We're two weeks from Rivalry Week and three from the conference championship games. We still have seven unbeaten teams (five in power conferences) and eight primary CFP contenders. Things still feel awfully uncertain (in a good way). But the top three teams in the country seem awfully certain. Michigan, Georgia and Ohio State began 2023 pretty far ahead of the field. Oregon remains within striking distance at No. 4, but No. 1 Michigan is about the same distance from No. 5 Penn State (8.7 points) as PSU is from No. 19 Ole Miss. We certainly know who the best teams in the country have been this season.
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 that gives credit for big wins or particularly brave scheduling -- no good predictive system is. 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.
Here are the full rankings:
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:
NMSU: up 3.9 adjusted points per game (ranking rose from 81st to 66th)
Appalachian State: up 3.4 points (from 71st to 59th)
Liberty: up 3.2 points (from 43rd to 27th)
Bowling Green: up 3.1 points (from 107th to 99th)
Middle Tennessee: up 3.0 points (from 113th to 102nd)
UNLV: up 2.8 points (from 73rd to 63rd)
Sam Houston: up 2.8 points (from 127th to 119th)
Northwestern: up 2.8 points (from 89th to 75th)
Hawai'i: up 2.5 points (from 124th to 118th)
Western Michigan: up 2.1 points (from 118th to 114th)
The weight of conference adjustments gets heavier after 10 games, and a couple of Group of Five conferences (the Sun Belt and CUSA) benefited the most. Among top-20 teams, here are the three that saw the biggest movement this week:
Texas A&M: up 1.2 points (from 18th to 15th)
Missouri: up 1.0 points (from 21st to 17th)
Georgia: up 1.0 points (no change from second)
Because A&M, Mizzou and Georgia won conference games by a combined 139-34, I guess that list makes sense. (Their three vanquished opponents -- Mississippi State, Tennessee and Ole Miss -- all fell by quite a bit, too.)
MOVING DOWN
Here are the 10 teams whose ratings fell the most:
USC: down 4.4 points (from 17th to 24th)
Kentucky: down 3.5 points (from 25th to 31st)
Tennessee: down 3.4 points (from 11th to 16th)
Ole Miss: down 3.3 points (from 15th to 19th)
Vanderbilt: down 3.3 points (from 104th to 115th)
Michigan State: down 3.1 points (from 72nd to 86th)
Pitt: down 3.1 points (from 68th to 78th)
Mississippi State: down 3.0 points (from 60th to 69th)
Arkansas: down 2.8 points (from 50th to 58th)
Oklahoma State: down 2.7 points (from 31st to 45th)
The SEC saw a downward shift with the change in conference adjustments, and because a number of SEC teams suffered in-conference blowouts, they fell significantly. In Mississippi State's case, the drop was likely overdue.
Conference rankings
Here are the FBS' 10 conferences, ranked by average SP+. We're pretty locked in until bowl season at this point.
1. SEC: +9.5 average points per team (32.8 offense, 23.4 defense)
2. Pac-12: +6.3 average (32.8 offense, 26.4 defense)
3. Big Ten: +5.9 average (24.6 offense, 18.8 defense)
4. Big 12: +5.5 average (30.3 offense, 24.9 defense)
5. ACC: +4.1 average (27.7 offense, 23.6 defense)
6. Sun Belt: -4.2 average (25.7 offense, 29.9 defense)
7. MWC: -7.6 average (24.1 offense, 31.8 defense)
8. Conference USA: -8.4 average (21.4 offense, 29.8 defense)
9. AAC: -8.5 average (24.3 offense, 32.7 defense)
10. MAC: -11.9 average (17.2 offense, 29.0 defense)
The SEC still leads the way after the most recent adjustments, but its average is under 10 points per team, and three teams have fallen out of the top 50. (Vanderbilt is now in the bottom 20.)
Résumé SP+
Because 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. Michigan (10-0): +3.4 points
2. Ohio State (10-0): +0.1
3. Georgia (10-0): -0.3
4. Florida State (10-0): -2.6
5. Oregon (9-1): -5.1
6. Washington (10-0): -5.3
7. Alabama (9-1): -10.9
8. Texas (9-1): -13.0
9. Penn State (8-2): -13.6
10. Oklahoma (8-2): -16.8
11. JMU (10-0): -18.3
12. Liberty (10-0): -18.9
13. Louisville (9-1): -19.0
14. Kansas State (7-3): -21.0
15. Oregon State (8-2): -21.6
The same top three lead the way here, too, albeit in a slightly different order.
