Top 10 Point Differential & Thoughts

[BevoBlake]

I took the scores from each of the games that included a Top 10 team and averaged them out.

The teams in the Top 10 beat their opponents by an average of 14.12 points, or two scores, this week. If you remove TAMU's throttling of SMU, the average point differential would be 7.83, or one score. Only two of the seven Top 10 ranked schools played ranked opponents this week. Those two teams were #1 Florida State (vs. #22 Clemson) and #5 Auburn (vs #20 Kansas State). It's likely that neither of those opposing schools will be ranked going into this next week. The winning percentage of the opponents heading into this weekend's matchups was: .583. After this weekend, the winning percentage of the opponents is: .458. 

I bring this up because I feel like this season, more than any other as of late, has had a lot of parity. And it's led me to question how good the schools in the Top 10 this year truly are. 

 

[echeese]

I bring this up because I feel like this season, more than any other as of late, has had a lot of parity. And it's led me to question how good the schools in the Top 10 this year truly are. 

I would agree .. 

Though I will point out, FSU with Winston likely wins by 3 scores.

LSU is clearly over rated so part of the problem is the Top 10 needs to adjust to mean.

But I would very much agree with you that this is very much a "parity season" which is going to make Playoff selections VERY interesting.

 

[HornEsch]

I agree there really is no truly dominating top team this year. If you look at the 1st week this year where the "top" teams struggled against teams where they were heavily favored.

The SEC has a lot of overated teams this year, more than normal. I think they are truly going to beat themselves up this year. I see a similar trend in the PAC 12, where you have some strong teams, but as you saw last night even an un-ranked team like WSU can take their top team to the wire. The Big 10 is really just bad this year.

Going to be a crazy season, especially when you throw in that it is the first one with a playoff.

 

[Bear19]

I think there are zero great teams this year and only a handful that should be considered very good.

I haven't seen any with great defenses.

Your premise is spot on.

 

[drgilbert]

Can any sec team stop the spread offense