College Football Playoff Rankings: Key Metrics and Teams to Watch
The unveiling of the College Football Playoff (CFP) rankings is always one of the most anticipated moments in college sports. In just 33 days, the 12-member selection committee will finally reveal the 12-team CFP field, capping off weeks of speculation and debate.
This year, the committee has rolled out new metrics and principles to help ensure fair comparisons between teams. As the first rankings approach, it’s worth taking a closer look at the core principles, metrics, and the teams everyone’s talking about.
Core Principles of the CFP Selection Committee
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The CFP selection committee uses a handful of core principles to separate teams with similar records and resumes. These guidelines are meant to keep evaluations thorough and fair:
- Strength-of-Schedule: Judges how tough a team’s schedule really was.
- Head-to-Head Competition: Looks at what happened when the teams in question actually played each other.
- Comparative Outcomes of Common Opponents: Compares results against the same teams, but doesn’t reward running up the score.
- Relevant Factors: Considers things like missing players or coaches that may have affected performance.
This season, they’ve added a new metric called strength-of-record to better reward teams that beat top-tier opponents.
New Strength-of-Record Metric
In the past, beating a powerhouse like Alabama counted the same as beating a much weaker team. The new strength-of-record metric changes that by giving extra credit for wins over stronger opponents.
Now, teams get more recognition for tough victories, which feels like a long-overdue adjustment.
Impact on Margin of Victory
The committee can talk about margin of victory, but once a team wins by more than 21 points, it doesn’t matter how much more they win by. For example, Indiana’s 63-10 blowout over Illinois is treated the same as Ohio State’s 34-16 win against Illinois.
This discourages teams from running up the score just for rankings’ sake.
Key Metrics for Evaluation
The committee has zeroed in on 12 data points that help separate the top teams. Here are a few of the most important:
- Relative Scoring Offense: Measures how many points a team scores compared to what their opponents usually allow.
- Relative Scoring Defense: Tracks how many points a team gives up versus what their opponents usually score.
- Plays Per Point: Counts how many plays it takes to score a point, both on offense and defense.
- Yards Per Point: Looks at how many yards it takes to put up a point, for both sides of the ball.
These stats go deeper than the basics and offer a fuller picture of team performance.
Top Performers in Key Metrics
Indiana leads the pack in relative scoring offense, outscoring all but one of their FBS opponents’ defensive averages by at least 16 points. Oregon, Utah, USC, and Tennessee aren’t far behind.
Ohio State tops the list for relative scoring defense, giving up just 55 points across eight FBS games. Indiana comes next, then Utah, Oregon, Iowa, and Texas Tech.
Tennessee stands out in a bad way here—they’re the only ranked team allowing more points than their opponents’ average.
Offensive and Defensive Efficiency
The Big Ten dominates offensive plays per point, with Indiana, Oregon, USC, and Ohio State all in the top five. Vanderbilt sneaks in at No. 3 and breaks up the conference monopoly.
On defense, the top six teams look a lot like the leaders in relative scoring defense. In offensive yards per point, Iowa leads the way, squeezing out 250 points from just 2,543 yards. Indiana, Texas Tech, Memphis, and Vanderbilt round out the top five.
The bottom five for offensive yards per point? Oklahoma, Ole Miss, Missouri, Georgia Tech, and Michigan. Defensively, Ohio State, Indiana, Utah, Texas Tech, and Texas are the best in yards per point. Virginia, Missouri, Texas A&M, Louisville, and Tennessee are at the bottom.
Additional Metrics Considered
The committee also looks at:
- Relative Total Offense and Defense: How many yards a team gains or allows compared to their opponents’ averages.
- Scoring Differential: The gap between points scored and points allowed.
- Starting Field Position Differential: Average starting field position for and against a team.
- Points Per Possession: How efficient teams are at scoring and stopping scores per possession.
Committee members also watch condensed games to get a feel for teams beyond the numbers. It’s not all spreadsheets and stats.
Teams to Watch
With the first CFP rankings just around the corner, a few teams are especially interesting:
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Oklahoma
The Sooners are No. 11 in the AP poll but lag behind in offensive metrics. Their strength of schedule is going to matter a lot here.
Odds to make the CFP: 14 percent.
Virginia
Virginia is the last unbeaten team in ACC play, yet their defensive numbers are pretty rough. That could knock them down from their No. 12 AP spot.
Odds to make the CFP: 20 percent.
Michigan
The Wolverines have issues on both sides of the ball and two double-digit losses. That’s probably going to drop them below their No. 21 AP ranking.
Odds to make the CFP: 13 percent.
Iowa
Iowa keeps rolling on offense and still plays tough defense. They’ve dropped two close games, which leaves them at No. 24 in the coaches’ poll, but the AP voters left them out. Odds to make the CFP: 2 percent.
Last year, the SEC put eight teams in the first CFP poll. This time, the league has nine teams in the latest AP Top 25.
The Big Ten looks set to grab the top two spots in the first CFP rankings again. Ohio State probably lands at No. 1, with Indiana chasing right behind.
Three teams from outside the Power 4 crashed last year’s first CFP rankings: Boise State, Washington State, and Army. Will Memphis or another American Conference team sneak in this year?
Maybe Sun Belt leader James Madison finally gets a shot. Guess we’ll find out Tuesday evening.
If you want more details, check out the New York Times article on the College Football Playoff rankings preview and metrics.