Depending on how you look at it, either no one wants the No. 1 ranking in the SP+ rankings or everyone does. For the seventh time in eight weeks, the top spot changed hands again -- this time, back to Ohio State after the Buckeyes' road win over previously unbeaten Penn State. Texas, on bye, slipped back to No. 2, but the main story is the bunching at the top. Ohio State might be the best team, but four teams are within 0.7 points of No. 1, including two-loss Ole Miss, and six teams are within 1.8 points. I'm not sure I've ever seen that entering the second week of November. But with two of those top four teams, Georgia and Ole Miss, playing each other this weekend, a particularly impressive performance from either could give us another new No. 1 next week.
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 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 (hence the lack of unbeatens near the top), so it does not automatically give credit for big wins or particularly brave scheduling -- no good predictive system does. 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.
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.
UAB: up 3.2 adjusted points per game (ranking rose from 118th to 112th)
FIU: up 3.0 points (from 117th to 114th)
Georgia: up 2.9 points (from sixth to third)
Troy: up 2.8 points (from 105th to 100th)
Oklahoma: up 2.5 points (from 32nd to 25th)
South Carolina: up 2.4 points (from 28th to 19th)
Western Kentucky: up 2.4 points (from 74th to 66th)
Mississippi State: up 2.3 points (from 84th to 76th)
USF: up 2.3 points (from 102nd to 94th)
Boise State: up 2.1 points (from 36th to 28th)
If you've been following along this season, you're probably noticing that the shifts up and down are getting quite a bit smaller. That's to be expected as this season produces more and more data. But although Georgia didn't overwhelm Florida on the scoreboard -- the Dawgs won, 34-20, nearly a touchdown under what the spread projected -- SP+ saw the game a little bit differently.
Based on my postgame win expectancy number -- which takes the key, predictive stats produced in a given game, tosses them into the air and says "With these stats, you could have expected to win X% of the time" -- Georgia's postgame win expectancy was 99.9%. The Dawgs had a massive success rate advantage and some poor turnovers luck, and with the stats the game produced they would have won this by an average of 26.2 points. Considering Florida entered the week 21st in SP+, a 26-point win over a good team bumps you up in the ratings.
Moving down
Here are the 10 teams whose ratings fell the most:
Pitt: down 3.2 adjusted points per game (ranking fell from 23rd to 29th)
Wisconsin: down 3.1 points (from 30th to 41st)
Michigan State: down 3.0 points (from 72nd to 80th)
Navy: down 2.6 points (from 64th to 68th)
Texas A&M: down 2.6 points (from 11th to 13th)
Michigan: down 2.4 points (from 27th to 30th)
FAU: down 2.4 points (from 106th to 111th)
Arizona: down 2.4 points (from 69th to 73rd)
Florida State: down 2.3 points (from 68th to 72nd)
UMass: down 2.3 points (from 125th to 128th)
No surprises here, though I have to point out the absolute roller coaster Wisconsin has been on this season. The Badgers plummeted to 66th in SP+ after underachieving against projections by an average of 10.4 points per game over the first month, then surged to 20th after overachieving by 28.0 points per game in their next three. Since then? They underachieved by 5.0 points against Penn State ... and 25.7 points against Iowa. They're back down to 41st. Make up your mind, Badgers.
Conference rankings
Here are FBS conferences ranked by average SP+:
1. SEC: 15.8 average rating (34.4 offense, 18.8 defense)
2. Big Ten: 8.4 average rating (28.0 offense, 19.7 defense)
3. ACC: 6.5 average rating (31.0 offense, 24.6 defense)
4. Big 12: 5.7 average rating (30.4 offense, 24.8 defense)
5. Sun Belt: minus-7.1 average rating (24.8 offense, 31.9 defense)
6. AAC: minus-8.0 average rating (25.1 offense, 33.1 defense)
7. Mountain West: minus-9.1 average rating (23.9 offense, 32.9 defense)
8. Conference USA: minus-14.3 average rating (18.0 offense, 32.1 defense)
9. MAC: minus-14.5 average rating (18.9 offense, 33.4 defense)
The tightest race of late has been the battle for eighth (or ninth, I guess) between CUSA and the MAC. CUSA inched back ahead despite its previous top team (Liberty) faltering once again. Elsewhere, the averages are pretty much set at this point.
SP+ projects the College Football Playoff
Here's what the new 12-team CFP would look like based on updated SP+ projections (and what the results would look like if the projected favorite won each game, even though that never actually happens).
First round
12 Boise State at 5 Ohio State (OSU by 20.9)
11 SMU at 6 Indiana (IU by 4.9)
10 Ole Miss at 7 Georgia (UGA by 2.7)
9 Tennessee at 8 Penn State (PSU by 2.8)
Quarterfinals
Rose Bowl: 1 Oregon vs. 8 Penn State (UO by 4.6)
Fiesta Bowl: 4 BYU vs. 5 Ohio State (OSU by 16.9)
Peach Bowl: 3 Miami vs. 6 Indiana (UM by 4.0)
Sugar Bowl: 2 Texas vs. 7 Georgia (UT by 0.2)
Semifinals
Cotton Bowl: 1 Oregon vs. 5 Ohio State (OSU by 1.2)
Orange Bowl: 2 Texas vs. 3 Miami (UT by 5.2)
Finals
2 Texas vs. 5 Ohio State (OSU by 0.3)
When you've got this many high-quality teams bunched together in the ratings, you're probably going to see a playoff with loads of close games, and eight of the 11 games above are projected within 5.2 points.
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. Indiana (9-0): -4.5
2. Miami (9-0): -5.6
3. Ohio State (7-1): -7.5
4. Texas (7-1): -8.1
5. Oregon (9-0): -8.6
6. Georgia (7-1): -9.3
7. Tennessee (7-1): -10.6
8. BYU (8-0): -12.0
9. Notre Dame (7-1): -12.9
10. Alabama (6-2): -15.8
11. Ole Miss (7-2): -16.3
12. Penn State (7-1): -18.5
13. SMU (7-1): -19.0
14. Army (8-0): -19.1
15. Boise State (7-1): -21.1
Just as I'm not sure I've seen a season with this many teams bunched up near the top of the rankings, I also haven't seen a season where zero teams had a positive rating. The remaining unbeatens have been awesome but maybe not quite top-five awesome (here's your reminder that Oregon began the season with a narrow win over Idaho, which is going to punish their Resume SP+ rating all season), and the best of the one-loss teams - Ohio State, Texas and Georgia - have been slightly better but suffered the loss penalty. We've got a very, very interesting season on our hands.