For maybe the first time in the 2024 college football season, we had a week in which nothing really happened.
I mean, things happened in Week 9: Two top-five teams (Ohio State and Texas) narrowly survived upset bids, Texas A&M made a statement, the Group of 5 playoff race crystallized and Pitt's defense (21 points) outscored both its opponent (13) and its own offense (20). But only four teams ranked in the AP Top 25 lost, and they all lost to higher-ranked teams. Even with Ohio State's serious flirtation with disaster, nothing of lasting consequence really unfolded.
For the sixth time in seven weeks, however, the top spot in the SP+ rankings did change hands. With Ohio State's aforementioned flirtations, Texas crept back ahead of the Buckeyes for the top spot despite its own narrow upset avoidance.
No one wants to be the top dog at the moment, and once again, we've got an interesting near-logjam at the top. The top five teams in this week's SP+ rankings are separated by only 1.6 points, and that batch includes two two-loss teams. Meanwhile, only one of the FBS' eight remaining unbeaten teams is currently in the SP+ top seven. It's a funky world out there at the moment.
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 (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.
Miami (Ohio): up 4.1 adjusted points per game (ranking rose from 99th to 87th)
Western Michigan: up 3.4 points (115th to 107th)
Jacksonville State: up 3.4 points (98th to 89th)
Ohio: up 3.3 points (109th to 101st)
Alabama: up 3.0 points (seventh to fifth)
Kennesaw State: up 2.7 points (134th to 133rd)
California: up 2.7 points (46th to 34th)
North Carolina: up 2.5 points (49th to 40th)
Fresno State: up 2.5 points (from 87th to 77th)
ODU: up 2.4 points (97th to 91st)
Most of this week's movement came at the Group of 5 level, and particularly in the MAC, where SP+ basically whiffed on every Week 9 game. (For the week, it was 0-for-6 against the early spread in MAC games and 57% ATS in all others.) But among power conference teams, Alabama made a nice statement in an easy win against Missouri -- albeit a Missouri without a functional starting quarterback -- and two ACC teams that had suffered countless tight losses, North Carolina and Cal, both enjoyed surprisingly easy wins and saw their ratings improve as well.
Moving down
Here are the 10 teams whose ratings fell the most:
Oregon State: down 5.3 adjusted points per game (ranking fell from 68th to 78th)
Northwestern: down 3.5 points (73rd to 79th)
Rutgers: down 3.3 points (58th to 67th)
Illinois: down 3.3 points (45th to 57th)
Virginia: down 3.2 points (66th to 71st)
Maryland: down 3.1 points (52nd to 63rd)
Missouri: down 2.7 points (15th to 16th)
Georgia Southern: down 2.6 points (85th to 95th)
Washington State: down 2.5 points (44th to 48th)
Mississippi State: down 2.4 points (78th to 84th)
The Big Ten didn't have itself an amazing week. A number of teams that constituted the middle-class portion of the conference -- Northwestern, Illinois, Rutgers, Maryland, Wisconsin, Washington -- all had disappointing performances and sank more than their victorious opponents rose. That, in turn, became a drag on the opponent-adjustment portion of the ratings and brought the entire conference down a bit: Only five of its 18 teams rose in the ratings, while 13 sank at least a bit.
Conference rankings
Here are FBS conferences ranked by average SP+:
1. SEC: 15.4 average rating (34.0 offense, 18.8 defense)
2. Big Ten: 8.8 average rating (28.3 offense, 19.5 defense)
3. ACC: 7.0 average rating (30.7 offense, 23.7 defense)
4. Big 12: 5.9 average rating (30.5 defense, 24.6 defense)
5. Sun Belt: -7.4 average rating (24.7 offense, 32.0 defense)
6. AAC: -8.0 average rating (25.2 offense, 33.2 defense)
7. MWC: -9.4 average rating (23.4 offense, 32.6 defense)
8. MAC: -14.7 average rating (18.6 offense, 33.3 defense)
9. CUSA: -14.9 average rating (18.4 offense, 33.2 defense)
We have movement! While it's hard for these rankings to change while everyone's playing conference games, the MAC's odd, unpredictable week, combined with Liberty's disappointing performance in a loss to Kennesaw State, meant the MAC hopped out of the cellar and ahead of Conference USA. The AAC crept closer to the Sun Belt, too, and the Big Ten is now quite a bit closer to the ACC (No. 3) than the SEC (No. 1).
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 Penn State (PSU by 17.8)
11 Notre Dame at 6 Indiana (ND by 3.1)
10 Texas A&M at 7 Tennessee (Vols by 4.3)
9 Ohio State at 8 Georgia (UGA by 0.3)
Quarterfinals
Rose Bowl: 1 Oregon vs. 8 Georgia (Oregon by 1.3)
Fiesta Bowl: 4 BYU vs. 5 Penn State (PSU by 11.6)
Peach Bowl: 3 Miami vs. 11 Notre Dame (ND by 0.6)
Sugar Bowl: 2 Texas vs. 7 Tennessee (Texas by 6.6)
Semifinals
Orange Bowl: 1 Oregon vs. 5 Penn State (Oregon by 3.1)
Cotton Bowl: 2 Texas vs. 11 Notre Dame (Texas by 4.4)
Finals
1 Oregon vs. 2 Texas (Texas by 1.4)
Obviously the favorites never all win, but ... seven of 11 playoff games within 4.4 points? Sign me up immediately.
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 (8-0): -4.2 points
2. Miami (8-0): -4.4 points
3. Ohio State (6-1): -6.4 points
4. Texas (7-1): -7.1 points
5. Georgia (6-1): -8.2 points
6. Tennessee (6-1): -8.3 points
7. Oregon (8-0): -8.5 points
8. Penn State (7-0): -10.3 points
9. BYU (8-0): -10.5 points
10. Notre Dame (7-1): -10.5 points
11. Pitt (7-0): -10.9 points
12. Iowa State (7-0): -12.8 points
13. Clemson (6-1): -14.4 points
14. Texas A&M (7-1): -14.5 points
15. Alabama (6-2): -15.7 points
Other unbeatens: 16. Army (7-0): -16.0 points
Just as no one wants to hold the No. 1 spot in SP+, no one seems to be playing at a consistent top-five level this year either. Even if you take the seven-point loss adjustment out, only one team has a positive rating (Ohio State, at plus-0.6). Granted, Georgia looked spectacular against Texas, and Oregon is looking increasingly viable even if its rating is still getting dragged down by a couple of poor September performances, but everyone has shown flaws or inconsistency at some point. And that could make for one hell of a home stretch and playoff.