Football Power Index: Week 2 College Football Edge vs The Spread ◀
Where FPI sees a Week 2 college football edge vs. the spread
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The betting market and our Football Power Index (FPI) often agree -- but not always. Each week we'll highlight some of the instances where our model significantly disagrees with the spread. We're looking at not only which side FPI feels is the right side but also why.
7 p.m. ET Saturday FPI prediction: LSU by 11.8 We mentioned this game before the season as a best bet -- since then, the line has gone up ... but so has FPI's predicted point margin. Week 1 only emboldened FPI's belief in the Tigers, as Joe Burrow and the offense lit up Georgia Southern (even after adjusting for opponent, it was still impressive). Since LSU's shutout loss against Alabama last year, no returning quarterback has had a higher QBR than Burrow.
While Texas was fine in Week 1, FPI maintains its overall pessimism on the Longhorns. QB Sam Ehlinger was slightly worse in QBR than Burrow last year and last week, and he is one of only eight starters back for Texas. That inexperience should show up against a tough Tigers team that FPI now rates as the third-best in the country.
(Bonus: LSU has a 13 percent chance to win the national championship according to Allstate Playoff Predictor, well beyond the +2200 number at Caesars.)
7 p.m. ET, Saturday FPI prediction: Penn State by 38.7
One place where FPI shines: We have a rating for not only every FBS team but also every FCS team. And Robert Morris, which Buffalo beat 38-10 last week? It's the 121st-best FCS team, so that was actually a disappointing performance from Buffalo. Meanwhile, Penn State obliterated Idaho, which we consider almost 20 points better than Robert Morris, 79-7. It isn't perfectly transitive, of course, but there's some signal to be found, even against terrible teams. FPI improved its rating for Penn State as a result.
Noon ET, Saturday FPI prediction: Ohio State by 9.7
Justin Fields lit it up in Week 1 (QBR: 92.8), but he and head coach Ryan Day are still relatively unproven. And Cincinnati's defense is a completely different animal. In fact, we make the Bearcats' D 10 points better per game than FAU's -- and they just turned in the highest efficiency defensive performance among Group of 5 teams after adjusting for opponent quality.
Absolutely monster differential here. UCLA deserves criticism for its performance against the Bearcats in Week 1, but you know who else deserves the hate? San Diego State! It beat Weber State by an old-fashioned 6-0 score. FPI bumped down UCLA's rating by 2.5 points, but even if we had moved it down by double that, we'd consider the Bruins double-digit favorites over the Aztecs on a neutral field. And it's not a neutral field.
Noon. ET, Saturday FPI prediction: Virginia Tech by 34.7
The Hokies found themselves on the wrong side of fumble luck against Boston College. Virginia Tech lost both of its fumbles while the Eagles lost neither of theirs. No, we didn't forget about Old Dominion's victory over Virginia Tech last year, but let's not overweight that one outlier against a largely different set of starters.
Scores can be deceiving. Akron's 42-3 loss to Illinois was only a slightly worse performance than UAB's 24-19 win over Alabama State, according to our efficiency numbers that factor in opponent strength. As a result, both teams were heavily downgraded by FPI after Week 1. No one is doubting UAB is the better team, but only by about six points on a neutral field or about three on the road.
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Football Power Index: Week 2 College Football Edge vs The Spread ◀
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