If you were a top college football team and you weren't either on a bye week or named Michigan, you probably got a little nervous at some point Saturday. Lots of highly ranked teams struggled. Most of them avoided an upset -- sorry, North Carolina -- but we saw a decent amount of change in the updated SP+ rankings.
Only top-ranked Michigan remains in the same spot it was in a week ago -- the Wolverines expanded their lead on the field following a ruthless blowout of rival Michigan State -- and there are otherwise lots of ups and downs.
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:
LSU: up 3.9 adjusted points per game (from 18th to 10th)
Michigan: up 3.6 (remains first)
New Mexico: up 3.4 (123rd to 112th)
Rice: up 3.2 (107th to 96th)
Missouri: up +3.0 (26th to 18th)
Boston College: up 2.9 (93rd to 83rd)
Alabama: up 2.8 (ninth to third)
Sam Houston: up 2.7 (127th to 121st)
Charlotte: up 2.4 (130th to 124th)
SMU: up 2.2 (60th to 46th)
With conference adjustments continuing to take on heavier weight each week, that benefited teams from the SEC and Pac-12 at the slight expense of the Big Ten and ACC. That Michigan still rose as many points as it did tells you quite a bit about how dominant the Wolverines continue to be, but the most interesting name here is Alabama's. SP+ was impressed by the Tide's tidy win over Tennessee; they held the edge in the efficiency and explosiveness categories and created more scoring opportunities and won by more than projected (34-20) despite an early 13-0 hole and some bad turnover luck.
Because the teams in the No. 3-11 range were so tightly clustered last week -- and because quite a few of those teams struggled in Week 8 -- their 2.8-point improvement was enough to vault them eight spots.
MOVING DOWN
Here are the 10 teams whose ratings fell the most:
Temple: down 4.0 adjusted points per game (121st to 130th)
Utah State: down 3.5 (85th to 98th)
Hawai'i: down 3.5 (109th to 120th)
Michigan State: down 3.4 (55th to 69th)
South Carolina: down 3.3 (39th to 50th)
Tulsa: down 3.0 (94th to 103rd)
Kent State: down 2.7 (132nd to 133rd)
FAU: down 2.7 (91st to 100th)
Washington: down 2.5 (fourth to seventh)
Duke: down 2.5 (22nd to 26th)
Scoring nine offensive points against an Arizona State team that allowed 21 to Southern Utah is not the best way to maintain a top-five ranking, Washington.
Conference rankings
Here are the FBS' 10 conferences, ranked by average SP+:
1. SEC: 11.1 average adjusted points per team (32.9 offense, 22.0 defense)
2. Pac-12: 8.2 average (32.9 offense, 24.6 defense)
3. Big 12: 8.1 average (32.0 offense, 24.0 defense)
4. Big Ten: 6.2 average (25.7 offense, 19.6 defense)
5. ACC: 6.1 average (28.5 offense, 22.6 defense)
6. Sun Belt: -4.9 average (24.5 offense, 29.4 defense)
7. Mountain West: -6.9 average (23.7 offense, 30.7 defense)
8. AAC: -8.6 average (22.9 offense, 31.3 defense)
9. Conference USA: -10.4 average (20.9 offense, 31.1 defense)
10. MAC: -13.3 average (17.0 offense, 30.2 defense)
The SEC continues to lead the way here, not because of a high volume of contenders -- its three top-15 teams are merely equal to the Big 12 and Big Ten and behind the Pac-12's four -- but because of a low volume of dead weight. Only one SEC team ranks outside the top 50, compared to the Pac-12's four, the Big 12's five and the Big Ten's seven.
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, most of these teams end up with a negative score. It is what it is.)
Here is this week's résumé SP+ top 15:
1. Michigan (8-0), +7.5 PPG
2. Ohio State (7-0), +4.3
3. Florida State (7-0), +3.7
4. Oklahoma (7-0), +3.2
5. Washington (7-0), +0.2
6. Georgia (7-0), -0.4
7. Penn State (6-1), -2.2
8. Oregon (6-1), -4.4
9. Texas (6-1), -7.2
10. Ole Miss (6-1), -9.7
11. Oregon State (6-1), -9.9
12. Alabama (7-1), -10.5
13. Kansas State (5-2), -11.8
14. Utah (6-1), -13.8
15. Air Force (7-0), -14.0
Other unbeatens:
17. James Madison (7-0), -16.2
22. Liberty (7-0), -19.2
Another competitive loss to Ohio State -- an annual tradition -- leaves Penn State as your highest-ranked one-loss team, ahead of Oregon and a Texas team that struggled to put away Houston. But the top name on the list shouldn't be a surprise. I always like to say it's how you play, not who you play, and while Michigan hasn't played any interesting "whos," the how is unquestionable at this point: The Wolverines are really, really good, illegal scouting methods or no illegal scouting methods.
