WhatIfSports College Football Week 10 Predictions

Week 10 NCAA Predictions

Scores from every upcoming game

By Paul Bessire, WhatIfSports.com

October 27, 2008

Each Monday morning we will preview every college football Division I FBS game of the upcoming week. All of our college football content, including our most recent power rankings and links to the preseason preview, are located here. If you want to take WhatIfSports weekly college football and/or NFL picks with you (to your MySpace, Facebook, or personal homepage), please see the widget below on the right or at this page.

The inputs to the 10,001 simulations of each upcoming game are based on a rigorous analysis of each team that considers strength-of-schedule-adjusted team and player ratings and then makes modifications for injuries and depth at each position.

Game of the Week: No. 1 Texas 36 @ No. 9 Texas Tech 30

The Longhorns' brutal stretch against four straight top-10 teams ends with another close shootout, this time on the road against Mike Leach's best Texas Tech team to date. The Red Raiders are also just the fourth-best of those four top-10 opponents.

Tech has been putting up its typical seven touchdowns a game, but an opportunistic defense that is third in the nation with 14 interceptions has set this team apart, keeping it from having to play many close games.

Don't expect Texas to be so kind. Colt McCoy is completing 81.8 percent of his passes and has thrown just four interceptions on 242 attempts.

With two extremely efficient offenses, the team that will win this game will likely be the team that possesses the ball last, which will also likely be the team that makes one big defensive stand. The data shows 57.2 percent of the time that team is Texas, as the Longhorns win in Lubbock by an average score of 36-30.

That being said, Texas still has a difficult path to the national championship game. Including this game, the Longhorns have just a 35.1 percent chance of making it through the Big 12 championship undefeated.

No. 8 Florida 31 vs. No. 10 Georgia 26

The polls have these teams backwards; Florida is the better team. Despite playing almost exactly the same quality of opponents, Florida is winning by 16 more points per game than Georgia (Florida's average score is 42-12; Georgia's average score is 34-20).

In almost every relevant statistic, including yards-per-rush for, yards-per-pass for and against, turnover margin, punt returns for and against, and kick returns, the Gators have been better than the Bulldogs. Florida is the better team and it will prove that in Jacksonville this weekend—at least they will 53.8 percent of the time and by an average score of 31-26.

Others

Homefield advantage helps several teams that would not otherwise be favored in some of the other big games of the weekend.

No. 19 Georgia Tech runs over No. 14 Florida State 61.9 percent of the time and by an average score of 22-16. No. 22 Oregon travels to No. 23 Cal, where the Golden Bears emerge victorious 60.9 percent of the time and by an average score of 25-19. No. 21 Iowa heads to Champaign, where it loses 63.0 percent of the time to an Illinois team that has shown enough to be ranked in our top 25 despite its .500 record.

On Thursday night, Cincinnati is a slight home favorite over South Florida, winning just 51.3 percent of the time in the sim. And Notre Dame sneaks by an inconsistent Pitt team by just a field goal (24-21) on average.

Week 10 Scores for Every FBS Game

Matchup	Home Win%	Avg Score
Iowa State @ Oklahoma State	95	15-34
Washington @ USC	95	6-41
Washington St. @ Stanford	95	9-33
Auburn @ Mississippi	95	8-28
Arkansas St. @ Alabama	91.1	15-32
Temple @ Navy	88.9	13-29
E. Michigan @ W. Michigan	88	20-36
Tulane @ LSU	86.9	19-34
Arizona St. @ Oregon State	86.3	18-31
Nebraska @ Oklahoma	85.9	28-40
Colorado @ Texas A&M	85.7	14-27
North Texas @ Western Kentucky	85.5	14-28
Miami (FL) @ Virginia	84	9-22
Duke @ WF	81.2	11-20
Michigan @ Purdue	80.6	12-23
Fla. Int. @ LA-Laf	75.1	20-30
C. Michigan @ Indiana	74.5	21-29
Northwestern @ Minn.	74	15-24
Kansas State @ Kansas	73.1	25-33
UAB @ S. Miss	71	24-33
San Diego State @ Wyoming	68.3	14-21
Tennessee @ S. Carolina	66.2	13-19
Iowa @ Illinois	63	26-32
W. Virginia @ Connecticut	62.8	17-23
Buffalo @ Ohio	62.6	18-22
Florida State @ GA Tech	61.9	16-22
Oregon @ California	60.9	19-25
Wisconsin @ Michigan State	60.1	20-25
Kent St. @ Bowling Green	59.4	20-24
Pittsburgh @ Notre Dame	57.1	21-24
Hawaii @ Utah State	56.9	20-25
South Florida @ Cincinnati	51.3	24-25
Kentucky @ Mississippi State	48.5	15-12
Clemson @ Boston College	46.5	21-17
Florida vs. Georgia	46.2	31-26
Rice @ UTEP	43	32-26
Texas @ Texas Tech	41.8	36-30
Brigham Young @ Colorado St.	37.5	28-21
Fresno State @ Louisiana Tech	33.8	30-22
Missouri @ Baylor	30.9	36-27
Houston @ Marshall	30	31-22
Tulsa @ Arkansas	27.8	40-28
Boise State @ New Mexico State	26.2	28-17
Louisville @ Syracuse	23.1	29-17
San Jose State @ Idaho	20.8	23-11
TCU @ UNLV	19.1	30-17
East Carolina @ UCF	18.3	23-10
Utah @ New Mexico	18.1	28-15
Air Force @ Army	11.2	30-13
Troy @ LA-Monroe	9.3	37-18

 

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