Sagarin says

[IzzyFlexion]

The Massey bracket:

SHSU
SBU
	SHSU
	MSU
MSU
UNH
		SHSU
		UNI
UNI
WOFF
	UNI
	MONT
MONT
CARK
			UNI
			NDSU
GSU
ODU
	GSU
	ASU
ASU
MAINE
		GSU
		NDSU
TOW
LEH
	TOW
	NDSU
NDSU
JMU

Imagine the buildup if it does end up being an NDSU/UNI Championship.
The winner's bragging rights will be unprecedented!
The losing team's fans will be on 24 hour suicide watch not wanting to face the cyber-pummeling.

[NDSUBowler]

Here is what Massey says about the FCS playoffs...

http://masseyratings.com/rate/cf2011.htm

Interesting that 'on paper' the top 3 seeds correctly got the easiest, 2nd easiest and 3rd easiest schedules in the playoffs...impressive. Also funny #4 Montana has 6th easiest schedule but #8 Mont St is 5th easiest.

Depth column (average expected rounds each team will survive) has us as a very clear #1 at 3.66. GSU (3.06) and SHSU (3.04) 2nd and 3rd respectively.

If you're a gambling fiend... put your bet to win championship on NDSU at 2.63-1? or Stony Brook at 1627.63-1???

[GradBison]

Anybody has that game simulator/predictor website handy? I can't seem to find it.

Thanks in advance.

[TAILG8R]

Anybody has that game simulator/predictor website handy? I can't seem to find it.

Thanks in advance.

This one?
http://nationalsportsrankings.com/in...n=com_oneonone

North Dakota St.(2011) wins 87 of 100 matchups against James Madison(2011)

[bisonaudit]

Sagarin has the same predicted bracket as Massey, BTW.

Sagarin also says you should take Stony Brook @ 1628-1 but not NDSU at 2.63.

Sagarin says NDSU over JMU 92 out of 100.

Sagarin, by a small margin says, Ga. Southern, is the best team in the field so NDSU getting them at home in the semi's rather than on a neutral field in the championship is quite advantagous to NDSU in simulations built off of his assessments.

[GradBison]

This one?
http://nationalsportsrankings.com/in...n=com_oneonone

North Dakota St.(2011) wins 87 of 100 matchups against James Madison(2011)

Thank you sir!

[Hammersmith]

I'm starting to wonder if there was a mistake regarding GSU's ranking last week. At this time of year, the ratings are barely moving from week to week(tenths or even hundredths of a point). But GSU suddenly jumped ahead of us for one week, then dropped 2.5 points after a win(we dropped 0.04). Oh well, guess we'll never know.

Anyway, I've updated the list by dropping Towson and adding Maine. I'll continue to include our upcoming opponent and both possible opponents from the next round. Sagarin has us as 12.45 point favorites over Lehigh, 11.28 over Maine, and 5.51 over GSU.

If anyone doesn't understand what the numbers mean, I'll explain again(I should have done this a couple times during the season). First, all ratings come from the PREDICTOR column of Sagarin. The rate column from my chart is the raw predictor number. My predict column is what Sagarin predicts the outcome of the game will be, factoring in home field advantage. If the number is positive(all of them are), we are predicted to win by that amount. The next column(actual) is what the score actually was for that game(blank if we haven't played the game yet). The diff column is the difference between Sagarin's prediction and the actual result. You can use that column to see if the Bison under-performed, over-performed, or played at their typical level for any game. Mostly, it confirms what we already know: We sucked at YSU, SIU & WIU, while we played pretty good ball at Minnesota, SDSU & StFU. The rest of the games were within a TD of the prediction.

Week 14

			rate   predict  actual	 diff
66  North Dakota State	70.40
69  Northern Iowa	69.76  + 3.94  + 8.00	+4.06
76  Georgia Southern	68.19  + 5.51
89  Minnesota		64.09  + 3.01  +13.00   +9.99
102 Maine		62.42  +11.28
103 Illinois State	62.29  +11.41  +10.00   -1.41
109 Lehigh		61.25  +12.45
113 Youngstown State	60.69  +13.01  - 3.00  -16.01
125 Indiana State	57.68  + 9.42  + 9.00   -0.42
130 James Madison	56.52  +17.18  +12.00   -5.18
149 Southern Illinois	53.23  +13.87  + 6.00   -7.87
152 South Dakota State	52.13  +14.97  +24.00	+9.03
165 Missouri State	49.20  +24.50  +30.00	+5.50
188 Lafayette		43.81  +29.89  +36.00   +6.11
196 Western Illinois	42.29  +24.81  +16.00   -8.81
233 Saint Francis-Pa	30.16  +43.54  +53.00   +9.46

Week 13

			rate   predict  actual	 diff
61  Georgia Southern	70.78  + 2.03
65  North Dakota State	70.44
68  Northern Iowa	70.14  + 2.67  + 8.00	+5.33
92  Minnesota		64.01  + 4.06  +13.00   +8.94
100 Illinois State	62.44  +10.37  +10.00   -0.37
112 Youngstown State	60.65  +12.16  - 3.00  -15.16
117 Lehigh		59.55  +13.26
121 Indiana State	57.78  +10.29  + 9.00   -1.29
124 Towson		57.51  +15.30
130 James Madison	56.52  +16.29
149 Southern Illinois	53.42  +14.65  + 6.00   -8.65
152 South Dakota State	52.30  +15.77  +24.00	+8.23
164 Missouri State	49.43  +23.38  +30.00	+6.72
192 Lafayette		42.75  +30.06  +36.00   +5.94
194 Western Illinois	42.44  +25.63  +16.00   -9.63
237 Saint Francis-Pa	29.31  +43.50  +53.00   +9.50

Conferences

Week 14
1. GWC	58.21
2. MVFC	57.52
3. SoCn	56.34
4. BSC	55.42
5. CAA	54.34

Week 13
1. GWC	58.51
2. SoCn	58.39
3. MVFC	57.66
4. BSC	55.54
5. CAA	52.37

[bisonaudit]

Per sagarin App St should have won by 5 but they lost by 22. That's a 2 standard deviation type of outlier so I wouldn't be suprised to see that reverb through the model. Same conference so there may be some kind of SOS feedback loop happening too. Ga. Southern won but they underperformed sagarin expectation. I think that's why you're seeing such a large change.

NDSU 82.2% to advance.
56.9% to make the final.
33.3% to win it all.

Ga. Southern 16.3%
Sam Houston St. 15.7%
Montana 14.2%
Northern Iowa 14.1%
Montana State 2.5%
Maine 2.2%
Leigh 1.8%

[NWNDBison]

Computer games are unreliable, but fun, nonetheless.

[bisonaudit]

The unreliable bit isn't the computer. They're utterly predictable. The variance is in human performance. Either the human telling the computer what to do or the humans performing the actions the computer is attempting to simulate.