Just wanted to throw out a few interesting things I found on Texas Tech, primarily with their defense, but I'll start with the offensive note first:
Their offense converts on 50.6% of their third down attempts (17th best in the NCAA), but what is most interesting is that their average third down distance to go is 7.6 yards (that is the 95th most in the country). That conversion rate with that average distance is pretty impressive. Without knowing a whole lot that tells me that they either have an extremely dynamic offense or their level of competition hasn't been the greatest, which leads me to...
I have begun to calculate a "strength of schedule" for each FBS team that basically looks at the opponents that each team has played and how those opponents rank in a given statistical category. This is important because if you look at Tech's defense you'll see that they have the 11th best rush yard per carry defense, 16th best pass yard per attempt defense, and the third best scoring defense by points per possession.
However, based off of the FBS teams they have played so far and their rankings in those categories Texas Tech has had the 2nd easiest schedule against rushing teams, 3rd easiest against passing teams, and the 5th easiest against scoring efficiency.
The one flaw in my SOS calculation is that I don't remove the stats from the head to head game with how opponents have done statistically because I haven't found a great way to do that just yet. So, Tech's defensive performance against their schedule is contributing to those rankings with their opponents and their struggling offenses.
Their offense converts on 50.6% of their third down attempts (17th best in the NCAA), but what is most interesting is that their average third down distance to go is 7.6 yards (that is the 95th most in the country). That conversion rate with that average distance is pretty impressive. Without knowing a whole lot that tells me that they either have an extremely dynamic offense or their level of competition hasn't been the greatest, which leads me to...
I have begun to calculate a "strength of schedule" for each FBS team that basically looks at the opponents that each team has played and how those opponents rank in a given statistical category. This is important because if you look at Tech's defense you'll see that they have the 11th best rush yard per carry defense, 16th best pass yard per attempt defense, and the third best scoring defense by points per possession.
However, based off of the FBS teams they have played so far and their rankings in those categories Texas Tech has had the 2nd easiest schedule against rushing teams, 3rd easiest against passing teams, and the 5th easiest against scoring efficiency.
The one flaw in my SOS calculation is that I don't remove the stats from the head to head game with how opponents have done statistically because I haven't found a great way to do that just yet. So, Tech's defensive performance against their schedule is contributing to those rankings with their opponents and their struggling offenses.
