Simulated Gameday Experience

We remember the first BCS Busters – Urban Meyer, Alex Smith, and the 2004 Utah Utes. En route to a perfect season, the Utes were completely not a part of the national title discussion as USC, Oklahoma, and Auburn all went unbeaten during the regular season, with the Trojans emphatically claiming the title over the Sooners, 55-19, while the Tigers became the first team from a major conference to win all of their games and not get to settle it on the field in the BCS era. Equally missing from the title discussion were the 2006 Boise State Broncos, one of just two unbeaten teams that season along with Ohio State. But the debate was over whether the Buckeyes should rematch Michigan or face once-beaten SEC champs Florida, not Boise. When the Gators claimed their title, the Broncos received just one #1 vote in the AP poll and still finished 5th despite having the nation’s best record.

Last season’s Utah, the nation’s lone unbeaten, claimed 16 out of the AP’s 65 first place votes, finishing second in the country. While certainly more respect than has been afforded to any midmajor team before them, it still took beating Alabama in the Sugar Bowl (Oregon State, TCU, and BYU didn’t cut it) for the Utes to earn that respect.

So it’s kind of a cool phenomenon that TCU has been a real part of the title discussion in 2009. It’s not just the “best team in Texas” talk that’s come out of Fort Worth in so many recent seasons, but a real national interest in a team who has played an entire season at a similar level as the other elite teams.

By the Numbers

TCU ranks in the top five of scoring, rushing, and total offense and are in the top six of scoring, rushing, passing, and total defense. While their passing offense ranks #66, this is at least in part due to the fact that the Frogs aren’t often in the kind of games where they need to throw the ball a lot; their team pass efficiency rating is 3rd nationally. It’s fair to say that no other team in the country dominated the competition they faced as well as TCU did in 2009.

The knock on TCU is just that – the competition they faced. This is the thing that would have kept them out of the BCS championship game even had Texas not been ranked so highly in the preseason or even if the Longhorns had fallen against Nebraska (as Cincinnati was next-in-line at #3 in the final BCS standings) – strength of schedule. According to Phil Steele’s blog, TCU had the #89 schedule in the country at the end of the regular season, just about the 25th percentile. Alabama impressed voters with the #22 schedule in the country, thanks to their showdown with Florida, while Texas’ road was a little tougher than most at #43 and Cincinnati’s was about average at #59. In addition to having Clemson as their toughest non-conference game rather than Oklahoma like the year before, this time around Utah lost to Oregon and BYU was throttled by Florida State. (it didn’t help that a potential quality win for BYU, over Oklahoma, was diluted when Sam Bradford went down en route to a 5-loss season for the Sooners; then again, that probably contributed to the Cougars’ 14-13 win) The Mountain West was still a good conference in 2009, and their current 4-0 bowl record backs that up, but it was a much tougher league in 2008 when Utah was also an excellent team.

vs Previous “BCS Busters”

This season, TCU and Boise State became the 5th and 6th teams from non-automatic qualifier conferenced to earn a BCS bid. What about the previous four?

2004 Utah was the first non-AQ team to get a BCS invite, and their strong performance probably paved the way for more to follow. Utah pasted a weak Pittsburgh team 35-7 in the Fiesta Bowl. Over the entire season, Utah beat teams by an average of 45.3-19.5, which is good, basically this was a top five offense coupled with a top 30 defense. We’re pretty sure the offense was legitimately that good, trusting Urban Meyer’s coaching ability and Alex Smith’s skillset being such a perfect fit for the Meyer system. Pittsburgh was also the only team Utah faced that finished with 8 wins, so the Utes never faced anything resembling an elite opponent, as nobody on their schedule finished in the final top 25.

2006 Boise State may be the non-AQ team people remember first, famous for their assortment of trick plays used to beat Adrian Peterson’s Oklahoma Sooners in a thrilling Fiesta Bowl game featuring numerous late-game lead changes, fourth-and-forever conversions, and a two-point conversion in overtime. Led by Jared Zabransky and Ian Johnson, the Broncos featured the nation’s #2 scoring offense (39.7 ppg) and #20 scoring defense (17.6 ppg). Similar to 09 TCU, the Broncos were top 10 in most major offensive categories except passing yards, and again similarly the passing efficiency was actually excellent (5th). Defensively this does not quite hold true, as the Broncos were 20th in points per game and 15th in yards per game in 2006. This team certainly had more quality wins than the only BCS busters to come before them, beating three teams with 10+ wins, two of which came from AQ conferences.

2007 Hawaii was the lone non-AQ team to lose their BCS game, and in doing so they really made people think twice about these teams that win all of their games without ever facing a quality opponent. Before facing Georgia in the Sugar Bowl, Sagarin had their strength of schedule worse than #119 (I forget what exactly), meaning there were I-AA teams who faced tougher schedules than the Warriors. The result was a 41-10 blowout in the Sugar Bowl against a hot Georgia team that really played on a lot of stereotypes about non-AQ teams. Georgia dropped seven into coverage and got constant pressure with their front four, and on offense they basically just ran the ball for consistent gains and occasionally threw over the top when the defense desparately threw everyone at the line; by the time Hawaii had a drive longer than 50 yards, the score was already 31-3.

2008 Utah did their best to immediately correct those perceptions. Up until now, we’d seen two AQ teams who won all of their games against non-top 25 competition, and a third who got a big win with all kinds of crazy trick plays being able to barely outscore an offense that pretty much attacked directly at them. These Utes were the first “BCS Buster” team who played against quality opponents and won with a standard offense (since by now, the spread option had become one of the standards in college offenses). Their opening week victory in the Big House lost its luster as Michigan tanked for the season, but Utah also defeated Oregon State one week after the Beavers gave a great USC team their only loss, defeated two legitimately good MWC teams in TCU and BYU, and then of course jumped out to a big early lead and held off heavily favored Alabama in the Sugar Bowl. This Utah team maybe wasn’t quite as impressive statistically – 15th in scoring offense (36.9 ppg) and 12th in scoring defense (17.2 ppg), and in total offense they were just #36 – but you can put that completely on the result of them playing by far the toughest schedule of any BCS Buster, including the two teams who made the BCS this year. Counting their game against Alabama, Utah faced the #56 schedule according to Sagarin’s computer.

This season’s TCU seems to fit more into the same category as 04 Utah and 06 Boise, minus the trickery, but unlike those teams TCU’s defense has been a little more dominant against their relatively weak schedule. Indeed, TCU may be the first really defense-oriented BCS Buster we’ve had so far — their performance against Clemson especially makes me a real believer in this defense, holding CJ Spiller & Co to 10 points in their lowest-scoring performance of the season. At the same time, the only defense with the size and depth we expect from AQ teams that contend for their conference titles was able to hold the Frogs’ offense to 14 points, with the game-winning touchdown coming in the 4th quarter. I’m a little more skeptical of how this offense would fare against an elite defense, which unfortunately we’ll never get to see that get played out on the field.

Looking Back

I’d also like to take a look at the 2008 edition of the Horned Frogs. This TCU team finished 11-2 with a Poinsettia Bowl victory over Boise State, a real treat of a bowl game played so early in bowl season. That team outscored opponents by an average of 33.6 – 11.3, outgaining them 421.3 – 217.8 in the process (5.4 yards per play versus 3.8).

But 08 TCU did one thing that the 09 edition never got the opportunity to do: take on a nationally elite BCS conference opponent. Championship Game losers Oklahoma defeated TCU 35-10 in Norman, outgaining the Frogs 436 – 314 in the process. If we remove this game from the sample, the 2008 Horned Frogs went 11-1, winning by an average of 35.6 – 9.3 (430.3 – 199.6 yardage) against a similar set of opponents to what TCU faced in 2009.

Keep in mind that the 2009 statistics are 12-0, average score 40.7 – 12.4, average yardage 467.8 – 233.3. Aside from allowing and gaining an average of some 30 ypg and a few ppg more on both sides of the ball, the team seems to be doing about the same as a year ago. So why 12-0 vs 11-1? (again, looking at the similar parts of the schedule)

The difference, of course, is the Utah game. One thing I was not really aware of is how much TCU dominated the gameplay between these two teams in 2008. The final score read Utah 13, TCU 10. Nothing else was so close. TCU outgained Utah 416 – 275. They gained 4.2 yards per rush to the Utes’ 1.8. Andy Dalton averaged 6.8 yards per pass, Brian Johnson 5.9. The deciding factors were Dalton throwing 2 INT and Evans making just 1 of 3 FGs. Committing 11 penalties to the Utes’ 2 did not help matters either. I won’t say it was purely luck – Utah tended to pull out of games like this with wins in 2008, and some credit goes to Brian Johnson for having a knack for leading these comebacks and being a great leader for the team in general. But the statistics say that, on a play-by-play basis, TCU dominated this one but couldn’t translate that to the scoreboard.

Fast forward a year and TCU outgains Utah 549 – 284. This time, turnovers are even at 2 apiece and Utah commits 14 penalties to TCU’s 5. The result is a 55 – 28 blowout that played out remarkably like the pervious year’s game on the field. Only rather than the Utes catching all the breaks for a somewhat fortunate win at home (on a go-ahead pass with 48 seconds left, to boot), the Frogs coast to a comfortable win in their home stadium that is a little more indicative of what you’d expect given the yardage totals.

What does that mean for TCU?

There is some good news and some bad news here.

The good news is that, barring a heroic performance by Kellen Moore, this does bode well for the Frogs in the BCS game they are playing tonight, the Fiesta Bowl against Boise State. Like in their loss to Utah, in the Frogs’ close win over Boise State in the 2008 Poinsettia Bowl, they actually dominated the yardage statistics and should have won by more than they did. Boise State has done little this season to make me think that they are better than they were a year ago. In all likelihood, the Frogs should emerge from the Fiesta Bowl victorious and ranked #2 behind the Alabama/Texas winner.

The bad news is that the difference between 12-0 this season and 11-2 last season had more to do with a) not facing a championship game-caliber team and b) Utah not catching a ton of breaks / possibly missing Brian Johnson’s leadership… as opposed to some massive improvement by the Frogs. Indeed, this is basically the same team it was last year, playing at about the same generally high level. And therefore, I see little reason to believe that they wouldn’t face a similar outcome against an elite team than what happened a year ago. I’d expect Alabama, Florida, or Texas to beat the Frogs comfortably.

But we shouldn’t end things on a sour note, so there is some more good news here… and this ultimately matters more anyway. The team is becoming stably dominant over the over teams that they typically face. Indeed this consistency of playing about the same from year to year means that the Frogs have taken a step towards not just having a great team, like Utah seems to have every three or four years, but towards becoming one of the standards for consistent high-level play on a year in/year out program level. With consecutive blowout wins over BYU and consecutive strong performances against Utah, TCU is becoming the king of the MWC. Should they beat Boise State for a second year in a row, they essentially claim the title of best non-AQ program in the country. They’re losing a few key playmakers this offseason, notably Jerry Hughes, Rafael Priest, and Nick Sanders from their defense. Andy Dalton and most of the offense, save for RB Joseph Turner, should be back. With Max Hall graduating from BYU, who is going to challenge them for the MWC in 2010? The only non-AQ team in a better situation is actually Boise State, who should return 21 starters (all as juniors or seniors) with only CB Kyle Wilson graduating. But again, if they’re the premiere non-AQ program, as opposed to just having an elite team every few years or whatnot, there’s no reason why they can’t just fill this relatively small number of holes and continue to field top 10 squads year in and year out. I’m interested to see how they do without three of their biggest defensive stars in 2010, to see if they really are at the level where they can just reload the way the great programs do.

TCU will face Baylor in 2010 and 2011, and they add Texas Tech in 2011 as well. If they want to get national championship invites over a team from, say, the Big 12 with the same record, then they will need to put Texas or Oklahoma on the schedule in a year when that team wins 10 other games, or alternatively try to face USC or a high-level SEC opponent. Indeed, with Boise State facing both Oregon State and Virginia Tech in 2010, they probably wouldn’t even be first on the pecking order amongst non-AQ teams trying to get their first title berth ever, or competing for that lone at-large bid in a season where the AQ conferences field one or two more elite teams than they did this year. However, if their strategy is to merely avoid getting passed over by a team with a worse record a-la what happened to Utah last season or Boise State in 2006, then a schedule like they faced in 2009 and will face in 2010 is just the ticket for doing that (which very nearly worked out for the Frogs this season as Texas and Cincy both squeaked by in week 14).

[probable followup with more detailed analysis coming in the weeks following the Fiesta Bowl]

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