Ranking 2023 NCAA Football Teams Objectively, Week 13
The CFP polls are updated …and full of bias. What did they get wrong?
Welcome to this week’s edition of bias-free rankings of all NCAA FBS football teams. Throughout the season, each team’s performance metrics are tracked by a truly objective formula (No inclusion of pre-season ranks, opinion polls, scouting grades, or any other human-fabricated numbers) and ranked only by what has happened on the field. For more about tracking performance objectively and the terminology referenced here, please refer to the season kickoff.
Most of the FBS football teams have concluded their regular seasons and we’re nearly to bowl season. One last hurdle remains for the College Football Playoff and its committee’s much-awaited decision-making: conference championship time. The weekend’s slate of games is relatively short but almost all of them hold major implications for the College Football Playoff (Sorry, American and Conference USA).
The committee is preparing to decide which of their conferences and schools should receive the massive financial bonus of a playoff or New Year’s Six appearance. No amount of mental gymnastics or hoop-jumping ‘process’ can remove the fact that their decision will be heavily biased; a collective opinion that will likely leave at least one of the four most deserving teams in the country out in the cold. With so much information available at our fingertips, there has to be a better way. And there is!
Throughout the season, the PASS ranking (Performance against strength of schedule) has tracked what each team has done on the field and compared each of those performances against how other teams have fared against common opponents. These results may be surprising and may even seem unfair given win-loss records or looking at who has already beaten whom, but the same can be said of the CFP committee’s ranking. With this kind of objective formula we can all be assured that every team is treated fairly and viewed on a truly level landscape.
The Objective Top 25
Winning matters most, right? The CFP currently boasts 4 teams with 4 losses despite 30 teams carrying lighter baggage at 3 losses or less. That field changes when tWin% (True win percentage, factoring in lesser FCS competition) ranks the schools.
Going by wins alone, the playoff would see Michigan face off against Georgia and Washington go up against Liberty. It’s fun as an exercise, though problematic for competition — Even the goodest boy of all the Huskies out there probably shouldn’t have a treat that big. The real goal is to award the four best FBS teams a chance to claim the title of National Champion.
As the CFP committee struggles to justify their opinions to the media each week, PASS reveals what the teams have actually been accomplishing.
The Objective Performance-Based Top 25
There’s an echo from last week: 5 teams are still outperforming the CFP-leading Georgia on the season. Georgia can silence their biggest critic — their own performance — if they can shut down the rising tide of Alabama in the SEC title game. Last week, Michigan proved it’s season-long PASS ranking above Ohio State to be valid, as their remaining coaching staff notched a decisive win. Alabama, partially due to an edge in oSoS (Objective strength of schedule) has created an even larger advantage in PASS over Georgia. More on that matchup below.
James Madison remains the top Group of Five team, but the clandestine rulings of the NCAA also mean the Dukes remain ineligble for a conference title or bowl game. “Cowards!” and “Let them play!” seem like perfectly rational responses to those rulings. Toledo, Miami of Ohio, and SMU are also on the receiving end of the committee’s inherently biased nature. PASS shows that their performance has indeed been greater than many of their Power Five peers.
Oklahoma State may have beaten BYU, but by a narrow margin against a team accustomed to losing by even more. There are also the two blowout losses against middling opponents. The PASS numbers show O.K. State to be just that, average and okay, at #72. The Cowboys have been one of the luckiest teams in all the land, to land in both their conference title game and the committee’s limited range of vision. N.C. State, Tennessee and Clemson fill out the imposter list as the sweethearts stealing spots from the more deserving Group of Five teams.
The PASS Top 25 Vizualizer
Heading into the conference championships this chart illustrates the gaps in performance between contending teams. Boston College finishes the season continuing their reign of league-worst performance, and the other 107 teams are tucked somewhere between them and Arizona.
The interactive chart can be found here.
The Three Tiers:
To better rebalance tiers around the current groupings of teams, this week the margins of each tier have been adjusted upwards by 10.
The Playoff Contenders (50+ PASS): Michigan didn’t soar following their big, narrow win and treads water while continuing to defend the top spot. Alabama slides into second after an Iron Bowl win and rises a bit more, playing a stronger oSoS overall. Ohio State falls, but not as drastically as others may have hoped. Florida State and Washington are hotly contesting that 4th playoff spot. Georgia can change the entire landscape if they rise to the challenge of meeting the media’s expectations of them.
The Elite (30–50): The elite is the “good enough to be a NY6 participant” range. Strong teams like LSU, Penn State, Oklahoma and Notre Dame unfortunately don’t have the benefit of a conference title game to push them further towards contention. Texas and Oregon do have that chance, and the committee might like them enough, but their performance isn’t quite on the same level as that of the teams in the tier above. Mississippi and Missouri are also here on the back end but similarly stuck with no remaining games.
Everybody Else: James Madison is out due to the rulings mentioned above, but we’ll award them with the “Best of Everybody Else” belt. Toledo could steal that belt with a decisive win in a MAC title rematch against Miami of Ohio. SMU/Tulane square off below that for what’s likely to be erroneously chosen as the G5 participant in the NY6.
The committee could decided Oregon St. and Kansas St. worthy of a NY6 game, but in this objective reality they’re mired below with no games left to prove anything. Louisville might be the luckiest team in the country right now— after perhaps the easiest ACC schedule of all, they face a Florida State team hampered by losing their starting QB. That won’t be enough to earn them a playoff trip by objective performance. Iowa is here, hanging out as the lowest ranked conference title participant.
Highest rise
#64 Marshall. Marshall had a hot start to the year and faded to a bit of obscurity, but finish off their season with this badge of honor and jumping into the top half of teams overall. A decisive win over Arkansas State saw The Herd climb 14 places.
Hardest fall
#65 Texas Tech. Again! A 2-week streak and featured here 3 times overall! Except… this time it’s a fall. A second big fall. The Red Raiders fell 14 spots after getting blasted by 50 points in their season-ender against Texas. While we’re handing out belts, how about one for “Most Volatile”. That’s all you, TT. It’s been a wild ride, it could have been worse.
Week 13 Conference Rankings
The week’s update at how the conferences shake out in terms of PASS, sTem (Scoring tempo), and tWin%. The Big XII jumped the ACC and there was a bit of a Group of Five shuffle below the MAC as Conference USA and the AAC moved up, trading spots with the Sun Belt and MWC.
Games to Watch (All of them!)
Here are the 10 conference title matchups in the order they will air, tempo-based spreads, and each teams’ tWin% PASS, sTem (Scoring tempo), and oSoS. Parsing this data, only a couple of these games feel like true locks.
New Mexico State at Liberty (-4)
tWin% rank: #29 NM St. 69.23% // #3 Liberty 100%
PASS rank: #43 NM St. 7.21 // #22 Liberty 19.17
sTem rank: #28 NM St. 0.152 // #17 Liberty 0.231
oSoS rank: #129 NM St. 6.85 // #128 Liberty 6.925
These teams met early this year and Liberty won with ease, 33–17. Since that point all New Mexico State has done is win 9 out of 10 games — including winning easily on the road at Auburn — a brag even Alabama couldn’t claim this year. Liberty takes the odds on their overall body of work, but that tWin% rank rings hollow when compared against oSoS, and NM State has a lot of momentum here.
Oregon (-8) vs. Washington
tWin% rank: #10 Oregon 87.12% // #2 Washington 100%
PASS rank: #12 Oregon 37.28 // #5 Washington 67.98
sTem rank: #2 Oregon 0.408 // #11 Washington 0.280
oSoS rank: #113 Oregon 9.525 // #42 Washington 20.225
Buyer beware, this doesn’t feel like a good game to bet the spread. Oregon takes the spread here because they’ve maintained one of the most explosive paces of play in the nation. The Ducks’ oSoS rank has been a cause for concern throughout the season, but now looks to be a result of a PAC12 conference that just doesn’t play much defense. Washington can’t be counted out with their top-tier PASS rank and the narrow win they’ve already notched over Oregon. How will the Huskies fare without home field?
Appalachian State at Troy (-2)
tWin% rank: #34 App. St. 63.19% // #19 Troy 77.27%
PASS rank: #46 App. St. 5.37 // #33 Troy 10.90
sTem rank: #43 App. St. 0.109 // #22 Troy 0.171
oSoS rank: #111 App. St. 9.725 // #121 Troy 8.25
With James Madison sidelined, Appalachian State is lucky to be here. The narrow spread is a testament to how competitive and oft-chaotic the Sun Belt was this year. Troy looks like the stronger side, yet App. State seems to have figured something out, carrying a 5-game win streak that includes the only win over JMU.
Boise State at UNLV (-1.5)
tWin% rank: #51 Boise State 54.86% // #25 UNLV 71.21%
PASS rank: #45 Boise State 5.39 // #38 UNLV 8.49
sTem rank: #52 Boise State 0.077 // #34 UNLV 0.136
oSoS rank: #57 Boise State 18.225 // #110 UNLV 9.75
The carousel of Mountain West teams finally stops here. A few weeks ago this looked like it could’ve been Air Force vs. Fresno State; how quickly fortunes can change. After the standings shuffle the conference has gone through, it only makes sense for this to be the smallest point spread amongst title games. Boise St. might only have 7 wins, but they’ve been through a much tougher schedule and their only big loss was to Washington.
Georgia (-2) vs. Alabama
tWin% rank: #4 Georgia 97.73% // #7 Alabama 88.89%
PASS rank: #6 Georgia 59.33 // #2 Alabama 81.87
sTem rank: #7 Georgia 0.319 // #10 Alabama 0.287
oSoS rank: #75 Georgia 15.875 // #2 Alabama 29.15
Here we go again. This matchup of titans is likely to be stronger than at least one of the playoff games. Alabama carries the aforementioned performance edge that’s correctly indicated 71.24% of the winners on the season. Georgia also carries a schedule-strength rank that leaves room for doubt. Yet when these teams are matched up by tempo it’s Georgia that comes away with the spread. We can only hope the game is as good as this matchup on paper, as Michigan vs. Ohio St. was last week.
Louisville vs. Florida St. (-4)
tWin% rank: #20 Louisville 76.52% // #5 Florida St. 93.94%
PASS rank: #18 Louisville 20.82 // #4 Florida St. 68.87
sTem rank: #25 Louisville 0.160 // #4 Florida St. 0.340
oSoS rank: #66 Louisville 17.05 // #60 Florida St. 17.975
One thing no metric is particularly good at is predicting the intangibles, such as the impact of an injury to a key player. Florida St. has an obvious edge here, but only one of the full games factored in the performance of the QB who will be starting on Saturday. These metrics focus on the performance of the entire team on both sides of the ball, with the hope that any sole injury won’t impact the numbers significantly. Taking Florida St. here hinges on one’s belief in the system over the individual, and the Seminoles have had one heck of a system this year.
Miami of Ohio vs. Toledo (-2)
tWin% rank: #21 Miami OH 75.76% // #12 Toledo 85.61%
PASS rank: #19 Miami OH 20.45 // #16 Toledo 24.42
sTem rank: #15 Miami OH 0.232 // #14 Toledo 0.238
oSoS rank: #105 Miami OH 11.625 // #106 Toledo 10.9
The MACtion: Reloaded. With due respect to the other Group of Five conferences and the NCAA exclusion of JMU, this is the game to determine the best G5 team of the season. SMU and Tulane below will likely get the NY6 bid, but the numbers say it should be the winner of this game. These teams are extremely well-matched and Toledo will hope for a repeat performance of when they beat the RedHawks by 4 points earlier this year on the road.
Michigan (-12) vs. Iowa
tWin% rank: #1 Michigan 100% // #14 Iowa 83.33%
PASS rank: #1 Michigan 91.26 // #23 Iowa 18.14
sTem rank: #1 Michigan 0.423 // #38 Iowa 0.125
oSoS rank: #59 Michigan 18.0 // #64 Iowa 17.425
Nothing to see here but a big spread. Iowa’s defense has been admirable all year, but based on the year’s performances it would be nothing short of miraculous if they were to hold Michigan to a loss in this game.
Oklahoma State vs. Texas (-8)
tWin% rank: #22 Ok. St. 71.97% // #6 Texas 91.67%
PASS rank: #72 Ok. St. 0.57 // #9 Texas 45.96
sTem rank: #75 Ok. St. 0.004 // #16 Texas 0.231
oSoS rank: #34 Ok. St. 21.475 // #46 Texas 19.725
The overview above described Oklahoma State as one of the luckiest teams, and that is true. They’re lucky to be in this game. That doesn’t mean it’ll be an automatic win for Texas. By the numbers, the Cowboys have probably won a couple of games they shouldn’t have; that’s just the kind of unpredictability someone looking to place a big money bet may want to avoid. The Longhorns should come away with a win based on these numbers, but that current -14.5 spread Vegas is posting for Texas sure doesn’t feel safe.
SMU (-7) at Tulane
tWin% rank: #18 SMU 79.55% // #9 Tulane 87.88%
PASS rank: #20 SMU 19.55 // #24 Tulane 17.52
sTem rank: #8 SMU 0.317 // #30 Tulane 0.144
oSoS rank: #122 SMU 7.75 // #97 Tulane 12.55
Finally, we end on a game with odds that are in direct opposition to Vegas. SMU’s tempo can’t be ignored against a Tulane team that has looked shaky at times, with very narrow wins against significantly weaker Tulsa and East Carolina squads. SMU will pose the biggest threat the Green Wave have seen since Week 2 when they took a 4th quarter pounding by Mississippi. The Mustangs aren’t a complete lock as they’ve lost both games they played against the Power 5, (Including a not great TCU team), but they’ve really floored it against AAC competition.
Thank you for reading. If you enjoyed this, please consider sharing it with a wider audience, friend, foe, or anyone who loves college football. For the full rankings of all 133 teams or if you’d like a particular team or game featured, reach out to me, or drop a comment. Follow along next week for the 2023 Objective Bowl Game Projections.
Writer’s note: Due to site publishing issues, an erroneous version of this article went out via email to subscribers that contained last week’s Games to Watch. This has now been updated to reflect the conference championship games.
