WEEK FIVE TOP 25: Training Wheels Are Off
· Yahoo Sports
And away we go with our post-week four rankings, and for those of you don’t know, this is the week where some shuffling happens. Preseason weights are fully gone, in-season weights enter (my Seese Model), so what a team is on the field — EPA/play, success rate, yards per play, and of course, win or loss — creates the Top 25, and really the entirety of the 138 team ranking, which I reveal in full after the final week of the season.
Here is the Week 5 Top 25:
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Who’s New#15 Oregon Ducks
#34 Game Factor | +0.19 NET Adj. EPA/Play | -2.2% NET SR | +0.5 NET YPP
Why They’re Here: A massive win at USC catapulted Oregon from the Next Four cutline to the top-15. SP+ and FPI very strongly view the Ducks, and justifiably so, but while Oregon has made the biggest leap for the Top 25, they still have a lot of work to do to shed the ‘biggest disappointment’ label thus far.
#18 Nebraska Cornhuskers
#27 Game Factor | +0.35 NET Adj. EPA/Play | +13.8% NET SR | +2.2 NET YPP
Why They’re Here: Nebraska finally got a win worth talking about, getting away from three consecutive wins against teams outside the top-100 and getting a decisive 18-point road win over #70 Michigan State. What Nebraska has done well is dominate offensively. Their adjusted offensive EPA/play ranks second in the nation, a metric weighted to opponent, and while there’s still some noise to that stat this early on, they’ve been undeniably impressive nonetheless. They’ll host Maryland this week, but the real fun begins the two weeks after as they host Indiana and then head to Eugene for Oregon.
#25 James Madison Dukes
#20 Game Factor | +0.10 NET Adj. EPA/Play | +7.1% NET SR | +0.7 NET YPP
Why They’re Here: The James Madison Dukes, everybody! The Dukes may have lost Bob Chesney to UCLA, but Florida’s trash has been their treasure thus far as Billy Napier’s Dukes have risen to the top of the Group-of-6 leaderboards. The Dukes’ defense is its strength, and with dominant consecutive road wins at San Diego State and Old Dominion, they’re set up well heading into the thick of conference play, but given the narrow separation between JMU, North Dakota State, and Boise State, they likely can’t drop more than one game and still have a shot to lead the pack come conference championship weekend.
The Kansas State Wildcats (31-26 L @ Cincinnati), Louisville Cardinals (30-27 L vs. Wake), and Oklahoma Sooners (41-13 L @ UGA). If I had to hazard a guess, Louisville can scrap their way back into the back end of this ranking at some point, but they cannot lose another game. A home loss to now #38 Wake Forest has put their ACC Championship Game aspirations on life support. Kansas State was always too good to be true. Their offense has explosive capabilities, but those plays are few and far between while their defense is a walking big play alert. Oklahoma kind of is who we thought they were. A terrible ground game with inconsistency under center, they aren’t winning anything of note with Mateer at quarterback, and I would be truly shocked if Ben Arbuckle survives this season.
Biggest Riser: UCLA Bruins#3 Game Factor | +0.33 NET Adj. EPA/Play | +17.0% NET SR | +1.8 NET YPP
UCLA is for real, and we should all take note of it. The Bruins, admittedly, have also had the unfortunate scheduling shakedown that’s proven that none of the teams they’ve played are even close to where experts had them in the preseason, but road dominance at Cal and Maryland have bookended what’s been four straight wins by at least three possessions to start Bob Chesney’s time in Los Angeles. Coming out of a bye, UCLA heads to Eugene in what will be among the better games of the 10/10 slate.
Biggest Faller (within the ranks): Penn State Nittany LionsAt the time of this writing, Penn State kicked off our fifth week of the season with an embarrassing loss at Northwestern. You won’t hear from Penn State past this week.
Week 5 Games of the Week Predictions:GameSpreadMy PickProjected Score#6 Alabama vs. #10 Mississippi StateBAMA -5.5Mississippi State31-28#4 Ohio State vs. #16 IowaOSU -14.5Ohio State24-6#26 Auburn vs. #19 TennesseeVOLS -6.5Tennessee27-17#8 Florida vs. #29 MissouriUF -5.5Florida28-23#108 Navy vs. #81 Air ForceAF -3Air Force20-13#86 California vs. #85 UNLVUNLV -2.5Cal34-26#52 Washington vs. #23 USCUSC -8.5USC24-14#27 Kentucky vs. #52 South CarolinaSCAR -2.5South Carolina28-20#98 Marshall vs. #25 James MadisonJMU -18.5James Madison37-17#126 Eastern Michigan vs. #63 UMassUMass -5.5UMass30-13We will revisit these next week! See you all then!