Half Way Point

[Catsrgrood]

The conference slate may have just begun, but the regular season itself is halfway over already.

A lot of talk lately about differences in strengths of schedules, thought I'd do a fairly quick comparison and rundown of the Big Sky and the handful of the top contenders.

This is their rankings among all 126 FCS Teams

Team-Massey Rating-SOS-Defensive PPG-Offensive PPG

SDSU......1....22.....7....16
NDSU......2....59.....1....6
MSU.......3....2......11...25
Tarleton...4...38......8.....4
um.........5....35....47...9
UCD.......6....13.....91...24
NAU......10....9......85...34
Idaho.....14....4.....42....61
SacSt.....26....28....36....45
Weber....32....11....107...88
EWU......37....15....100...72
ISU........39....24....66....12
CP.........41....34....72....32
UNC......67....55....17.....97
PSU.......79....1.....115....124

NDSU has undoubtedly looked impressive, having the #1 ranked defense and #6 ranked offense is impressive. Seeing that it's against the 59th toughest schedule so far also adds a lot of context. Not to say it won't continue, but it's definitely too early to call this team untouchable.

MSU's defense has been great as we've all seen. Officially 11th in the FCS in PPG, but seeing that we've played the 2nd toughest schedule up to this point adds a lot of context to that as well. Playing the #3 team in the FBS and going two extra periods against the #2 team in the FCS skews the data a bit. Switch out our game with Oregon with some random D2 team from the PNW and we'd likely be sitting much higher than 11th.

Really have to feel for PSU right now (kind of). They've played the toughest schedule in the FCS up to this point. And rank 115th out of 126 in PPG scored and 124th out of 126 in PPG given up. That's rough.

[coloradocat]

The conference slate may have just begun, but the regular season itself is halfway over already.

A lot of talk lately about differences in strengths of schedules, thought I'd do a fairly quick comparison and rundown of the Big Sky and the handful of the top contenders.

This is their rankings among all 126 FCS Teams

Team-Massey Rating-SOS-Defensive PPG-Offensive PPG

SDSU......1....22.....7....16
NDSU......2....59.....1....6
MSU.......3....2......11...25
Tarleton...4...38......8.....4
um.........5....35....47...9
UCD.......6....13.....91...24
NAU......10....9......85...34
Idaho.....14....4.....42....61
SacSt.....26....28....36....45
Weber....32....11....107...88
EWU......37....15....100...72
ISU........39....24....66....12
CP.........41....34....72....32
UNC......67....55....17.....97
PSU.......79....1.....115....124

NDSU has undoubtedly looked impressive, having the #1 ranked defense and #6 ranked offense is impressive. Seeing that it's against the 59th toughest schedule so far also adds a lot of context. Not to say it won't continue, but it's definitely too early to call this team untouchable.

MSU's defense has been great as we've all seen. Officially 11th in the FCS in PPG, but seeing that we've played the 2nd toughest schedule up to this point adds a lot of context to that as well. Playing the #3 team in the FBS and going two extra periods against the #2 team in the FCS skews the data a bit. Switch out our game with Oregon with some random D2 team from the PNW and we'd likely be sitting much higher than 11th.

Really have to feel for PSU right now (kind of). They've played the toughest schedule in the FCS up to this point. And rank 115th out of 126 in PPG scored and 124th out of 126 in PPG given up. That's rough.

If you only count FCS games, NDSU is giving up 9.2 points per game and we're giving up 10.0, but 13 of our 40 total allowed were in OT to SDSU. If you remove Oregon from the SOS calculation we're no longer 2 but we're still way higher than 59 and also better than 22.

[Prodigal Cat]

The conference slate may have just begun, but the regular season itself is halfway over already.

A lot of talk lately about differences in strengths of schedules, thought I'd do a fairly quick comparison and rundown of the Big Sky and the handful of the top contenders.

This is their rankings among all 126 FCS Teams

Team-Massey Rating-SOS-Defensive PPG-Offensive PPG

SDSU......1....22.....7....16
NDSU......2....59.....1....6
MSU.......3....2......11...25
Tarleton...4...38......8.....4
um.........5....35....47...9
UCD.......6....13.....91...24
NAU......10....9......85...34
Idaho.....14....4.....42....61
SacSt.....26....28....36....45
Weber....32....11....107...88
EWU......37....15....100...72
ISU........39....24....66....12
CP.........41....34....72....32
UNC......67....55....17.....97
PSU.......79....1.....115....124

NDSU has undoubtedly looked impressive, having the #1 ranked defense and #6 ranked offense is impressive. Seeing that it's against the 59th toughest schedule so far also adds a lot of context. Not to say it won't continue, but it's definitely too early to call this team untouchable.

MSU's defense has been great as we've all seen. Officially 11th in the FCS in PPG, but seeing that we've played the 2nd toughest schedule up to this point adds a lot of context to that as well. Playing the #3 team in the FBS and going two extra periods against the #2 team in the FCS skews the data a bit. Switch out our game with Oregon with some random D2 team from the PNW and we'd likely be sitting much higher than 11th.

Really have to feel for PSU right now (kind of). They've played the toughest schedule in the FCS up to this point. And rank 115th out of 126 in PPG scored and 124th out of 126 in PPG given up. That's rough.

If you only count FCS games, NDSU is giving up 9.2 points per game and we're giving up 10.0, but 13 of our 40 total allowed were in OT to SDSU. If you remove Oregon from the SOS calculation we're no longer 2 but we're still way higher than 59 and also better than 22.

I know Illinois St was ranked higher than NAU but that was wrong. I think Herder had them one spot away from each other last week, they are basically in the same tier. So with that context if you take FCS only with the Cats played SDSU and NAU while NDSU has only played ISU among ranked matchups. So to be only .8 points difference I would say the Cats are playing better Defense. With the Bison hosting SIU this weekend I could see most of those numbers pointing to the Cats a week from now.