[Husker] Game worries

[Paul Dalen]

Wasn't referring to the odds of winning one game. I was referring to
my hunch that in the past, the highly ranked home team beats the
unranked visitors at least 95% of the time.

Nothing but a WAG, but I doubt it's much less than that.

The Stanford over USC games come around once a decade or so.

Sent from my iPhone

On Oct 12, 2010, at 11:42 AM, Steve Reichenbach <reich at inetnebr.com> wrote:

> Massey's website actually has % odds on each remaining game.  Actually,
> few games are 95% unless a very good team plays a very weak schedule
> (as do Boise St and TCI).
>
> Here are his game-by-game odds for NU shown as a product to give the
> likelihood of an undefeated regular season record:
> .79 * .70 * .80 * .80 * .97 * .76 * .92 = .24
> So, according to Massey, NU has about 1/4 shot at an undefeated record
> in the regular season, even though their odds of winning each game are
> very good.  Add in the Big 12 Championship game and the odds are no
> better than 1/6.
>
> Contrast that with Boise St:
> .98 * .98 * .95 * .91 * .96 * .66 * .99 = .52
> Basically, they have one game that is much of a contest and figure to
> have a 1/2 shot at being undefeated.
>
> TCU is about the same as Boise St, with one tough game:
> .97 * .90 * .97 * .60 * .97 * 1.00 = .49
>
> Oregon is about the same as NU, but without a conference championship
> game:
> .92 * .73 * .93 * .66 * .81 * .71 = .24
>
> Ohio St has a better shot, again without a conference championship game:
> .76 * .94 * .94 * .90 * .57 * .90 = .31
>
> LSU is Massey's highest ranked undefeated SEC team:
> 1.00 * .52 * .42 * 1.00 * .85 * .54 = 0.10
> And, that is without the SEC Championship game.  Ouch.
>
>> True. But upsets are rare. The better team rarely loses, especially at
>> home.  I wish I had time to do the research on this, but I'll bet that
>> when a top five team plays an unranked team at home, the ranked team
>> wins in at least 95% of the games, maybe close to 99%.