Data-Driven Analytics

Because we are a school of engineers, architects, and veterinarians, I would like to throw out some actual DATA for y'all to chew on regarding our football program.

I am not here to say we don't have areas of weakness that need to get better - I'm not blind. However, I think that many of us are prisoners of the moment, and need to take a step back and look at performance using numbers instead of emotion.

Also remember that the ultimate stat is on the last line - 4 vs. 7 vs. 8 (so far).

Notes: 2020 was weird, and lacked 2 games. Also an all-SEC schedule. Also obviously we have another game left in this season.

With that, here we go:

MSU	2020	2021	2022
Total Points	235	378	392
Points/Game	21.36	29.08	32.67
Total Ints	18	9	7
Rush TDs	8	10	12
Pass TDs	17	37	35
Total Off.	340.2	441.5	393.2
Avg./Play	5.5	5.6	5.2
RZ Scores	25/33	49/58	37/41
RZ TDs	18/33	36/58	32/41
RZ TD %	54.5	62	78
Defense	2020	2021	2022
Total Points	309	337	290
Points/Game	28.09	25.92	24.17
Total Ints	11	11	14
Rush TDs	11	16	19
Pass TDs	23	20	15
Total Offense	389.7	344.9	350.3
Avg./Play	5.5	5.6	5.2
RZ Scores	32/40	32/37	35/43
RZ TDs	22/40	22/37	24/43
RZ TD %	55	59.4	55.8
Overall Record	4-7	7-6	8-4

Discuss.

My initial thoughts:

Tougher schedule + lack of a Makai Polk + loss of 1st round LT hurt our passing game a bit. Luckily our rushing attack picked up enough to compensate somewhat but would account for the lack of smoothness in our offense. Hopefully Leach will figure this out. I don't think it's all on Rogers but he certainly doesn't help his cause by running into sacks and coughing the ball up when he takes hits.

Having a lock-down corner like Forbes has made our pass D pretty stout. We'll miss him next season. Hopefully the next guy up can carry that load.

Why did we lose nearly 50 yards per game this year? That's a concern. Other than that, this year was pretty successful in the stats.

The RZ TD% seems like it'll be an outlier. That rate is 3rd in the country. Leach has been top 10 before (2018), but that was it. Usually he's a good bit farther down. That stat shows how ppg went up while yds/game and yds/play were down.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Quaoarsking

Why did we lose nearly 50 yards per game this year? That's a concern. Other than that, this year was pretty successful in the stats.

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Our offense did sputter at times but we also had a bunch of short fields with our kickoff and punt returns. I haven't looked but i bet our return yardage is significanlty higher. We actually only gave up 24 sacks this year as compared to 34 last year. 24 sacks for as much as we throw the ball is pretty dang good and the fact Will isn't very mobile.

Anyone willing to break down each opponent vs what our offense actually generated? Example: Bama's defense sucked and we scored one TD when it no longer mattered. It seems like every SEC team but us was able to move the ball and score on them. UGA - was probably pretty average since they had a great defense but we also scored a Special Teams TD and not much offense.

What were we in SEC only games compared to the rest of the SEC? We seemed average at best which is kind of disappointing with all the returning starters and supposedly an offensive guru. I am not saying fire Mike Leach but we don't need to just gloss over the bad because we beat an Ole Miss team with a great defensive game plan and great special teams play. The offense was far from good on Thursday.

It's all still skewed with the OOC teams production included but I guess it's okay.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Pancho

It's all still skewed with the OOC teams production included but I guess it's okay.

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And our yds/play is still down from 2020

We need to add one or two more plays to the note card.