very unlikely, but not impossible.
October 30th, 2015 at 9:45 AM ^
October 30th, 2015 at 9:48 AM ^
So if OSU beats Sparty they come into AA undefeated having just beat a top 7 team, and if we beat them they have 1 loss on the road to a top 12ish team. We wont go in over them as we have 2 losses and they have 1 quality loss. We have 2 quality losses. Both teams have only 1 quality win over a top 10 team (them MSU, us OSU)
If Sparty beats OSU they have a road win over a top 3 team and have 0 losses and beat us head to head. Or if they drop some dumb game like PSU at home they'd have 1 loss plus the OSU win. And beat us head to head.
We are not going to the playoffs this year.
October 30th, 2015 at 9:50 AM ^
We go to the playoffs. I'm more focused on getting to the B1G Championship game with my above post.
October 30th, 2015 at 9:52 AM ^
Got it.
But I dont see UM moving ahead of OSU in the polls when OSU's only loss at that time would be to a top 10 team on the road. Voters wont sink them that much for that. Losing to a 2 loss UM would be different than say a 5 loss Minnesota.
October 30th, 2015 at 10:06 AM ^
It's not the voters, it's the committee. And technically we can be one spot behind them and then our head-to-head win over them gives us the nod for the B1G championship game.
October 30th, 2015 at 10:58 AM ^
I don't think it can be understated how monumentally and fundamnetally shifted things are from before, because of the CFP committee.
A committee that literally sits down and DECIDES who should be ranked where.
With all previous rankings, it was done by averages, and everyone voting, then seeing the averages, (even with the BCS).
Now, there will be a group of people that collectively rank, seek consensus, and order the teams, it will be of a single mind, and set precedents for what acutally makes a "good" team "good", and what doesn't.
There will slowly codify a new set of rules (and debates) about what outcomes are positive, and what outcomes are negative.
Previously, there was a sort of strange averaging of teams, because with a large amount of voters, all the outliers were attenuated by the averages. This will not be the case any more. The "blind voting", or, "vote and see", was a sort of "pro-fairness", no single influencer, approach, it was this sort of dice roll. But also, "no single standard equates to "good", and sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't.
In addition, the playoff committe ABSOLUTELY KNOWS about the Big Ten tiebreaker rules and there rankings, again, will ABSOLUTELY reflect who they DECIDE should go to the Big Ten Title game.
But now, people will sit down and decide the route and consequences of teams, 100% humanly.
It's a huge, fascinating, change.
October 30th, 2015 at 11:07 AM ^
Yep, if I'm on the committee I want a 1 loss OSU to play in the B1G Championship game as they would probably be on the cusp of making the playoff. I wouldn't want a 1 loss OSU sitting at around #5 and not playing. If one of the teams above OSU loses I am then faced with the prospect of putting a team in the playoff that I effectively decided shouldn't play for their own conference championship.
October 30th, 2015 at 12:06 PM ^
assumes that Michigan CANNOT make the playoff, which I don't think is true. I did for a while, but the more I think about it, if we beat OSU in the final game of the season, I don't know how we are not ranked ahead of them or at least within 1 spot of them. In that case, we would probably be sitting around #5 and could feasibly have a good argument for the playoff having beat Ohio State and presumably Iowa, who would be in the Top 5 at that point having not lost yet. (Iowa is the biggest playoff/NC game sleeper possibly in the history of football). If we beat 2 top 5 teams in the last two weeks of the season and looking at the nature of our losses, we would have a pretty good resume.
October 30th, 2015 at 1:45 PM ^
Depending on where Sparty is. Sparty losing to OSU is not going to drop them 10 spots.
October 30th, 2015 at 2:53 PM ^
by the time Nov 21 rolls around, if UM keeps winning they aren't going to be 10 spots behind Sparty. There's a lot of games to be played between then and now and a good amount of games between teams ranked ahead of UM.
October 30th, 2015 at 10:19 AM ^
this is so hypothetical but ill play along -
i think the playoff committee could easily overlook our flukey lost to MSU, and if we beat OSU convincingly (14+ points) - you could see a path to us being ranked ahead of both MSU and OSU. but like i said - all hypothetical. theres still a half of season of football to play, but i certainly dont think we're out of the BIG title contention at all.
edit - also dont overlook the end of the season loss-factor, where the committee may put more stock into recent losses versus those earlier in the year. obviously that would also help us in this hypothetical osu/msu/UM round robin scenario.
October 30th, 2015 at 10:08 AM ^
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October 30th, 2015 at 10:24 AM ^
It also depends on the margin.
The committee will have a very hard time keeping Ohio State (with their putrid non-conference and weaker BIG West matchups than us) ahead of a Michigan team that just beat them by 10+ points.
If we beat OSU by 3 points, I think you're right. However, if we beat them significantly we will move ahead of them. Anyways, idc about the playoff, I just care about the BIG championship for this year. If Nebraska beats Sparty all of these problems go away.
October 30th, 2015 at 11:30 AM ^
October 30th, 2015 at 1:47 PM ^
You most certainly will have to be. Since MSU, OSU and UM will be tied, assuming 7-1 conference record the next thing that breaks the tie is CFP ranking. If OSU is ahead of you, regardless of whether you beat them or not, they go.
October 30th, 2015 at 9:50 AM ^
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October 30th, 2015 at 9:52 AM ^
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October 30th, 2015 at 10:21 AM ^
What about a win in the B1G Championship over an undefeated Iowa?
October 30th, 2015 at 11:17 AM ^
In the end if we win out, we will all be happy with the season but it might be a little bittersweet knowing how close we were.
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October 30th, 2015 at 11:19 AM ^
In the end if we win out, we will all be happy with the season but it might be a little bittersweet knowing how close we were.
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October 30th, 2015 at 9:44 AM ^
LSU plays Bama
ND plays Stanford
TCU plays Baylor play Oklahoma
OSU plays MSU
There are going to be a lot of teams ahead of us who must lose by default due to head to heads.
Not sure if OP is saying this for UM to finish in top 10 in final poll or believes we have a chance for playoffs. Playoffs dont seem realistic.
October 30th, 2015 at 12:27 PM ^
The top teams in the Big 12 still all have to play each other: Oklahoma St, Oklahoma, Baylor and TCU. There's a lot of losses sitting there.
The SEC West as you mentioned still has Bama vs LSU. LSU also still has to go to Oxford and has games with Arkansas and Texas A&M.
Utah still has to go to Washington and Arizona and hosts UCLA.
Florida has Georgia and FSU left.
Iowa - still not sure what to make of them but on paper they don't have any games against ranked opponents.
ND still has to go to Stanford and what could be a tricky game at Pitt.
Stanford still has ND and possibly tricky games with WSU, Oregon and Cal.
Crazy things happen in college football. There's usually one Saturday each year where there are upsets galore, especially in the Top 10, and this year that Saturday hasn't happened. I think the playoff is a pipe dream for UM, and the Big Title game is a bit of lonshot but who knows. They just need to take care of their business and see what happens.
October 30th, 2015 at 9:43 AM ^
About counting and chickens. Lets just win and the rest will play out.
October 30th, 2015 at 9:58 AM ^
Agreed. Like the old story says: "Never count on a chicken. They're unreliable a-holes."
October 30th, 2015 at 9:45 AM ^
The only senerio I can see a possible CFP berth is:
We win out.
MSU loses to OSU and one other team
Iowa Wins out until the Big Ten Championship (should give us back to back top 5 wins
We beat Iowa.
would prolly need a bit more chaos to happen in other conferences but this is atleast plausable