Saturday, December 28, 2013

Pinstripe Bowl 2013

New Era Pinstripe Bowl has the Notre Dame fighting Irish (who are independent) will play in the Pinstripe Bowl against the Rutgers Scarlet Knights of the American Athletic Conference and soon to be of the Big 10 Conference.  Below is an analysis of these two teams using the Complex Invasion College Football Production Model.
 
Pinstripe Bowl 2013

Fighting Irish Scarlet Knights
Wins 8 6
Losses 4 6
Total 85 96
Offense 112 85
Defense 38 95
SOS 57.33 66.58
Best 7 82
Worst 63 93

Notre Dame finished the regular season at 8-4 playing an "average" strength of schedule.  Notre Dame's best game this season was a 17-13 victory over currently ranked #7 Michigan State and their worst performance was a loss to currently ranked #63 Pittsburgh.  In terms of overall production, this has not been a good team this year.  The Irish currently rank as the #85 most productive team in all of the Football Bowl Subdivision with the #112 ranked offense and the #38 ranked defense.  Seems as if the Irish sure do miss Golson.

Rutgers finished the season at 6-6 playing an "average" strength of schedule.  Rutger's best game was a victory over currently ranked #82 SMU and their worst game was a loss to currently ranked #93 Connecticut.  As of this game, Rutger's is currently ranked as the #96 team in total production, with the #85 ranked offense and the #95 ranked defense.

Frankly, I am going to skip this game, as it looks like the worst game of all of the bowl games this season.  Notre Dame's above average defense should have an advantage over Rutger's below average offense, with the ND offense and Rutger's defense each cancelling each other out.  Using the model, Notre Dame is more productive than Rutgers, so the model "predicts" that Notre Dame will be the winner in the Pinstripe Bowl.