Sagarin Predictions: Welcome Back (and Week 1)

Welcome back to the sometimes entertaining, never-quite-correct Sagarin predictions for 2015. This year, I'll be using three different numbers - the GOLDEN_MEAN spreads, the PREDICTOR spreads, and the newly unveiled RECENT spreads, found here. For the first week of the season, all three numbers are the exact same, so you won't see them all listed below. That won't be the case in subsequent weeks.

How did it end up at the conclusion of last year? Not terribly. It retroactively predicted a win against Illinois (we lost) and retroactively predicted a loss against Nebraska (we won). How did it do at the beginning of the season? Worse, predicting losses against Michigan, Iowa and Nebraska and a win against the Fighting Illini.

So all that said, the key thing to keep in mind is that these numbers are strictly for entertainment purposes only, and particularly at the beginning of the season, they may be pretty far off. The formula is taking a lot of last year into account as Mr. Sagarin ranks teams, and as we all know, college football changes a lot from year-to-year.

Still, enjoy these, debate over them, and relish the fact that we're just two and a half weeks away from kicking off the season under the lights at TCF.

Without further ado ...

vs TCU (+13.5)
@ Colorado State (-5.5)
vs Kent State (-23)
vs Ohio (-19)
@ Northwestern (-0.5)
@ Purdue (-8.5)
vs Nebraska (+3)
vs Michigan (-1)
@ Ohio State (+17)
@ Iowa (+3)
vs Illinois (-10)
vs Wisconsin (+8.5)

Predicted Record 7-5 (4-4)

Likely wins (>6 point difference in favor of Minnesota): vs Kent State, vs Ohio, @ Purdue, vs Illinois
Likely toss-ups (within 6 points): @ Colorado State, @ Northwestern, vs Nebraska, vs Michigan, @ Iowa
Likely losses (>6 point difference in favor of opponent): vs TCU, @ Ohio State, vs Wisconsin

So there it is. A lot of toss-up games this early in the season (not surprisingly) shows a lot of opportunity available for this team this year.

Great stuff.

I truly appreciate the effort you put in to bring this on a weekly and annual basis.

Could the Gophers have avoided a Sagarin deficit against Iowa this year if they could have somehow against all odds held the hawkeyes from scoring that garbage time touchdown in last year's pummeling?

+1 On the effort as well, love reading this every week.

homermn said:

+1 On the effort as well, love reading this every week.

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+2. Thank you Gopher07 for putting this together every week.

We are +3 against Neb at home coming off two straight wins against them. D'oh OK.

Gophers7NatTitlesBadgers0 said:

We are +3 against Neb at home coming off two straight wins against them. D'oh OK.

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I think we were double digit underdogs in both of those games. Just because we beat them those two times doesn't mean we'd beat them more than 50 out of 100 times.

Cayman said:

I think we were double digit underdogs in both of those games. Just because we beat them those two times doesn't mean we'd beat them more than 50 out of 100 times.

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They will be better this year but they also will be coming off a big game vs. Wisconsin.

I would love to see the prediction and results from past years under Coach Kill. Great job and thanks for putting this stuff together.

Thanks Gopher07

Unregistered User said:

Great stuff.

I truly appreciate the effort you put in to bring this on a weekly and annual basis.

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homermn said:

+1 On the effort as well, love reading this every week.

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e.bigelow said:

+2. Thank you Gopher07 for putting this together every week.

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Spoofin said:

Thanks Gopher07

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No problem! I truly enjoy seeing the results myself each week as well.

HoustonTXGopher said:

I would love to see the prediction and results from past years under Coach Kill. Great job and thanks for putting this stuff together.

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As far as past years, I have last year at the ready but would need to dig for the other years. If I find time btwn now and 9/3 I'll give it a go.

Here's the prediction last year after the first week of the season:

vs. MTSU -10
@ TCU +8.5
vs. SJSU -12
@ Michigan +11 x
vs Northwestern -4
vs Purdue -14
@ Illinois -2 x
vs Iowa +3 x
vs Ohio State +14
@ Nebraska +11 x
@ Wisconsin +17

Predicted Record 6-6 (3-5)

Here's each game (2 through 12) predicted the week of each game:

vs. MTSU -10
@ TCU +22
vs. SJSU -6.5
@ Michigan +4 x
vs Northwestern -1.5
vs Purdue -14.5
@ Illinois -8.5 x
vs Iowa +3 x
vs Ohio State +13.5
@ Nebraska +13.5 x
@ Wisconsin +15.5

Predicted Record 6-6 (3-5)

And predicted the last week of the regular season:

vs EIU -20.5
vs MTSU -17
@ TCU +18.5
vs SJSU -20.5
@ Michigan -2.5
vs Northwestern -6.5
vs Purdue -13.5
@ Illinois -9.5 x
vs Iowa -2
vs Ohio State +9.5
@ Nebraska +10.5 x
@ Wisconsin +15.5

Predicted record 8-4 (5-3)

So, you can see that last year at least (and probably in many years) the formula only gets better as the season gets along and it has more data points to ingest. Interesting to point out though that, even at the end of the season, the formula says we choked one away at Illinois and stole one at Nebraska. The two most impressive games of the year were @ Michigan and vs Iowa (both games where we blew the expected spread out of the water).