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1. Texas_Dawg said:

   November 25th, 2008 at 5:29 pm

   It increasingly looks like the Colorado/Nebraska and Syracuse/Cincinnati games will decide the Big 12 South (assuming both TX/OU win). Texas needs a big upset in one of those two games, possibly both.

2. TaylorTRoom said:

   November 25th, 2008 at 5:38 pm

   I suspect OSU has a better chance of beating OU than there being upsets in either of those games. My hope is that OSU is watching Stoops plead his case in all the media, and understands that he is basically assuring a Sooner victory. They should be po’ed.

3. Nero said:

   November 25th, 2008 at 5:39 pm

   Using regular NCAA stats, UT is ranked near the bottom in pass defense. What this analysis really shows me is that there are a lot of hidden yards in sacks. There are two components to a sack – “loss of down” and lost yards. If a team has 3rd and 5 from the 30 and rushes for 0 yards, they can still kick a field goal, even though they essentially incurred the “loss of down” of a sack. However, if that team has a sack for -8 yards, that field goal goes from a 47 yarder to a 60 yarder, which is a punt.

   What I’m really trying to say is, what your analysis shows me is that the effectiveness of a sack is all about the sack yardage, not really the disruption of flow in an offensive drive that the “loss of down” provides.

4. Scipio Tex said:

   November 25th, 2008 at 6:40 pm

   Our weakness against the run is surprising, though some of that is via QB scrambles (Griffin) and Kendall Hunter going off on us in a big way.

   Thanks Taylor.

5. TaylorTRoom said:

   November 25th, 2008 at 7:01 pm

   Sure, Scipio. Notice, too, that teams have a choice on each playcall whether to run or pass. Usually, they opt to pass on us. I think that’s because we pair a salty defense with a good offense, and teams find themselves having to throw to stay in the game. Teams don’t call many runs on the Sooners or Cowboys either.

   In the Aggie game in 2006, our inability to get a two-score lead allowed them to keep running their spread option offense. I’m not expecting that to be a problem this year.

6. p said:

   November 25th, 2008 at 7:11 pm

   Scipio-

   That stat can be misleading. If we take out the two games vs OSU, and Baylor you can see a better representative of how we usually do vs the run. These are compiled during big12 play……

   125 attempts for 433 yards (3.4 per carry)

   We are pretty good against the run. Tack on leading the nation in sacks and you see why our D has been quite effective. Once our secondary gets up to par we will be pretty nasty on that side of the ball.

7. Kafka said:

   November 25th, 2008 at 8:06 pm

   Taylor:

   The UT D line was much more focused on rushing the passer than stopping the run this year. This was a good strategy (considering the horns’ secondary problems) but hurt the run stopping stats a bit.

   “Well, this is a passing league. I was surprised that OSU has such an effective passing game, and that Texas doesn’t have more yards per play.”

   Iyt wasn’t too surprising to me. Teams that can run the ball as well as OSU are able to force the opposition safeties to deal with the run. This leaves the opponent vulnerable to the big play.

   I also was not surprised that UT had a relatively small yards per completion average. UT mainly threw short to possession receivers. UT did not have a very dangerous running attack so the opposition safeties could focus on not giving up the big pass play.

   UT played crappy against A&M in 2005 (barely escaping with a victory) and lost the past two years. This is the uber rivalry game for A&M and they will use all their resources (especially animal husbandry and late hits) to beat UT.

   UT wins this game but does not cover the spread. All bets are off if A&M is able to hurt Colt early in the game.

8. TaylorTRoom said:

   November 26th, 2008 at 3:11 am

   I think two bits of conventional wisdom are wrong this year. I think most people think that UT is vulnerable to the pass. We’re really not, relative to our conference peers.

   The other wrong assumption is that OU has a terrific defense. They don’t. It jumps out at you that they give up almost 30 ppg in conference, and they played two of the Big 12’s worst offenses (TAMU and BU). They have a great offense, but a pedestrian defense.

9. BrickHorn said:

   November 26th, 2008 at 7:22 am

   Yardage statistics can be misleading. Our defense is ranked #53 nationally in terms of YPG, but #26 in terms of PPG. The Horns give up lots of yards in the middle of the field, but doesn’t give up a ton of points.

   One way to quantify the “bend-but-don’t-breakiness” of a defense is to calculate the average points a defense yields per yard gained by the opponent. The national average for ppy 0.071. Texas is below that average at 0.056, putting the Horns at #13 nationally on this measure. For comparison, USC is at 0.037 (#1) and OU has a defensive ppy of 0.066 (#48).

   I believe this stat reflects that Texas has an excellent red zone defense. In fact, Texas ranks #15 nationally in terms of TD per red zone drive (0.47). This is actually one spot ahead of USC, and way ahead of OU at #74 (0.63).

10. BrickHorn said:

    November 26th, 2008 at 8:10 am

    I should also note that while total yardage can be a misleading stat on a team-by-team basis, it is also a very highly correlated with the one stat that counts (points). In fact, the correlation coefficient between total yards and total points this season is 0.9.

    If you generate a scattergram of all D-1 teams, plotted on the basis of their total yards and points allowed, the correlation is striking. What is also striking is how far an outlier USC and TCU are. Those two teams have, far and away, the two best statistical defenses in the nation.

    Also of note, plotted in terms of PPG per YPG, Texas is the statistical outlier on the high end of YPG in its PPG band (i.e. the band of teams giving up roughly 18-20 ppg).

11. Kafka said:

    November 26th, 2008 at 9:20 am

    Taylor:
    “Most people think that UT is vulnerable to the pass. We’re really not, relative to our conference peers.”

    That is probably a good point but I have to credit Will Muschamp for making the defensive schematic adjustments that allocated defensive resources to pass defense at the cost of stopping the run.

    Will Muschamp did the following to help the pass defense:
    * Focused the D line more on pass rushing this year, which permitted the back 7 to focus much more on pass D.
    * Kept his safeties back much more to protect against the big pass play.
    * Played many more nickel and dime packages to bolster pass D

    All of these moves came at the expense of stopping the run.

    As he said many times during the year, Will followed a bend, don’t break approach this year. The UT pass D was respectable but this respectability was achieved by diverting resources from run stopping to pass D. Muschamp made the horns’ secondary look better than it actually was. I guess that is why he makes the big bucks.

12. BrickHorn said:

    November 26th, 2008 at 9:58 am

    As he said many times during the year, Will followed a bend, don’t break approach this year.

    And the statistics show that. Texas is just about average in terms of opponents’ trips into the red zone per game (ranking #58 nationally). However, the Texas defense is #13 in terms of TDs allowed per red zone trip.

    The Horns let opponents move the ball between the 20s, but really crack down in the red zone.

13. horny711 said:

    November 26th, 2008 at 12:34 pm

    http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/23/sports/ncaafootball/23sooners.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=oklahoma+sooners&st=nyt

14. Facebook User said:

    November 26th, 2008 at 2:22 pm

    Hey Mike – Which team whipped your ass in the Cotton Bowl this year?

    
    John A. Bowersmith/Lubbock Avalanche-Journal, via Associated Press

15. Phenomenal Smith said:

    November 26th, 2008 at 4:12 pm

    Good breakdown, Taylor.

    Mizzou fares well in those defensive stats even with the UT game included, but I backed out the Big 12 South games to compare MU and KU v. North opponents and Mizzou is by far superior there. Not even close. Stats are fun like that.

    Mizzou’s defense leads the Big 12 (including south games) in yards/play yet many Mizzou fans still want Eberflus fired. Frustrating.

    Love the numbers. Good luck to the ‘horns (don’t need it against A&M of course, but for the rest of the outcomes).

16. Out from under rock said:

    November 29th, 2008 at 5:55 am

    Okay, I have to say I have read almost every article on BC this season and have sent copies of a number to my friends so it is not without some reservation that I say this. This is the most pointless thing I have ever read on this website.

    Let start with the fact that according to your stats, on average OU should beat TT by less than nine points? I am assuming that the 65 – 21 drubbing is already subsumed into this calculation. Because 1, Tech should be skewed down by 44 points because they lost to one of the top three teams in the entire United States of America whereas Harvard probably only lost to Dartmouth by what? 4?

    That is just getting me warmed up. Tech starts out by playing Eastern Washington, SMU, Nevada and Massachusetts? Gosh I wonder how they got such a decent average in a number of these categories? Meanwhile a team like oh I don’t know Baylor plays Wake Forest, UCONN, Washington State and Northwestern St. Not world beaters by any means but two of which have flirted with the top 25 all season and both of which are probably realistically better than Fla Atlantic, Rice, UTEP, Colorado, and Kansas on UT’s schedule.

    Moreover, you have the dregs of the South, ATM who has played Ark St, Miami, Army, New Mexico, Colorado, K State and Iowa st. to collect their numbers this year.

    Bottom line if everyone played the same teams at the same time this might be a relevant calculation for course of the year performance.

    But, I am not done. You also start to predict the outcome of upcomming games based on these stats. Just like someone that multiplies an erroneous number to come up with an irresponsible outcome this makes even less sense. For instance, UT started out by blending some of Colt’s time with the abomination that is called Chiles. (Sorry if you think this guy is good you should join the aggies that thing Jerrod Johnson is the “answer”. In the meantime two true freshmen begin to start on BU’s offense and raise the completion, rushing and YPC stats dramatically over time. So the basic assumption that the team that is about to hit the field is an average of the worst team to hit the field against the best opponent all season and the best team to hit the field against the field against the worst opponent just sounds like non-sense to me. I hope you are not betting based on these numbers.

    Baylor fan – with degree and education – out from under rock. Love this site. I had to read this and sleep on this before making this post but had to be done.

    Footnote. – Baylor has lost one game all year to a team that has not been ranked in the top 25 – Nebraska at home. Hapless – I think not. Sic em.

17. TaylorTRoom said:

    November 29th, 2008 at 6:01 am

    I guess you didn’t catch the part where I wrote that I was only using stats from Big 12 games?

18. Bob in Houston said:

    November 29th, 2008 at 6:14 am

    [Emily Litella] Never mind. [/Emily Litella]

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