Coastal race affects Clemson, FSU playoff hopes ESPN college football reporter Heather Dinich explains the importance of games like the one between No. 23 Pitt and North Carolina affects the title aspirations for the ACC’s Atlantic division champion. 0 Shares print Have you ever watched a game and thought, “That team is way better than the score suggests”? Or the opposite: “Geez, I cannot believe that team is unbeaten.” Of course you have. It’s the eternal battle of eye test versus stat sheet, or as we’re calling it, man versus metric. ESPN Stats & Information analytics writer Sharon Katz takes a run through some of the more debatable data, and then ESPN senior writer Mark Schlabach offers his take. Let’s just say they agreed to disagree … but their conversation is engaging, just the same. Stat sheet says Ohio State most likely to finish unbeaten Katz: FPI projects there is a 77 percent chance that at least one Power 5 team enters bowl season undefeated, and it pins Ohio State and Clemson, each at 33 percent, as the most likely to run the table. Currently, Ohio State has the slightest edge, less than half a percentage point, over Clemson when it comes to their respective chances to win out. With games against Michigan State and Michigan, the Buckeyes have a tougher remaining schedule than Clemson, but they also have one fewer game, and one fewer chance to lose, than the Tigers. Even when a team has a 90 percent chance to win, it is still expected to lose one out of every 10 times, so the extra game makes a difference. …
Continue Reading: Pick a winner to run the table: Tigers or Buckeyes
