Saurian Sagacity Week 8 Power Ratings

Our top 25 –

1 LSU
2 Ohio St.
3 Oregon
4 South Fla.
5 Missouri
6 Kansas
7 Boston College
8 Kentucky
9 Florida
10 Oklahoma
11 West Virginia
12 Rutgers
13 Arizona St.
14 Michigan
15 Oklahoma St.
16 Oregon St.
17 Connecticut
18 Clemson
19 BYU
20 Georgia Tech
21 Texas Tech
22 Georgia
23 Alabama
24 Auburn
25 Virginia

To reiterate, we are using a formula here that takes into account the following –

1. Total Offense (yards per game) modified by Strength of Schedule (per NCAA)
2. Total Defense (yards per game) modified by Strength of Schedule (per NCAA)
3. Win – Loss Record

This is a virtually unbiased rating system, as we use 3 factual statistics (Offense, Defense and Win Loss), and modify the first two by the NCAA SoS ratings, which are themselves unbiased (they merely look at the win-loss records of opponents faced). I know some folks are critical of the NCAA SoS, but I prefer an unbiased rating system to something like Sagarin (who won't even reveal his system).

The only bias is the weightings I chose, and I chose to equal weight the 3 categories. A perfect score would be a “3”, which would result if a team had the best offense and the best defense, played the hardest schedule, and had a perfect record.

LSU, for instance, rates out at a 2.2545, while Ohio State gets a 2.1356. The worst team in our ratings, Northern Illinois, gets a 0.5037.

The bottom 10 –

110 Colorado St.
111 Eastern Mich.
112 La.-Lafayette
113 Rice
114 North Texas
115 Idaho
116 Southern Methodist
117 Florida Int'l
118 Utah St.
119 Northern Ill.

Despite an NCAA worst offense and 1 win, Notre Dame does not make the bottom 10 by merit of having played the 2nd hardest schedule thus far (they are 100th). On the other hand, USC is not in the top 25, as they are tied for the 116th schedule in the NCAA, having played teams with a combined 12-32 record.