With the end of the NCAA FBS 2018 season, I can update the how competitive the highest tier of college football was using the
Noll-Scully Competitive Balance measure. I have decided to calculate this since 1996 (the year that the NCAA FBS went to overtime to decide games), thus there are no ties and the version used by Roger Noll and Gerald Scully is used here. For those that are interested in calculating this on their
own, here is a
step-by-step guide as to how to perform the Noll-Scully competitive balance calculation.
As you can see below, competitive balance slightly improved this past season as the Noll-Scully moved closer to one (a league where wins and losses randomly occur), and that for the last 20 plus years, competitive balance among NCAA FBS programs has been relatively stable.
