A second consecutive drama-free win, despite numerous impactful personnel losses, moved the Irish to 9-1 and put them firmly on course for an 11-1 regular season record and a New Year’s Six bowl bid. Our controversial position here at 18 Stripes is that this is a Good Thing, and that given that at the end of September it seemed this season might be short on Good Things we should all enjoy the moment. There were a handful of things, particularly on offense, that could’ve gone a little better, but I’m guessing that if the fumbled exchange from Tyler Buchner to Logan Diggs was a touchdown instead there would be far less grumbling.
Oh by the way, seven true freshmen saw meaningful action on offense – Buchner, Diggs, Mitch Evans, Joe Alt, Lorenzo Styles, Deion Colzie, and Jayden Thomas. Styles broke a reverse (I’m choosing to forget the flag on Colzie). Diggs invoked the ghost of Le’Veon Bell once again.Ā Blue-chip freshman linebacker Prince Kollie had a cup of coffee late in the game, as he did against Navy, and has now posted seven tackles in his last two games. We also saw some good things from sophomores Rylie Mills (2.0 sacks and generally unblockable all night), Howard Cross (his first career sack in the first half), Xavier Watts (five tackles, three in the first half), and Ramon Henderson (4 tackles, 0.5 TFL, and a Hamilton-esque interception). 2022 should be a fun season.
We get it. We wanted that score on the Buchner drive and a scoring drive at the end of the first half too. Nonetheless, it was a very effective performance that the advanced stats models loved – a 6.9-4.3 yards per play advantage and 56%-39% success rate advantage (per EPA) and zero drama after the first five minutes will do that. In fact the SP+ postgame win expectancy was, like last week, 100%.
Recapping the methodology for these articles: These aren’t actual SP+ win probabilities, as SP+ creator Bill Connelly doesn’t publish those regularly. He does though publish his SP+ ratings every week for all FBS teams. We use a slightly tweaked version of the formula that Reddit poster rcfbuser (account deleted, pour one out) posted a few years back to approximate the official calculation. The FPI win probabilities are updated weekly by ESPN, so those are the real deal.
SP+ measures offensive and defensive explosiveness and efficiency on a per-play basis. FPI is ESPN’s proprietary metric and is much more of a black box, but we do know that it rests heavily on expected points added, which is a pretty solid advanced stat and also a per-play number.
Post-Week 11 Update – SP+ Matrix
As you move down each column, you find the probability of Notre Dame owning that many wins at that point of the schedule. In the tenth row, for example, you can see that the probability of owning zero or ten wins through ten games is 0%, and of owning nine wins is 100%. So, 9-1. In the last row of the table we’re tracking how much the probability of each win total has changed from the previous week. This is a function of our own outcomes, the quality of play that led to those outcomes, and SP+’s changing perceptions of our past and future opponents.
The 77.5% figure at the end of the Stanford row reflects our probability of winning all the remaining games per SP+. Not surprisingly, that number is up massively from last week given what SP+ thought of Virginia – the model had it as a near toss-up, so taking it out of the calculation and focusing on the two remaining softer opponents sent the win-out probability skyrocketing. This is up on the merits also though; based on last week’s SP+ ratings, the probability of sweeping Georgia Tech and Stanford was about eight points lower. Georgia Tech lost its fourth straight and Stanford lost its fifth straight while the Irish rolled in Charlottesville, and here we are.
Post-Week 10 Update – FPI Matrix
FPI is still a bit more bullish on Stanford, as it has been all season, but even it is now convinced that Stanford is bad and should have bad things happen to them. (I’m assuming that second part.) By either model, it would be a massive surprise for the IrishĀ not to get to 11-1 in the regular season.
Week by Week Game Trends
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After a rough start to the season, Notre Dame has been trending steadily upward in both models since knocking off Virginia Tech in Week 6. All credit to the staff and the players for sticking with it until they worked it out. Ideally the staff would’ve figured out some of those answers sooner, but take a look at the flaming wasteland that is college football this year and consider that the vast majority of the sport has had a far harder time figuring anything out. I think most of us, even those who voted for 11-1 or 12-0 in the preseason survey, expected this to be at least something of a rebuilding year and those expectations have been met. I also think that if 11-1 with a New Year’s Six berth qualifies as a rebuilding year, it’s a sign that your program is in a pretty damn good spot.
Excelsior.
Just noticed that weāre ranked 2 spots behind Pitt and 1 spot behind 6-4 Iowa State in FPI. If you had told me that in the preseason, I would have assumed we were roughly a .500 team, not #9 in FPI rankings.
We have the highest odds of winning out of any team in the top 25, at 73%. Thatās about 14% higher than any other team in the top 25. If you had told me that in the preseason, I would have assumed we were a top 4 team in the country, gearing up for a guaranteed CFP birth. College football is weird.
If you told me these things in preseason, I would be perturbed you were giving these oddly specific yet generally unhelpful nuggets on the season and ask for more that I could bet on š
(Joke aside, I get and like that train of thought)
You’re surprised ISU is top 10??? Have you never read the internet?
FPI is the final straw for me: Fire BK and hire Campbell NOW. š
Sort of a tangent to this: SP+ has Wisconsin 4, Clemson 7, and Texas A&M 8. *I know* it’s a predictive model and not a resume measure, but when you have three three-loss teams in the top ten, two of which in particular have often looked like butt, it’s fair to question whether it’s as predictive as you think it is.
Maybe we should start looking at SPWarm rather than SP+
Like much of statistics: the advanced metrics are intellectually intriguing but of questionable utility. Maybe the committee should use them as tie breakers?
āIām Dabo Swinney and dadgum it I approve this message.ā
Ah yes a 99% chance of winning 10 games. exactly as I expected during that fun toledo purdue sequence
Brendan, can you get us all excited by giving us some FPI and SP+ data about how Michigan is going to lose?
Well… FPI gives Michigan an 89.2% win probability vs. Maryland and SP+ sets the spread at Michigan -23, so that’s exceedingly unlikely. However, FPI gives Michigan a 38.3% win probability against Ohio State and SP+ sets that line at OSU -5.5 – a number that seems at least 3 or 4 points too low to me, but Michigan has mastered the art of impressing SP+ with a real-life mediocre team so it’s not surprising.
In FEI, Ohio State is 4 and Michigan is 5, but there’s a sizable gap in rating between them – very slightly smaller than the gap between Michigan and… Notre Dame at 8. Sagarin also has the Big Game as OSU -5.5, interestingly. (Michigan fools a lot of models.) If you’re wondering, it has ND at 5 and Michigan at 6, and would have ND as a half point favorite on a neutral field.
I suppose we can go into the OSU-Michigan game expecting it to be somewhat close (based on the models), only to be pleasantly surprised when OSU shuts them out
At the far end of town, where the Maize horn helmet grows
and the wind smells slow and sour whenever it blows
and no one sings except for that one old Jalen Rose
They clothed in the most mournful shade of blue
Where losing spectacular goes back to Chris Double-Ewe
They love the team that will lose again to OSU
One joyous WIN!! every now and then
In aught-three and twenty-eleven
Crushed that the better winged helmet belongs to the Blue Hen
One out of nine
Two of seventeen
The most glorious streak over skunk the world has yet seen
The wrong Harbaugh they hired, the khakied one a bust
The ex-Stanford one, in him they mightily trust
This year is the year, they chant in self-disgust
For their shapes toward tubby they skew
Plus sized veins run through with beef stew
Loving the football team that almost always loses to OSU