Predicting 2024 Utah Football Season (based on SP+)

[krindor]

Connelly just put out his SP+ ratings, rating Utah as the #17 FBS team with an SP-rating of 16.4.

Opponents are as follows (team, SP+ Rank/Rating, Utah Win Probability)

• Southern Utah (No SP+) 98.9%
• Baylor (#71 / -3.1) 90.2%
• @ Utah St (#95 / -9.0) 91.1%
• @Oklahoma St (#20 / 13.1) 51.9%
• Arizona (#19 / 14.4) 60.4%
• @Arizona St (#82 / -6.0) 87.9%
• TCU (#32 / 8.7) 72.6%
• @Houston (#78 / -5.1) 86.8%
• BYU (#65 / -2.2) 89.3%
• @ Colorado (#66 / -2.6) 83.4%
• Iowa St (#22 / 11.7) 66.4%
• @UCF (#59 / -0.6) 80.3%

Based on this, Utah is favored in every game… but still not likely to end up winning every game.  4 in particular stand out as the toughest (@Oklahoma St, Arizona, Iowa St, TCU), but Utah generally got a win from the schedulemakers with all the toughest games (except Okla St) at home.  The best estimate for wins (based on SP+) is 9.59 wins  Which explains why FanDuel put the O/U at 9.5 – even if you’re favored in every game, it’s hard to win them all

Simulating the season ten million times with these win percentages gives the following results

2024 Season Prediction Graph

For more detail, you can see (if my graph shows up…) the probability of each number of wins in the table below the chart.  Note that the chart shows 0% chance of 1, 2, or 3 wins, but these are all due to rounding.  In 1 of the 10 million instances, Utah did come up with only 1 win.  Similarly in 8 cases Utah only won 2 games, and in 159 cases (0.00159%) Utah only won 3 games.  There really were 0 cases in the ten million where Utah didn’t win a game.  With enough trials we’d eventually see it, so it’s not truly zero…but close enough (about one in a trillion chance)

Anyway this is basically an analysis of where SP+ sees Utah’s season (without any added biases from me on how good I think teams are) and explaining the FanDuel O/U of 9.5.  By his SP+ numbers 44.75% of the time Utah wins 9 or fewer. and 55.25% of the time they get 10+ wins.  98.7% of the time, Utah ends up bowl-eligible.

Note that this simulation is not dynamic. In reality, if we win or lose in a given week, it will influence how good SP+ thinks we are and change our odds for future weeks. This analysis assumes that the preseason predictions are more or less accurate (otherwise I’d have to sim EVERY team’s seasons to see how they all change as well)

[2008 National Champ]

don’t be lazy 🙂

(otherwise I’d have to sim EVERY team’s seasons to see how they all change as well)

That’s a tough over to hit. Utah has only done so once since entering P5 competition (2019). If I was a betting person, I’d probably put a small wager on the under while rooting for the over. But Utah just isn’t a good bet for this year. Save the money and try to find an up and coming team that is underrated based on previous like 2023 Arizona (5.5 win over/under).

Just from a betting – not fan – perspective, taking the over assumes the following:

1. Risng and Kuithe not only return to All-Conference form but are healthy all season
2. 3 “draftable” DB’s are replaced with similar or greater production
3. 2 “draftable” O Lineman are replaced with greater production and the whole unit performs better
4. Barton and L. Fano injury recoveries do not extend into the season and they are both able to return to immediate previous production
5. Utah manages to win the usual one or two “what the heck” games that every team experiences each season. It is not a Utah only phenomenon. No one performs at peak effectiveness every time out. Otherwise Tiger Woods would have won every tournament he entered.

Utah will have a very experienced team, similar to 2019, so playing 8 new opponents should tilt in their favor. The schedule isn’t overly daunting so schedule luck – catching the other team without key pieces – would also tend to lean in Utah’s favor. But without the five items I listed, along with overall improvement from the other returning players and “normal” injury rate.,, I wouldn’t risk my money on 10+ wins. And I’d challenge any of the people already claiming CFP appearances to show their betting slip.

[krindor]

Yup, from a betting perspective, it turns out that Vegas has a pretty good idea what they’re doing. There’s really not any value on the over. The under has a bit more value, just given the possibility of major injury/upheaval, but it’s really not a great bet either.

Vegas did a solid job setting the O/U, it’s almost like they’re professionals at this

[MDUte]

For me, the Oklahoma St game will determine the over/under. If we win that game, a 10 win season is the floor with a great opportunity to go 11-1.

If Utah loses this game, then a 9 win season becomes the floor with the goal of dropping only 1 other game for a 10 win season.

[2008 National Champ]

It’s Baylor for me, just like it was last year. That’s the game best set up for a relatively easy win. 5 weeks of camp to prep, scrimmage week 1 to knock the rust off, and a coach on the warm seat who just changed his entire staff.

A low stress win against Baylor would signal that the team is capable of double digits. Struggling like they did against them in 2023 would be an early indication that those November games may not be the sure things many believe they are right now.

Iowa State, then travelling across country on a short week is already going to be a stressful season end. Add a rivalry that’s been closer than the recruiting rankings would suggest and a potential trap game in Boulder? I think if the offseason questions get answered early and emphatically, it makes the back end a lot easier to deal with.

[MDUte]

It’s one thing to play Baylor on the road in the sweltering heat without Cam Rising and other key starters…but being back to full strength and playing at RES against an even worse Baylor team isn’t going to tell us anything IMO. That game isn’t going to be close…Utes are going to destroy Baylor.

[Uteanooga]

Good stuff.

In terms of betting- I decided long ago that I am virtually incapable of separating emotion from reason regarding Utah sports. I just can’t do it and consequently don’t bet Utah games. The truth is that just paying attention is a fairly large emotional gamble- if we win I feel great and if we lose I feel badly for a while. That is enough for me.

As for the winning probabilities I think they follow the probability of staying healthy fairly closely though this is all guesstimating. 5 or 6% chance of going undefeated? Yeah that sounds right and just about equal to the probability of all our best players staying healthy for all of the games.

Our best seasons happened to coincide with fielding our best players in the toughest games. Remember when Ohio St. played their 5th-string QB in their bowl game and he looked like the best QB in the country? Or when Smith-Njigba looked like a mixup of Jerry Rice and Randy Moss against our depleted secondary after Smith-Njigba spent the entire season on the bench behind future 1st rounders? We have never been built like that and won’t be this season either.

The stats are fun, but if Utah stays healthy, they will be very good. If not, the fans will say that Ludwig is an idiot, that Whitt interferes too much with the O, etc. All predictable and all fun.

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