IowaHawkBlog's Marble Game through Week 8

And then there were 10.  Two more undefeated teams went down, with the biggest obviously being Wisconsin who were in 6th place last week.  They had only given up 29 points TOTAL on the season going into that game!  Illinois's win moves them up 47 spots to 48th place and drops Wisconsin to 14th.  All the remaining teams in the top 10 won ('cept ND who was on a bye and therefore dropped to 12th).  The PAC-12 finally has a contender in the top 10 with Oregon climbing in and Utah on the bubble.

App St and SMU continue to climb as the remaining undefeated teams of the G5.  Both are in the top 25 but need some better matchups if they hope to catch the top end of the table.

I've added a couple tables to the bottom of the page here.  I have calculated the average rank of all opponents played to this point for each team.  You could perhaps use this as an analog for Quality of Schedule played so far.  I also then calculate and report the average rank of all opponents played across all teams in each conference, and the average rank of all the teams in each conference.  These seem to show that the SEC plays easy schedules, and has the broadest distribution of quality of any conference, while the PAC-12 plays the hardest schedules (partly thanks to non-conf games) and is the "flattest" conference in terms of quality top-to-bottom.

I think the game I'm the most interested in this week is Auburn vs LSU.  I've maintained for the last few weeks that Auburn has put in one of the best cumulative performance of all FBS teams even with their one loss.  That doesn't necessarily translate into them being as good as LSU, but just that they've had that type performance to this point.  My calculations on my other ranking system say that as of last week they'd played the 2nd hardest schedule of any team to this point.  That slipped somewhat this week, to 15th, with their game against Arkansas.  Considering that LSU was ranked as the 2nd AP last week it'll be interesting to see who really is the better team.

Some big games this week: Auburn at LSU (111 vs 63 marble gain potential), Wisconsin at Ohio St (113 vs 60), Oklahoma at K-St (51 vs 81), and Notre Dame at Michigan (63 vs 66).
I think this is the first week where any matchup has the potential to reward a team with >100 marbles.

I'm again going to assume that all our readers know the basic rules of the Marble Game now, but if you don't please see one of the first few posts of this season where the rules are listed. As always, if you have any feedback or see any issues feel free to reach out to the commissioner, David Burge (@IowaHawkBlog) or myself (@NateEMiller) on Twitter.

Rank	Team	W	L	Conf	Marbles	Change
1	Clemson	7	0	ACC	493	0, +64
2	Penn State	7	0	B10	452	+2, +63
3	Ohio State	7	0	B10	450	-1, +21
4	LSU	7	0	SEC	445	-1, +35
5	Baylor	7	0	B12	416	+3, +56
6	Alabama	7	0	SEC	407	-1, +20
7	Oklahoma	7	0	B12	405	0, +29
8	Oregon	6	1	PAC	393	+6, +79
9	Florida	7	1	SEC	370	+3, +53
10	Minnesota	7	0	B10	356	-1, +16
11	Utah	6	1	PAC	344	+6, +63
12	Notre Dame	5	1	IND	329	-2, 0
13	Auburn	6	1	SEC	315	+3, +21
14	Wisconsin	6	1	B10	302	-8, -75
15	SMU	7	0	AAC	297	+7, +41
16	Wake Forest	6	1	ACC	295	+3, +33
17	Georgia	6	1	SEC	288	+3, +28
18	Iowa State	5	2	B12	263	+9, +39
19	Pittsburgh	5	2	ACC	256	+9, +32
20	Texas	5	2	B12	256	+4, +19
21	Arizona St.	5	2	PAC	254	-10, -63
22	Michigan	5	2	B10	251	-9, -63
23	App. St.	6	0	SUN	249	+2, +15
24	Wash.	5	3	PAC	235	-9, -79
25	Virginia	5	2	ACC	229	+10, +37
26	Iowa	5	2	B10	220	+8, +24
27	USC	4	3	PAC	216	+14, +45
28	Missouri	5	2	SEC	212	-10, -53
29	Cincinnati	6	1	AAC	211	+4, +13
30	Kansas St.	4	2	B12	203	+12, +35
31	Virginia Tech	5	2	ACC	202	+9, +30
32	Boise State	6	1	MWC	200	-9, -50
33	Indiana	5	2	B10	198	+12, +35
34	Louisville	4	3	ACC	193	-13, -64
35	Memphis	6	1	AAC	191	+11, +29
36	Arizona	4	3	PAC	181	-10, -45
37	San Diego St.	6	1	MWC	177	+14, +22
38	Air Force	5	2	MWC	175	+19, +35
39	BC	4	3	ACC	170	+23, +36
40	Mich. St.	4	3	B10	167	+3, 0
41	BYU	3	4	IND	166	+30, +50
42	Oklahoma St.	4	3	B12	166	-13, -56
43	Temple	5	2	AAC	164	-11, -41
44	Navy	5	1	AAC	163	+9, +17
45	Georgia St.	5	2	SUN	159	+9, +14
46	Nebraska	4	3	B10	159	+2, 0
47	S. Carolina	3	4	SEC	159	-17, -53
48	Illinois	3	4	B10	157	+47, +75
49	Stanford	3	4	PAC	154	-18, -51
50	LA Tech	6	1	USA	149	+14, +21
51	Duke	4	3	ACC	148	-14, -37
52	Texas A&M	4	3	SEC	146	+18, +28
53	Wash. St.	4	3	PAC	146	+19, +32
54	NC State	4	3	ACC	145	-16, -36
55	California	4	3	PAC	142	-19, -48
56	UCLA	2	5	PAC	140	+32, +51
57	W. Kentucky	5	2	USA	140	+6, +9
58	TCU	3	3	B12	139	-19, -35
59	Oregon St.	3	4	PAC	138	+28, +48
60	Florida St.	3	4	ACC	133	-16, -33
61	UAB	6	1	USA	132	+5, +6
62	Colorado	3	4	PAC	129	-15, -32
63	Utah State	4	2	MWC	127	+15, +24
64	UCF	5	2	AAC	122	+12, +12
65	Wyoming	5	2	MWC	121	+9, +9
66	Miami (FL)	3	4	ACC	118	-17, -39
67	N. Carolina	3	4	ACC	118	-15, -30
68	Texas Tech	3	4	B12	118	-18, -39
69	E. Mich.	4	3	MID	116	+12, +19
70	UL Lafayette	5	2	SUN	116	+14, +21
71	Tulane	5	2	AAC	116	-16, -29
72	W. Virginia	3	4	B12	116	-16, -29
73	Ball State	4	3	MID	114	+13, +24
74	Vanderbilt	2	5	SEC	114	+31, +53
75	C. Mich.	5	3	MID	112	+8, +17
76	Kentucky	3	4	SEC	111	-17, -28
77	Hawaii	4	3	MWC	104	-19, -35
78	Maryland	3	4	B10	104	-18, -35
79	Miss. St.	3	4	SEC	104	-18, -35
80	Georgia Tech	2	5	ACC	102	+23, +39
81	Liberty	5	2	IND	101	-1, 0
82	Toledo	4	3	MID	98	-15, -24
83	Nevada	4	3	MWC	97	-15, -24
84	Purdue	2	5	B10	96	-15, -24
85	Syracuse	3	4	ACC	94	-20, -32
86	Marshall	4	3	USA	93	+16, +28
87	S. Miss.	4	3	USA	86	-10, -21
88	Ole Miss	3	5	SEC	85	-15, -28
89	Florida Atl.	4	3	USA	82	-14, -28
90	Tennessee	2	5	SEC	82	-11, -20
91	W. Michigan	4	4	MID	77	-9, -19
92	Florida Int.	4	3	USA	75	+7, +7
93	Kansas	2	5	B12	75	-8, -19
94	Georgia So.	3	3	SUN	74	+13, +16
95	S. Florida	3	4	AAC	69	-5, -17
96	Fresno St.	3	3	MWC	67	+14, +11
97	Miami (OH)	3	4	MID	67	+14, +11
98	Coastal Caro.	3	4	SUN	66	-4, -16
99	San Jose St.	3	4	MWC	65	-10, -22
100	Arkansas	2	5	SEC	64	-9, -21
101	Arkansas St.	3	4	SUN	64	-9, -21
102	Ohio	3	4	MID	64	+15, +14
103	Northwestern	1	5	B10	63	-10, -21
104	Buffalo	3	4	MID	62	+5, +6
105	Houston	3	4	AAC	59	+9, +7
106	UL Monroe	3	4	SUN	58	-10, -15
107	Troy	3	3	SUN	58	+8, +6
108	Army	3	4	IND	56	-11, -14
109	North Texas	3	4	USA	56	+9, +10
110	Kent State	3	4	MID	54	-10, -14
111	Texas State	2	4	SUN	54	+2, 0
112	Tulsa	2	5	AAC	54	-11, -13
113	Bowling Grn	2	5	MID	52	-15, -17
114	UTSA	3	4	USA	49	+5, +4
115	E. Carolina	3	4	AAC	48	-9, -12
116	Rutgers	1	6	B10	47	-12, -16
117	UNLV	2	5	MWC	46	-9, -11
118	N. Illinois	2	5	MID	44	-6, -11
119	Colorado St.	2	5	MWC	43	+2, 0
120	Mid. Tenn.	2	5	USA	40	-4, -10
121	Charlotte	2	5	USA	35	-1, -9
122	New Mexico	2	5	MWC	34	0, -9
123	UTEP	1	5	USA	29	0, -7
124	UMASS	1	6	MID	27	+3, 0
125	Old Dominion	1	6	USA	23	0, -6
126	Connecticut	1	6	AAC	22	-2, -7
127	S. Alabama	1	6	SUN	22	-1, -6
128	Rice	0	7	USA	18	+1, -4
129	NM St.	0	7	IND	17	+1, 0
130	Akron	0	7	MID	16	-2, -6

Average rank of all opponents played per team:

N. Carolina	37.7
Florida St.	38.3
USC	38.4
UCLA	38.6
Northwestern	44.8
Louisville	45.1
Colorado	45.9
Tennessee	46.9
Purdue	47.3
Rutgers	47.4
:	:
:	:
UTEP	95.8
W. Kentucky	96.0
Florida Int.	96.7
App. St.	98.8
LA Tech	99.3
Troy	100.7
Georgia St.	104.3
UMASS	105.4
Liberty	110.3
UAB	116.0

Average rank of all teams per conference:

PAC	38.4
B12	41.3
B10	44.6
ACC	44.9
SEC	48.8
AAC	71.2
IND	74.2
MWC	79.0
SUN	88.2
USA	97.3
MID	99.1

Average rank of all opponents played per conference:

PAC	56.2
ACC	63.2
B10	63.3
B12	63.3
SEC	65.2
IND	73.3
AAC	78.0
MWC	81.4
MID	84.1
SUN	84.3
USA	87.4