Paul Prattles On

Welcome Back! What an exciting weekend of football! This was one of those weekends where we had several surprise results, but when we look back at the end of the year, they may not have been surprises after all. Some teams are starting to come into clearer focus, by which I mean we can begin to see whether they are contenders or pretenders. Others are less clear, as they started slow but look much better, or the opposite- started fast but are already falling off the map, so to speak. And for the 3rd week in a row, we had a P5 school fire it's coach. This week, it's Georgia Tech, who has replaced HC Geoff Collins with interim HC Brent Key. Let's get to the recaps! Teams Who Defeated FCS Opponents, Just As They Should Have Illinois defeated Chattanooga 31-0 Pittsburgh defeated Rhode Island 45-24 UTSA defeated Texas Southern 52-24 Texas State defeated Houston Baptist 34-0 Teams Who Escaped An FCS Upset Ohio had to outscore Fordham 21-3 in the 4th quarter to avoid the upset ...

Welcome Back! I had my best week yet, as I went 60-12, or 83.3%!  It was my first time over 80% this year. Overall I am 197-51, or 79.4%, which is a 1.6% improvement. Hopefully, I can continue to improve. There are some very difficult to predict matchups this week, but only 66 games. On to the picks! Thursday, September 22 West Virginia @ Virginia Tech - This game could go a long way toward defining the season for both teams. The Mountaineers lead the series 29-23-1, and won 27-21 last year, but the Hokies have won 3 of the last 4, and 10 of the last 14, dating back to 1994. They 1st played in 1912, but after playing 4 times through 1917, they didn't play again until 1952. WVU won 11 of the 1st 15 played, but are only 7-12-1 in Blacksburg, as this game, besides being played there and in Morgantown, has been played in Charleston, WV, Huntington, WV, Bluefield, WV, Richmond, Va, and Landover, Md. Both are coming off short weeks, but while WVU has the worse record, they have played a ...

Welcome Back! On Wednesdays I have my  Odds and Ends .  This is where I present interesting statistics that you can't easily find elsewhere. Enjoy! Inter-conference results  Now that everyone has played multiple games, we have more to go on.  For these purposes, all Independents (even Notre Dame) are considered G5.  Here are the results of all out-of-conference games. Overall 1) SEC 31-5 .861 2) ACC 27-6 .818 3) Big Ten 29-8 .784 4) Big 12 21-6 .778 5) Pac 12 25-8 .756 6) AAC 17-11 .607 7) SBC 19-19 .500 8) CUSA 15-18 .455 9) MWC 16-20 .444 10) MAC 12-21 .364 11) Ind 8-15 .348 12) FCS 7-90 .072 The SEC takes over the top spot while the AAC moves into the top G5 place. The MAC moves out of the bottom ahead of the Independents. The SBC was 2-9 in OOC games this week after their fantastic week last week. vs FBS 1) SEC 22-5 .814 2) Big Ten 22-7 .759 3) ACC 16-6 .727 4) Big 12 13-6 .684 5) Pac 12 15-8 .652 6) AAC 9-10 .474 7) SBC 10-19 .345 8) CUSA 7-17 .292 9) MWC 7...

Welcome Back! After 3 weeks, we are starting to get an idea of which teams are pretty good, and which ones aren't. However, my rankings are still heavily weighted toward my preseason factors, so although there is more movement, some teams are still way too high, and others way too low. This will all come out in the end, but it is a little frustrating in the early part of the season. However, I feel a little explanation is due, so that you, the reader, can get a little understanding of how my Power Rankings work. I use my own formula-no, I'm not going to give that away- and none of it is subjective, except for the weight assigned to each aspect, of course. Before the season starts, I use 8 data points to come up with my preseason rankings. Some are worth more than others, but each team receives a set of points from each of these data points. After compiling these, the points ranged from a high of 1253.83 (Alabama) to a low of 30.455 (UMass). The other 129 teams fall somewhere in...