We know who the top three teams in college football probably are. Michigan, Ohio State and Georgia were projected in the top three to start the season, and none has ranked worse than fourth at any point in the first seven weeks of 2023. But they aren't really pulling away from the pack.
Michigan took its time before hitting the accelerator against Indiana on Saturday, and Georgia never really shifted out of third gear in a comfortable but frustrating win over Vanderbilt. They each kept their lofty rankings, and Ohio State moved back to second following a routine thumping of Purdue, but the No. 1 and No. 11 teams in this week's SP+ rankings are still only separated by about a touchdown. The Top six are only separated by a field goal. We're used to far greater stratification than that.
Below are this week's SP+ rankings. What is SP+? In a single sentence, it's a tempo- and opponent-adjusted measure of college football efficiency. I created the system at Football Outsiders in 2008, and as my experience with both college football and its stats has grown, I have made quite a few tweaks to the system.
SP+ is indeed intended to be predictive and forward-facing. It is not a résumé ranking that gives credit for big wins or particularly brave scheduling -- no good predictive system is. It is simply a measure of the most sustainable and predictable aspects of football. If you're lucky or unimpressive in a win, your rating will probably fall. If you're strong and unlucky in a loss, it will probably rise.
Here are the full rankings:
This week's movers
Let's take a look at the teams that saw the biggest change in their overall ratings. (Note: We're looking at ratings, not rankings.)
MOVING UP
Here are the 10 teams that saw their ratings rise the most this week:
Liberty: up 3.7 adjusted points per game (from 72nd to 57th)
UTEP: up 3.4 points (from 125th to 117th)
James Madison: up 3.1 points (from 55th to 42nd)
Notre Dame: up 3.0 points (from 12th to 10th)
Penn State: up 3.0 points (from 10th to eighth)
Duke: up 2.7 points (from 28th to 22nd)
Virginia Tech: up 2.6 points (from 76th to 69th)
Georgia State: up 2.6 points (from 83rd to 76th)
FAU: up 2.4 points (from 98th to 91st)
TCU: up 2.4 points (from 33rd to 27th)
Notre Dame's resounding win over USC bumped the two-loss Fighting Irish back into the top 10, and Penn State's destruction of poor UMass brought the Nittany Lions to within 3.2 points of next week's opponent, Ohio State. (The 2.5-point home field adjustment means that the Buckeyes will be about a six-point projected favorite.)
MOVING DOWN
Here are the 10 teams whose ratings fell the most:
UMass: down 5.0 adjusted points per game (from 124th to 133rd)
Louisville: down 3.6 points (from 20th to 29th)
Auburn: down 3.2 points (from 35th to 45th)
Texas Tech: down 3.1 points (from 26th to 33rd)
Washington State: down 3.1 points (from 27th to 34th)
Syracuse: down 3.0 points (from 38th to 50th)
USC: down 3.0 points (from ninth to 14th)
BYU: down 2.9 points (from 49th to 65th)
Cincinnati: down 2.8 points (from 46th to 63rd)
New Mexico: down 2.6 points (from 116th to 123rd)
I guess the main surprise was that after Arizona's 44-6 road win over Washington State -- a win in which the Wildcats outgained the Cougars by a 516-234 margin (6.5 yards per play to 4.3) -- the Wildcats didn't rise as much as Wazzu fell. Still, Arizona is up to 36th overall, a huge jump from 58th, where it resided a month ago. And two weeks after peaking at 20th, Wazzu is down to 34th.
Conference rankings
Here are the FBS' 10 conferences, ranked by average SP+:
1. SEC: 10.7 average points per team (33.3 offense, 22.7 defense)
2. Pac-12: 8.3 average (32.9 offense, 24.6 defense)
3. Big 12: 8.1 average (31.9 offense, 23.8 defense)
4. Big Ten: 6.8 average (26.7 offense, 20.0 defense)
5. ACC: 6.5 average (28.8 offense, 22.3 defense)
6. Sun Belt: -4.5 average (24.9 offense, 29.4 defense)
7. Mountain West: -6.6 average (24.2 offense, 30.9 defense)
8. AAC: -8.1 average (23.6 offense, 31.6 defense)
9. Conference USA: -11.0 average (20.7 offense, 31.5 defense)
10. MAC: -13.3 average (17.6 offense, 30.7 defense)
Once again, the SEC's lack of dead weight gives it the top spot here -- the league of It Just Means More has only one team outside of the top 50, even if it also only has three teams in the top 16.
Here's a fun nugget, by the way: There aren't many divisions left anymore, but the top four averages belong to the Big Ten East (11.0), SEC West (11.0), SEC East (10.5) and Big Ten West (2.6). The Big Ten West is closer to the Sun Belt East (-3.0) than the Big Ten East. But it will still get to send a representative -- probably Iowa at this point -- to Indianapolis to play for the Big Ten title in early December.
Résumé SP+
Since the College Football Playoff rankings are on the horizon, I'm also including Résumé SP+ rankings in this piece each week.
As mentioned above, SP+ is intended to be a power rating, not a résumé evaluation tool, but Résumé SP+ attempts to fill that latter gap. It is a look at two things: (1) how the average SP+ top-five team would be projected to perform against your schedule (in terms of scoring margin) and (2) how your scoring margin compares to (1). Throw in a seven-point penalty for every loss a team has suffered, and you can say that this is what the CFP rankings would look like if SP+ were in charge.
(Note: Because of the high bar teams have to clear in getting compared to an average top-five team, and because of the loss adjustment, almost every team here ends up with a negative score. It is what it is.)
Here is this week's Résumé SP+ top 15:
1. Penn State (6-0): +7.2
2. Oklahoma (6-0): +6.0
3. Michigan (7-0): +4.7
4. Ohio State (6-0): +4.6
5. Washington (6-0): +4.5
6. Florida State (6-0): +2.5
7. Georgia (7-0): -0.3
8. North Carolina (6-0): -2.1
9. Oregon (5-1): -3.0
10. Texas (5-1): -6.3
11. Ole Miss (5-1): -9.2
12. Oregon State (6-1): -9.7
13. Duke (5-1): -10.4
14. Alabama (6-1): -11.4
15. Air Force (6-0): -12.3
The two other unbeatens:
20. James Madison (6-0): -16.0
22. Liberty (6-0): -18.9
My main takeaway from this list: Quite a few teams have played at a top-five level or very close to it. That's pretty exciting considering what it could mean for the stretch run. Lots of big games still remain.
