Great Bill Connelly Article on LSU/MSU Game

[ShotgunDawg]

https://www.sbnation.com/college-foo...e-2017-results

Gotta see if our boys can handle praise this week.

Here is praise

[Prediction? Pain.]

Great article. Thanks for the link.

If you click through to Bill C.'s updated advanced stat rankings, you'll see an interesting tidbit there as well. While he has State at No. 17 in his current national S&P+ rankings, here's how we fare using his advanced metrics with all preseason data removed:

What the Top 10 would now look like, if there were no preseason projections

1. Mississippi State (3-0)
2. Penn State (3-0)
3. Oklahoma State (3-0)
4. Washington (3-0)
5. Wake Forest (3-0)
6. Miami (1-0)
7. Michigan State (2-0)
8. Oklahoma (3-0)
9. Vanderbilt (3-0)
10. Wisconsin (3-0)

That Mississippi State has throttled decent FCS (Charleston Southern) and G5 teams (Louisiana Tech) was reasonably impressive. That the Bulldogs then treated LSU almost as poorly as Charleston Southern was staggering. They have been tremendous in the first three weeks of the season. S&P+ reminds us that being good for three weeks isn’t the same as being good for 15, but so far, so good, to say the least.

So, using efficiency-based advanced stats, we've played better than anyone else in the country so far. It's going to be really hard to keep that up, especially given the next two games we've got, but I'll sure as hell take it right now.

[Cary Hudson's little bro]

Confirms my wooliness and 11-1 preseason prediction

[AusTexDawg]

Good article — thanks for posting. This stood out to me in the article:

Technically, the Tigers’ per-game [penalty] average went down on Saturday — they committed only nine penalties, dropping their rate from 10.5 per game to 10. But some were drive-killers and others were reckless, the mark of a team that had lost its cool and had no idea how to get it back.

MSU nose tackle Jeffery Simmons might have sensed this and did his part to egg on LSU.

About an hour prior to the start of LSU’s Southeastern Conference opener in Starkville, Mississippi, the Bulldogs’ nose guard Jeffery Simmons ran down to the Tigers’ end zone where he began taunting in the face of LSU’s Saahdiq Charles and several other offensive linemen.

While I doubt it actually happened this way given how coaches are frequently control freaks who want everyone in the right place and keeping their heads down, the thought actually crossed my mind during the game to wonder if someone (Mullen, Grantham, etc.) put a bug in Simmons' ear to mess with the LSU players and get them all worked up before kickoff. LSU has been so bad with penalties and is so young in some spots that you know that they aren't doing a good job staying focused. Simmons would be the perfect person for that assignment since he could be counted on to pull his weight (and then some) in-game against a suspect O-line.

Of course, it's possible that the TSUN conspiracy theory about Mullen's grand NCAA scheme has been repeated enough to make me finally see CDM for the grand puppet master that he is***

[DancingRabbit]

Good article, but he could have thrown in a mea culpa to start it off as he picked LSU to win 34-24.

[Tbonewannabe]

Great article. Thanks for the link.

If you click through to Bill C.'s updated advanced stat rankings, you'll see an interesting tidbit there as well. While he has State at No. 17 in his current national S&P+ rankings, here's how we fare using his advanced metrics with all preseason data removed:



So, using efficiency-based advanced stats, we've played better than anyone else in the country so far. It's going to be really hard to keep that up, especially given the next two games we've got, but I'll sure as hell take it right now.

I think the metrics takes into account Strength of Schedule. If it does then we don't have to win by that much since we are playing SEC schools on the road the next 2 weeks.