Week 2 college football power ratings and game spreads

Every FBS team has played at least one game, which means that the scrutiny has begun. There are some Week 2 lines that show some notable adjustments to teams that either struggled in Week 0 or Week 1 and some extreme adjustments to teams that struggled in both. This is going to be a recurring theme for the next couple of weeks as both bettors and bookmakers test the waters to see what the right power rating is for all 131 teams.

Now that we have a data point for each team, we’ve got something to go off of, but you never want to overreact to one game. Making adjustments is both an art and a science. It’s also imperfect. You may be right on some teams and wrong on others. The sportsbooks are going to be as well. The goal is to be right more often than they are so you can come out ahead and bet good numbers.

Before I list my 1 through 131 and my Week 2 spreads, I just want to remind everybody about my process for making adjustments. I compare my line with the closing line, analyze the box score for outliers and oddities and scour as many sources as I can for injury information. Then I try to figure out how much to adjust each team as a result of what I find. (Read about how I make my power ratings HERE and my home-field advantage values HERE.)

I may not adjust a team at all. If my line was right (or very close) and the game played to expectation, I won’t move a team up or down. Similarly, if my line was closer to how the game played out than the line or the line move, I’ll dig in a little bit and trust my numbers.

Up: Tennessee +  1, Oklahoma State +  2, West Virginia +  1, Missouri +  4, UCF +  1, Duke +  2, TCU +  1.5, Syracuse +  1, Maryland +  1.5, Rutgers +  1, James Madison +  3.5, Miami (OH) +  1.5, SMU +  2, Ohio +  2, USC +  2, Washington +  2, Georgia +  2, Alabama +  1, Tulane +  2, East Carolina +  1.5, UConn +  2, Iowa State +  2, Arizona +  2, Vanderbilt +  2, Mississippi State +  1, Duke + 4

Down: Pitt -2, Ball State -1, Penn State -2, Louisiana Tech -1, Northern Illinois -1.5, San Jose State -2, Temple -2, Colorado -1, Charlotte -5, Old Dominion -1, Utah -1.5, Louisville -2, Buffalo -1, Middle Tennessee -2, Kentucky -1.5, NC State -2, Utah State -3, UTEP -1.5, Houston -2, Hawaii -2, Iowa -2, Navy -2, Nebraska -1, Washington State -2, Boston College -1.5, San Diego State -3, Ohio State -1.5, UMass -3, Louisiana -1, Memphis -1.5, South Carolina -1, Boise State -2, San Jose State -2, Oregon -2.5, Liberty -3 (Brewer inj.), LSU -3

Questionable: Southern Miss (QB Keyes inj – concussion): -3

Charlotte (-5): The 49ers have had two horrific data points. They lost by 30 to FAU (who lost as a favorite at Ohio) and then lost by 17 to William & Mary. Based on this week’s line, five points isn’t enough, but I think anything more than that is a bit of an overreaction.

Duke (+ 4): Duke really impressed me against Temple. The Owls are awful, but Duke looked really competent and I think Mike Elko just might be a hell of a coach.

Missouri (+ 4): It seemed like I was a bit low on Missouri coming into the season and my line was five points light last week against Louisiana Tech. I’d rather catch up on a team like that early because I was off preseason and also off in Week 1.

James Madison (+ 3.5): James Madison didn’t just beat Middle Tennessee, the Dukes dominated. JMU held MTSU to 2.05 yards per play. The defense is for real. I don’t know if the offense really is, but the defense is clearly FBS-caliber. My line was also badly off on this game and I lost with MTSU in that one.

LSU (-3): My line was actually a little lower than the closing number here, but LSU got dominated by a Florida State team that hasn’t looked very good the last few seasons. I felt it best to move LSU now and adjust later if they show better moving forward.

Southern Miss (-3?): The Golden Eagles had to go full-on wildcat when Ty Keyes got hurt against Liberty (who also lost starting QB Charlie Brewer). It’s a concussion for Keyes, so who knows what happens as the week goes along, but it’s pretty clear that they have QB depth issues if they couldn’t really use one when the starter went out. I’ll keep an eye on the situation throughout the week.

As you can see, many of my adjustments were under three points. I don’t want to throw away my preseason work based on one or two games.

Date	Away	Home	My Line
9/9	Louisville	UCF	-6.5
	Boise State	New Mexico	+ 20.5
9/10	Arkansas State	Ohio State	-50
	North Carolina	Georgia State	+ 5.5
	Ohio	Penn State	-25
	UTSA	Army	-2.5
	Southern Miss (w/ Keyes)	Miami (FL)	-27
	Duke	Northwestern	-12
	Missouri	Kansas State	-5.5
	South Carolina	Arkansas	-10
	Alabama	Texas	+ 17
	Wake Forest	Vanderbilt	+ 11.5
	South Alabama	Central Michigan	-8
	Western Michigan	Ball State	+ 7
	Marshall	Notre Dame	-20.5
	Maryland	Charlotte	+ 22.5
	Tennessee	Pitt	+ 3.5
	Memphis	Navy	+ 8
	Colorado	Air Force	-17
	App State	Texas A&M	-16.5
	Washington State	Wisconsin	-19
	Middle Tennessee	Colorado State	-5
	Akron	Michigan State	-37
	Virginia	Illinois	-0.5
	UNLV	Cal	-16.5
	Houston	Texas Tech	+ 1.5
	Iowa State	Iowa	-4
	Old Dominion	East Carolina	-11.5
	Kansas	West Virginia	-14
	UAB	Liberty	+ 3.5
	Kentucky	Florida	-4
	UMass	Toledo	-27.5
	Syracuse	UConn	+ 22
	Kent State	Oklahoma	-31.5
	Eastern Michigan	Louisiana	-10.5
	Northern Illinois	Tulsa	-8
	FIU	Texas State	-9.5
	San Jose State	Auburn	-22
	Georgia Southern	Nebraska	-22
	USC	Stanford	+ 11.5
	Arizona State	Oklahoma State	-17.5
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