Dolphin Ratings - College Football

Explanation: Each team is listed with its record, overall score differential, and six ratings. Brief explanations of the ratings follow.

Schedule The number in this column is the effective opponent strength of a team. In other words, they would be expected to have the same record had they played all games against an opponent of this predictive rating at a neutral site. Because this calculation depends on the strength of the team in question, it is not possible to rank schedules using these values.
Standard Ranks teams in an order such that a team is "probably better" than all teams ranked lower than it. This calculation uses margin of victory only for computing a team's opponents strengths; the team's rating itself is computed using only wins, losses, and ties relative to its schedule
Median Likelihood Determines the likely ratings for each team, based on its wins, losses, and ties relative to its schedule. This generally produces the same or similar ratings as the standard ranking.
Predictive Both schedule strength and rating vs. schedule strength are determined considering both the wins and losses and the score differentials. This rating contains none of the biases in the standard rating, but does weight recent games slightly more than past games since those are a better indication of the team's current strength. This rating is the best of the first three for seeing how good teams are, and thus is the best for predicting future results.
Improved RPI Rating The improved RPI formula is similar to the standard RPI, except that the schedule strength is carried out to infinite depth instead of ending with opponents' opponents, thus allows for a better comparison of isolated groups of teams than is given by the standard RPI calculation. It is similar to the simple rating, except that all games are given equal weight.
RPI Rating. Included only because of common real-life usage. The RPI rating has many statistical problems. The football RPI rating is based on the BCS formula, and approximates the schedule, loss, and quality win components.
Pseudo-Poll. A blended ranking based on win-loss and predictive ratings, calibrated to match real-life polls as closely as possible. This gives a rough but unbiased estimate of how typical voters value record vs. impressive wins.
Predictive-Scoring. This value indicates how many points a team would be expected to score if it played an identical team.
Predictive-Offense. This combines the predictive and scoring ratings to measure how many points a team scores. The number is the predictive rating of an opponent against whom the team would be expected to score the league average number of points. This does not necessarily rate a team's offensive abilities, as a fast pace in basketball or big-play defense in football can make a team score more points.
Predictive-Defense. This combines the predictive and scoring ratings to measure how many points a team allows. The number is the predictive rating of an opponent against whom the team would be expected to allow the league average number of points. The same caveat in the predictive-offense rating applies here.

Because these ratings contain no prejudices regarding team or conference strengths, they tend to be quite inaccurate early in the seasons. College football appears to take at least 5 games per team before even remotely reasonable ratings are produced; acceptable ratings are produced with 8 games per team; excellent ratings unfortunately require 14 games per team.

Rankings by division: Overall I-A I-AA II III NAIA HAAC GAC NESCAC NSIC MAIAA

Full Ranking

                                               STANDARD   MED LIKELY  PREDICTIVE  IMPRVD RPI     RPI         POLL       OFFENSE     DEFENSE 
TEAM                     W  L  PF  PA  SCHED  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING
Minn St-Mankato         10  2 499 193  0.942    1  1.348    1  1.127    1  1.342    1 0.0000    1 0.0000    1 12.940    2  1.256    1  1.428
Augustana SD             9  3 494 318  0.663    2  1.092    2  0.884    4  0.791    1 0.0000    1 0.0000    2 12.255    1  1.366    7  0.217
Sioux Falls              9  3 472 257  0.625    3  1.062    4  0.850    3  0.835    1 0.0000    1 0.0000    3 12.225    3  1.107    4  0.563
Minnesota-Duluth         9  3 411 208  0.613    4  1.030    3  0.856    2  0.842    1 0.0000    1 0.0000    4 12.184    5  0.643    2  1.041
SW Minnesota St          8  3 366 290  0.420    5  0.881    5  0.749    5  0.465    1 0.0000    1 0.0000    5 11.914    4  0.684    6  0.247
Bemidji St               7  4 340 210  0.184    6  0.485    6  0.307    6  0.457    1 0.0000    1 0.0000    6 10.960    9  0.223    3  0.691
Upper Iowa               6  5 310 307  0.144    7  0.417    7  0.226   10  0.036    1 0.0000    1 0.0000    7 10.606   11  0.110   10 -0.037
Winona St                5  6 335 316  0.318    8  0.323    8  0.146    8  0.314    1 0.0000    1 0.0000   10 10.352    7  0.545    9  0.084
Northern St SD           6  5 316 247  0.121    9  0.323    9  0.144    9  0.257    1 0.0000    1 0.0000    8 10.503   10  0.158    5  0.355
Minn St-Moorhead         6  5 331 364 -0.160   10  0.295   10  0.115   11 -0.168    1 0.0000    1 0.0000   11 10.110    8  0.307   13 -0.642
TEAM                     W  L  PF  PA  SCHED  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING
St Cloud St              6  5 389 255  0.164   11  0.243   11  0.057    7  0.383    1 0.0000    1 0.0000    9 10.399    6  0.591    8  0.174
Wayne St NE              4  7 251 409 -0.289   12 -0.120   12 -0.272   12 -0.494    1 0.0000    1 0.0000   12  9.288   12 -0.306   14 -0.683
Concordia-St Paul        1 10 172 465 -0.312   13 -0.721   13 -0.895   14 -0.923    1 0.0000    1 0.0000   13  7.906   14 -1.019   15 -0.828
Mary                     1 10  89 404 -0.877   14 -1.010   15 -1.137   16 -1.379    1 0.0000    1 0.0000   16  7.301   16 -2.207   11 -0.550
Minnesota-Crookston      1 10 196 541 -0.764   15 -1.021   14 -1.124   15 -1.176    1 0.0000    1 0.0000   15  7.346   13 -0.754   16 -1.598
Minot St                 1 10 165 367 -0.626   16 -1.077   16 -1.192   13 -0.910    1 0.0000    1 0.0000   14  7.413   15 -1.218   12 -0.602


Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference: strength=0.121 (#1)
                                               STANDARD   MED LIKELY  PREDICTIVE  IMPRVD RPI     RPI         POLL       OFFENSE     DEFENSE 
TEAM                     W  L  PF  PA  SCHED  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING
Minn St-Mankato         10  2 499 193  0.942    1  1.348    1  1.127    1  1.342    1 0.0000    1 0.0000    1 12.940    2  1.256    1  1.428
Augustana SD             9  3 494 318  0.663    2  1.092    2  0.884    4  0.791    1 0.0000    1 0.0000    2 12.255    1  1.366    7  0.217
Sioux Falls              9  3 472 257  0.625    3  1.062    4  0.850    3  0.835    1 0.0000    1 0.0000    3 12.225    3  1.107    4  0.563
Minnesota-Duluth         9  3 411 208  0.613    4  1.030    3  0.856    2  0.842    1 0.0000    1 0.0000    4 12.184    5  0.643    2  1.041
SW Minnesota St          8  3 366 290  0.420    5  0.881    5  0.749    5  0.465    1 0.0000    1 0.0000    5 11.914    4  0.684    6  0.247
Bemidji St               7  4 340 210  0.184    6  0.485    6  0.307    6  0.457    1 0.0000    1 0.0000    6 10.960    9  0.223    3  0.691
Upper Iowa               6  5 310 307  0.144    7  0.417    7  0.226   10  0.036    1 0.0000    1 0.0000    7 10.606   11  0.110   10 -0.037
Winona St                5  6 335 316  0.318    8  0.323    8  0.146    8  0.314    1 0.0000    1 0.0000   10 10.352    7  0.545    9  0.084
Northern St SD           6  5 316 247  0.121    9  0.323    9  0.144    9  0.257    1 0.0000    1 0.0000    8 10.503   10  0.158    5  0.355
Minn St-Moorhead         6  5 331 364 -0.160   10  0.295   10  0.115   11 -0.168    1 0.0000    1 0.0000   11 10.110    8  0.307   13 -0.642
St Cloud St              6  5 389 255  0.164   11  0.243   11  0.057    7  0.383    1 0.0000    1 0.0000    9 10.399    6  0.591    8  0.174
Wayne St NE              4  7 251 409 -0.289   12 -0.120   12 -0.272   12 -0.494    1 0.0000    1 0.0000   12  9.288   12 -0.306   14 -0.683
Concordia-St Paul        1 10 172 465 -0.312   13 -0.721   13 -0.895   14 -0.923    1 0.0000    1 0.0000   13  7.906   14 -1.019   15 -0.828
Mary                     1 10  89 404 -0.877   14 -1.010   15 -1.137   16 -1.379    1 0.0000    1 0.0000   16  7.301   16 -2.207   11 -0.550
Minnesota-Crookston      1 10 196 541 -0.764   15 -1.021   14 -1.124   15 -1.176    1 0.0000    1 0.0000   15  7.346   13 -0.754   16 -1.598
Minot St                 1 10 165 367 -0.626   16 -1.077   16 -1.192   13 -0.910    1 0.0000    1 0.0000   14  7.413   15 -1.218   12 -0.602

Conference Strengths
CONFERENCE                                                W   L   PCT  RNK RATING
Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference                  89  91 0.494    1  0.121

Home field advantage amounts to:
     0.166 points in main ratings
     0.022 points in improved RPI
Average of 6.20 points per score

Predict score:






Team Strength vs. Time Plot:





posted: Sun Oct 12 21:53:02 2025

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