Sagarin says

[westnodak93bison]

Wow. We'd be 22 point favorites over the Griz at the Fargodome?

[bisonaudit]

Building off of Hammersmith's work here's a percentage peak at the first two rounds. Uses Sagarin's home field of 3.73. 2.61 pts for a bye. 13.86 standard deviation.

NDSU 100% 98.8%
SC St 76.4% 1.1%
Furman 23.6% 0.1%

Montana 100% 81.4%
Cst Car 66.6% 13.3%
B Ckman 33.4% 5.3%

Maine 100% 71.7%
UNH 84.2% 26.5%
Lafette 15.8% 1.8%

SE L 100% 86.9%
SHSU 89.1% 12.8%
S Utah 10.9% 0.2%

EWU 100% 74.8%
NAU 32.9% 3.9%
SDSU 67.1% 21.4%

McNeese St 100% 78.2%
J'ville State 69.0% 16.4%
Samford 31.0% 5.5%

Towson 100% 91.5%
Fordham 68.4% 6.9%
Sacred Heart 31.6% 1.5%

Eastern Illinois 100% 98.0%
Butler 19.5% 0.0%
Tenn St 80.5% 1.9%

[bisonaudit]

Based on Sagarin's numbers (3.97 home field) and a 2.61 pt kicker for coming off a bye week, here's the outlook for the playoffs:

15-0 57.0%
14-1 26.4%
13-1 9.1%
12-1 6.2%
11-1 1.2%

Assumes a normal distribution of outcomes w/ Sagarin's projected spread as the mean and a standard deviation of 13.86. In round numbers this means that if the spread is 14 the model predicts that roughly 2/3 of the outcomes will be between a tie and a 28 point victory. Half of the remaining outcomes or about 1/6 of all the outcomes would be a victory by more than 28 and there would be roughly a 1 in 6 chance that the team favored by 14 would lose.


Playoffs:

Sagarin gives NDSU a 57.0% chance of winning the championship.
Most likely opponents by round (assuming NDSU advances):
SC State 76.4% (Furman 23.6%)
#8 Montana 81.4% (Coastal Carolina 13.3%)
#4 SE Louisiana 71.6% (#5 Maine 16.8%)
#2 Eastern Illinois 75.5% (#3 E. Washington 9.9%)

[Mayville Bison]

Building off of Hammersmith's work here's a percentage peak at the first two rounds. Uses Sagarin's home field of 3.73. 2.61 pts for a bye. 13.86 standard deviation.

NDSU 100% 98.8%
SC St 76.4% 1.1%
Furman 23.6% 0.1%

Montana 100% 81.4%
Cst Car 66.6% 13.3%
B Ckman 33.4% 5.3%

Maine 100% 71.7%
UNH 84.2% 26.5%
Lafette 15.8% 1.8%

SE L 100% 86.9%
SHSU 89.1% 12.8%
S Utah 10.9% 0.2%

EWU 100% 74.8%
NAU 32.9% 3.9%
SDSU 67.1% 21.4%

McNeese St 100% 78.2%
J'ville State 69.0% 16.4%
Samford 31.0% 5.5%

Towson 100% 91.5%
Fordham 68.4% 6.9%
Sacred Heart 31.6% 1.5%

Eastern Illinois 100% 98.0%
Butler 19.5% 0.0%
Tenn St 80.5% 1.9%

5 things jump out at me
1 - Butler has literally no chance at beating Eatern Illinois
2 - SCSU is really that big of a favorite? Is that because it's a home game?
3 - Either Sacred Heart (going on the road) is better than I thought or Fordham isn't as good as everyone (outside of Sagarin's "followers") thought. I would love for SH to win this game!
4 - SDSU has a legit shot of taking down not only NAU, but EWU.
5 - Can the last team in (UNH) go to Maine and win or will Maine avenge the regular season loss?

[bisonaudit]

NDSU and Eastern Illinois are both huge favorites to make the championship. 83.4% for NDSU and 75.5% for Eastern Illinois. Sagarin anticipate that will be the matchup 63 times out of 100.

[bisonaudit]

5 things jump out at me
1 - Butler has literally no chance at beating Eatern Illinois Butler is 820 million to 1 to win the title. They're 11 1/2 point dogs to Tenn. St. and if they advance they're 42 point dogs to Eastern Illinois (99.9%).
2 - SCSU is really that big of a favorite? Is that because it's a home game? Favored by 6 on a neutral field 9 1/2 at home.
3 - Either Sacred Heart (going on the road) is better than I thought or Fordham isn't as good as everyone (outside of Sagarin's "followers") thought. I would love for SH to win this game! Sacred Heart didn't play last week so they're getting 2.61 in the model for a bye. Sagarin likes Fordham by only 5 1/2 before bye or home field adjustments, 6 1/2 after. Sagarin evaluates Fordham 17th in the field of 24.
4 - SDSU has a legit shot of taking down not only NAU, but EWU. Sagarin makes SDSU the 7th best team in the field. 6 point road favorite @ Northern Arizona. Would be pick'em v. EWU on same rest and neutral site. +6 1/2 in potential round 2 matchup.
5 - Can the last team in (UNH) go to Maine and win or will Maine avenge the regular season loss? Yes. They're in the same spot @ Maine as SDSU @ EWU. Pick'em all things equal, +6.5 on rest and field advantages.

10 characters, see red above.

[THEsocalledfan]

Audit, I am sure this is more than you may want to comment on, but if you swap out EIU for NDSU and run numbers, what are the chances they win the title, etc.

[Mayville Bison]

10 characters, see red above.

Good write-up, thanks! Gonna see if anyone will take a $10 bet on Butler and give me those odds - ok, maybe not cuz that's like giving away $10

Not sure if I'd factor in the bye week adjustments. Since they don't know who their opponent will be, it's not a true bye. Really looking forward to seeing the 4/5 and 3/6 quarter games as I think there will be at least one non-seed to be playing.

[bisonaudit]

NDSU and Eastern Illinois are both huge favorites to make the championship. 83.4% for NDSU and 75.5% for Eastern Illinois. Sagarin anticipate that will be the matchup 63 times out of 100.

Audit, I am sure this is more than you may want to comment on, but if you swap out EIU for NDSU and run numbers, what are the chances they win the title, etc.

EIU would be 73.1% to make the championship and NDSU 85.1%. Same matchup 62 times in 100.

By this measure Sagarin thinks that the bottom half of the draw is marginally easier than the top half. I'd speculate the primary driver of that would be avoiding SE Louisiana. Sagarin likes them more than EWU. 4 1/2 points on a neutral field.

[bisonaudit]

Good write-up, thanks! Gonna see if anyone will take a $10 bet on Butler and give me those odds - ok, maybe not cuz that's like giving away $10

Not sure if I'd factor in the bye week adjustments. Since they don't know who their opponent will be, it's not a true bye. Really looking forward to seeing the 4/5 and 3/6 quarter games as I think there will be at least one non-seed to be playing.

You're probably more willing to post the $10 than anyone would be to put up the $8.2 billion on the other side.