2019 ESPN FPI Game-By-Game Predictions

[DuckTownHusker]

This ESPN piece has us at 10-2 for the season, with losses to Ohio State and Minnesota.

Shockingly, the FPI numbers give us a 42% chance of beating the Buckeyes and only a 39.5% chance to beat the Gophers. That's right, according to their projections, Minnesota will be a tougher game for us than Ohio State. As the article points out, "the Gophers have multiple quarterbacks with starting experience, multiple 1,000-yard rushers, arguably the best receiver in the Big Ten and a defense that improved significantly after a mid-season 2018 coordinator change." Plus, the game is in the Twin Cities.

While I certainly want to beat Minnesota, if we have to lose a game I'd still rather lose to the Gophers providing that we beat Wisconsin and Iowa.

Nebraska Huskers 2019: ESPN FPI’s game-by-game predictions

...

247sports.com

 

[NU_Alum]

10-2 would put Frost in contention for HC of the year. Obviously I'm hoping for it, but I'll be surprised if we get past 8 wins.

 

[huskrthill]

This ESPN piece has us at 10-2 for the season, with losses to Ohio State and Minnesota.

Shockingly, the FPI numbers give us a 42% chance of beating the Buckeyes and only a 39.5% chance to beat the Gophers. That's right, according to their projections, Minnesota will be a tougher game for us than Ohio State. As the article points out, "the Gophers have multiple quarterbacks with starting experience, multiple 1,000-yard rushers, arguably the best receiver in the Big Ten and a defense that improved significantly after a mid-season 2018 coordinator change." Plus, the game is in the Twin Cities.

While I certainly want to beat Minnesota, if we have to lose a game I'd still rather lose to the Gophers providing that we beat Wisconsin and Iowa.

Nebraska Huskers 2019: ESPN FPI’s game-by-game predictions

...

247sports.com

Duck, do you know what they've predicted for the Huskers the past couple of years?

 

[Huskerthom]

This ESPN piece has us at 10-2 for the season, with losses to Ohio State and Minnesota.

Shockingly, the FPI numbers give us a 42% chance of beating the Buckeyes and only a 39.5% chance to beat the Gophers. That's right, according to their projections, Minnesota will be a tougher game for us than Ohio State. As the article points out, "the Gophers have multiple quarterbacks with starting experience, multiple 1,000-yard rushers, arguably the best receiver in the Big Ten and a defense that improved significantly after a mid-season 2018 coordinator change." Plus, the game is in the Twin Cities.

While I certainly want to beat Minnesota, if we have to lose a game I'd still rather lose to the Gophers providing that we beat Wisconsin and Iowa.

Nebraska Huskers 2019: ESPN FPI’s game-by-game predictions

...

247sports.com

No no no no no, we must never lose to row row row you PJs. Most annoying coach in all of sports.

 

[36Blast]

I'll be happy with 7+ wins with eyes set on 2020 as the point we become consistent title contenders.

 

[JHudson]

The author of that 247Sports article somehow missed the fact that the ESPN FPI projects an 8-4 record for Nebraska. Chances are you're not going to win every game you're favored to win.

 

[YUENGLING]

This ESPN piece has us at 10-2 for the season, with losses to Ohio State and Minnesota.

Shockingly, the FPI numbers give us a 42% chance of beating the Buckeyes and only a 39.5% chance to beat the Gophers. That's right, according to their projections, Minnesota will be a tougher game for us than Ohio State. As the article points out, "the Gophers have multiple quarterbacks with starting experience, multiple 1,000-yard rushers, arguably the best receiver in the Big Ten and a defense that improved significantly after a mid-season 2018 coordinator change." Plus, the game is in the Twin Cities.

While I certainly want to beat Minnesota, if we have to lose a game I'd still rather lose to the Gophers providing that we beat Wisconsin and Iowa.

Nebraska Huskers 2019: ESPN FPI’s game-by-game predictions

...

247sports.com

I believe the Huskers are going to need a ton of points to beat Minnesota and I believe they will score a ton of points on that defense.

 

[NU_Alum]

The author of that 247Sports article somehow missed the fact that the ESPN FPI projects an 8-4 record for Nebraska. Chances are you're not going to win every game you're favored to win.

This is where I'm at. We're relatively young, still a new coaching staff, very thin at too many positions, and we're going to make "old" mistakes because some of these kids have had too many different coaches at their position.

 

[DuckTownHusker]

Duck, do you know what they've predicted for the Huskers the past couple of years?

I don't have the FPI numbers on the Huskers, but given that we churned out back-to-back seasons with 4 wins, they probably didn't compile numbers on us.

However, we CAN look at the 2018 numbers for the Top 25 to get an idea of how accurate the FPI generally is.

Here's the 2018 FPI predictions (W/L, % and Ranking) versus how those teams actually fared.

What's interesting that is 12 teams "overshot" their winning percentage (second-to-last column), but only 5 teams actually overshot their ranking. This is reflected in the overall averages at the bottom-right of the chart.

Not every team plays exactly 13 games, but on a 13 game season (assuming a bowl) a difference of ±0.077 is equal to about 1 game. In other words, Oklahoma State finished the season with a W/L percent -0.144 lower than what the FPI predicted. That translates to about two games' difference. You can see that in the W/L column as the FPI projected 3.9 losses and they actually finished with 6. On average, the FPI was accurate to within a half game.

Rankings were a bit more random as several teams fell by double digit numbers. For mathematical purposes, a team falling out of the rankings gets a "26" ranking as the 26th place is just as good as 56th. Or, once you're out of the Top 25, nobody cares. In both percentages a rankings, though, the FPI had a tendency to overrate teams from the get-go. Teams were ranked about a half-game too high and about 4.5 spots too high in the Top 25.

If you apply that logic to 2019, Nebraska is projected in the FPI to finish at 10-2, which means that 9-3 is much more likely. What's funnier to me is that in the latest projections, we're not even in the Top 25. When you look at 2018 and see a bunch of 7-6 or 6-7 teams rounding out the Top 25, I'm not sure how a 9-3 team (or even 8-4) doesn't make that cut.

Again, this is a super loose correlation, so there's not exact math at work here. But if you're taking the FPI as your single source of truth, I'd say we finish 9-3 and somewhere in a #10-15 ranking.

 

[huskrthill]

I don't have the FPI numbers on the Huskers, but given that we churned out back-to-back seasons with 4 wins, they probably didn't compile numbers on us.

However, we CAN look at the 2018 numbers for the Top 25 to get an idea of how accurate the FPI generally is.

Here's the 2018 FPI predictions (W/L, % and Ranking) versus how those teams actually fared.

What's interesting that is 12 teams "overshot" their winning percentage (second-to-last column), but only 5 teams actually overshot their ranking. This is reflected in the overall averages at the bottom-right of the chart.

Not every team plays exactly 13 games, but on a 13 game season (assuming a bowl) a difference of ±0.077 is equal to about 1 game. In other words, Oklahoma State finished the season with a W/L percent -0.144 lower than what the FPI predicted. That translates to about two games' difference. You can see that in the W/L column as the FPI projected 3.9 losses and they actually finished with 6. On average, the FPI was accurate to within a half game.

Rankings were a bit more random as several teams fell by double digit numbers. For mathematical purposes, a team falling out of the rankings gets a "26" ranking as the 26th place is just as good as 56th. Or, once you're out of the Top 25, nobody cares. In both percentages a rankings, though, the FPI had a tendency to overrate teams from the get-go. Teams were ranked about a half-game too high and about 4.5 spots too high in the Top 25.

If you apply that logic to 2019, Nebraska is projected in the FPI to finish at 10-2, which means that 9-3 is much more likely. What's funnier to me is that in the latest projections, we're not even in the Top 25. When you look at 2018 and see a bunch of 7-6 or 6-7 teams rounding out the Top 25, I'm not sure how a 9-3 team (or even 8-4) doesn't make that cut.

Again, this is a super loose correlation, so there's not exact math at work here. But if you're taking the FPI as your single source of truth, I'd say we finish 9-3 and somewhere in a #10-15 ranking.

Thanks, I'll head to my nearest sports book now.

 

[Greatest Fan of All]

I believe 10 wins is very possible and, if the defense can hold up their end, quite likely.

 

[huskerator 5000]

Duck, do you know what they've predicted for the Huskers the past couple of years?

ESPN FPI projected NU to have about 6 wins in each of 2017 and 2018. I don't have original sources but those are the numbers in this post:

Season o/u set at 5.5 wins

I'm not trying to pick on you here, but it's kinda sad to me that the Riley/Pederhorst debacle has caused so many fans to reign in their expectations so much. We went from "A trained monkey can get 9 wins" to "The best coach in the country can't win more than 6" in a short and painful three...

forum.huskermax.com

 

[BigRedAvenger]

Wins over Iowa and Wisconsin, and 10 wins overall. I’ll take it.

 

[Oracle of Lincoln]

Isn’t the off-season a wonderful drug?

 

[Bleed Red]

The author of that 247Sports article somehow missed the fact that the ESPN FPI projects an 8-4 record for Nebraska. Chances are you're not going to win every game you're favored to win.

Ummmm, does that mean that you will also probably not lose every game you are predicted to lose?