At the end of the sixth week of the 2011 NCAA FBS season the University of Florida, Florida State University and Miami of Florida were all absent from the Associated Press Top 25 poll for the first time since December 6th 1982. (You might also notice that neither of those three teams were in any of the three top 25 production rankings). So that got me thinking - which NCAA FBS school in Florida is the most productive through the 6th week of the 2011 season?
For those who are reading this blog, you will notice that I have three different top 25 rankings. The reason is that the model I want to use (the one on the left in the link above which only takes into account the results from this season) still does not have enough variation in the data for it to be as accurate as I would like. As of the end of week 6 it has an explanatory power of over 85%, but the other two time periods are better - both over 90%. My hope is that as NCAA FBS teams are now playing primarily other NCAA FBS (and not FCS or Division II) schools that the model using only the 2011 data will become as accurate as the others, as it did last year. Since it currently is not, I have three top 25 ranks for now.
Even though the 2011 weights model has slightly lower explanatory power, I will use it for the rest of this post. So, using the data from only this season, here is how a variety of Florida based NCAA FBS schools are faring in terms of offensive productivity, defensive productivity and total productivity; ranked by total productivity.
The University of Central Florida is currently ranked as the 16th most productive NCAA FBS school, and the 77th most productive offense and 3rd most productive defense.
The University of South Florida is currently ranked as the 20th most productive NCAA FBS school, and the 29th most productive offense and 29th most productive defense.
Florida State University is currently ranked as the 26th most productive NCAA FBS school, and the 70th most productive offense and 7th most productive defense.
The University of Florida is currently ranked as the 32nd most productive NCAA FBS school, and the 51st most productive offense and 25th most productive defense.
Florida International University is currently ranked as the 41st most productive NCAA FBS school, and the 39th most productive offense and 44th most productive defense.
The University of Miami (Florida) is currently ranked as the 56th most productive NCAA FBS school, and the 40th most productive offense and 68th most productive defense.
Florida Atlantic University is currently ranked as the 99th most productive NCAA FBS school, and the 118th most productive offense and 38th most productive defense.