Clemson vs Miami - what does the data indicate?

Nov 27, 2017, 10:13 PM

I've been crunching the numbers to see how we match up against Miami. Just about every number I can find favors Clemson. Let's start with a comparison of the ACC Atlantic and Coastal Divisions:

In the chart above, W=winning record (i.e. 51% or more wins), E=even record (i.e. 50% wins, 50% losses), L=losing record (i.e. 49% or less wins).

Just as we all suspected, the competition in the Atlantic is significantly better than the Coastal. 71% of the teams (5 total) in the Atlantic have overall winning records. (i.e. 51% or more wins) Only 29% of Coastal teams (2 total) have overall winning records (51% or more wins). The Atlantic already has 5 teams bowl eligible (will probably be 6 if FSU wins this weekend) while the Coastal has 4 bowl eligible teams. Next look at the Atlantic vs Coastal head to head competition. In matchups between Atlantic vs Coastal teams, the Atlantic Division has won 9 of the 14 games with the Coastal winning only 5 of those matchups. In short the Atlantic wins 64% of the time against Coastal teams.

Advantage: Atlantic Division Champ

Next I looked at the schedule and quality of wins of Clemson and Miami. Here are the facts:

Clemson and Miami have 4 common opponents (FSU, Virginia Tech, Syracuse, and Georgia Tech). Only the Georgia Tech game is really comparable as it was the only game where both Clemson and Miami played Georgia Tech at home thus both having home field advantage. I will not ignore the Syracuse loss - it was a horrible loss for Clemson. Syracuse beat us in the Dome and finished with a 4-8 record. Likewise, the Pittsburgh loss for Miami is almost just as bad as Pittsburgh finished the season with a 5-7 record. Funny thing is that Miami beat Syracuse yet Syracuse beat Pittsburgh - just proves the transitive property does not apply to College Football.

Clemson has beaten 7 Power 5 teams with a winning record. Miami has beaten 2 Power 5 teams with a winning record. Clemson has beaten a total of 7 teams with winning records, Miami has beaten 4 teams with winning records. Clemson has a stronger body of work against tougher competition. Digging further into the wins, Clemson's best home win is against Auburn (11th ranked Total Defense, 18th ranked Total Offense), and Clemson's best road win is against Virginia Tech (13th ranked Total Defense, 61st ranked Total Offense). Miami's best home win was against Notre Dame (44th ranked Total Defense, 26th ranked Total Offense) and Miami's best road win is against Duke (23rd ranked Total Defense, 92nd ranked Total Offense). In both cases Clemson has beaten a better opponent at home and on the road.

Next I looked at the Clemson vs Miami team stats. Clemson has the 6th ranked Total Defense, and the 24th ranked Total Offense. Miami has the 41st ranked Total Defense, and the 44th ranked Total Offense. Clemson holds the advantage in Rushing Defense, Passing Defense, and Rushing Offense. Miami holds a 14.9 yards per game advantage in Passing Offense. Based on the competition levels previously discussed along with the fact the Bryant is a 66.4% completion passer compared to Rosier's 55.3% completion record, the overall stats indicate advantage to Clemson.

Lastly, I looked at Clemson's depth data. Here is a listing of playing time by Offense and Defense by position group through all 12 games this year:

As you can see we have an abundance of not only talent but experience in our 2 and 3 deep. We are almost at the point to where every position has at least 100(+) live game experience in every backup. I don't have such data for Miami, but my suspicion is that Miami does not have anywhere near the experienced depth of Clemson and that could be a big factor in this matchup.

Conclusions:
Clemson has played tougher competition than Miami and has won in tougher environments. Miami has played 4 away games this year (Duke, FSU, UNC, Pittsburgh), 0 of which were against teams with winning records (i.e. 51% wins or more). Miami won 3 of those 4 away games. Clemson played 5 away games this year, 4 of which were against teams with winning records (Louisville, VT, NC State, USuC) but lost to the one team with a losing record (Syracuse). To put it mildly, Miami has not been tested on the road and has yet to prove that they can beat a team outside the confines of Miami-Dade county that has a pulse.

Miami is a team whose trend has been to play to the level of competition. Much like Clemson under Tommy Bowden and the first couple of years under Dabo, Miami is a roller coaster team that can play like world beaters one week and look very pedestrian the next. This roller coaster affect was visible in their wins against FSU, Georgia Tech, UNC, and finally caught up with them in their loss to Pittsburgh. I believe this "playing to the level of competition" trait is a sign of Miami's inexperience and lack of maturity as a program.

Experience - This is Clemson's 3rd ACC Championship game in a row. We have been through 2 College Playoff Games and 2 National Championship games in the past 2 years. The Tigers have become accustomed to these types of games as to where Miami has no one on their roster that has sniffed this kind of rarefied air. Can Miami handle the big moment at night, away from Miami-Dade county, in front of a hostile crowd? At the end of the day, no one really knows how Miami is going to react to the pressure/excitement of playing for a Championship but I will take the experienced team every time over the novice - especially one that has yet to play a top ranked team on the road.

Prediction: There is a reason Vegas has us favored in this game. Everything I've looked at tells me that Clemson wins this game - and it might not be as close as the experts would have us believe. As long as Clemson continues to play to our Championship season norm while limiting turnovers (hopefully none), Clemson will be the 2017 ACC Champions late Saturday night.

flag link

military_tech

thumb_down

thumb_up

Miami is playing with 73 scholarship players and Rosier, the QB, has no business leading a P5 team into battle. Miami is without an experienced TE, has little depth in the OL, at RB and in the secondary.

They have an extremely good recruiting class coming in that will bring it's scholarship numbers back to what one would expect of a school at this level. The future is bright. However, by any measure, the fact they have arrived one or two years earlier than expected after over a decade of coaching incompetence and sanctions, speaks well of Richt and his staff who spend most of their time game planning around their QB's many deficiencies.

By any measure this game should not be close. However, they play the game for a reason.

Clemson vs Miami - what does the data indicate?

Re: Clemson vs Miami - what does the data indicate?

Re: Clemson vs Miami - what does the data indicate?

Re: Clemson vs Miami - what does the data indicate?

Re: Clemson vs Miami - what does the data indicate?

Re: Clemson vs Miami - what does the data indicate?

Syracuse's QB Eric Dungey has also been out the last month

Nicely done

Re: Clemson vs Miami - what does the data indicate?

Re: Clemson vs Miami - what does the data indicate?

Re: Clemson vs Miami - what does the data indicate?

+1 for the great analysis and thanks for your service!!***

Re: Clemson vs Miami - what does the data indicate?

Re: Clemson vs Miami - what does the data indicate?

tabbyplague is one of the one or two best user names on TNet

All right. Good. Good job.

Funny!

Re: Funny!

Another "I -get-easily-offended" post

Re: Another "I -get-easily-offended" post

Re: Clemson vs Miami - what does the data indicate?

TigerBoard POTD