Final Conference Rankings

 The end of year rankings for the conferences in college football. It may surprise many, but the data tells us that the SEC is still the best conference in college football. The data also is telling us that the Big 12 was better than the ACC this year. The Mountain West capitalized on a rebuilding year from the Sunbelt to rank as the best group of five conference this season.

According to the data we use to analyze games and predict future outcomes the SEC is the best conference in college football this year. That may surprise many as the Big 10 had a very good bowl season and with Ohio State winning the national championship. Here is a team by team breakdown of the two conferences. 

Team	Record	Rating	N. Rank	Team	Record	Rating	N. Rank
Texas	13-3	48.6	3	Ohio State	14-2	53.3	1
Mississippi	10-3	48.3	4	Penn State	13-3	45.9	5
Alabama	9-4	45.7	6	Oregon	13-1	45.1	7
Tennessee	10-3	44.7	8	Indiana	11-2	44.5	9
Georgia	11-3	44.1	10	Iowa	8-5	37.6	17
Florida	8-5	37.9	15	Southern California	7-6	37.2	20
South Carolina	9-4	37.9	16	Michigan	8-5	36.9	21
Louisiana State	9-4	37.6	18	Minnesota	8-5	36.4	22
Texas A&M	8-5	36.3	23	Illinois	10-3	33.1	30
Arkansas	7-6	32.6	32	Nebraska	7-6	31.1	37
Auburn	5-7	32.0	33	Washington	6-7	30.3	40
Oklahoma	6-7	31.6	35	Wisconsin	5-7	29.8	45
Missouri	10-3	31.2	36	Rutgers	7-6	27.9	48
Vanderbilt	7-6	30.3	41	UCLA	5-7	24.5	59
Kentucky	4-8	23.9	62	Maryland	4-8	22.1	64
Mississippi State	2-10	20.9	68	Northwestern	4-8	20.5	70
				Michigan State	5-7	20.4	71
				Purdue	1-11	7.1	115
Average		36.5	26			32.4	38

As you can see the data tells us that Ohio State was better than any SEC team, but the trend than quickly reverses itself. Many teams are very close compared to each other, but the glaring differences are Georgia compared to Iowa, 44.1-37.6 and Vanderbilt compared to UCLA, 30.3-24.5. Then the biggest difference is Purdue sitting at 115th is dragging the Big 10's averages down. 

The algorithm also see's the Big 12 as a better conference this year than the ACC. Two ACC teams got into the college football playoff, but many argued that it should have been the Big 12 that got two in. The data tells us that it should have been two ACC teams in, but it wasn't the two that ended up there. Even with that the Aggregate see's the Big 12 as the better conference overall. Here is the comparison of the two. 

Team	Record	Rating	N. Rank	Team	Record	Rating	N. Rank
Miami (FL)	10-3	43.4	11	Arizona State	11-3	39.0	13
Louisville	9-4	39.4	12	Brigham Young	11-2	35.9	24
Clemson	10-4	38.1	14	Colorado	9-4	35.5	25
Southern Methodist	11-3	37.4	19	Iowa State	11-3	33.7	27
Virginia Tech	6-7	34.5	26	Kansas State	9-4	33.7	28
Georgia Tech	7-6	33.3	29	Baylor	8-5	32.6	31
Boston College	7-6	30.7	39	Kansas	5-7	31.9	34
Syracuse	10-3	27.6	49	Texas Christian	9-4	30.2	43
Duke	9-4	27.4	50	Utah	5-7	28.8	46
Pittsburgh	7-6	27.2	52	Central Florida	4-8	28.7	47
Virginia	5-7	24.3	60	Texas Tech	8-5	27.3	51
North Carolina State	6-7	22.4	63	West Virginia	6-7	26.2	55
North Carolina	6-7	21.9	65	Cincinnati	5-7	24.7	56
Wake Forest	4-8	18.0	80	Oklahoma State	3-9	20.0	72
Stanford	3-9	17.6	83	Houston	4-8	19.2	74
Florida State	2-10	14.9	89	Arizona	4-8	14.8	90
Average		28.6	46			28.9	45

As you can see the top 6 in the ACC were better than the Big 12, but the next 9 teams were better in the Big 12. This middle to end made the Big 12 a slightly better conference overall than the ACC. This is one place that shows why this kind of data is important. Often public perception about a conference is driven by the top teams, but that never gives a whole view. In this case the top of the ACC was clearly better than the top of the Big 12, but when you look at the entire conference you see that the Big 12 was actually the better conference overall. 

Finally the data tells us that the Mountain West was the best group of five conference this season. Although none of it's teams made our top 25 both Boise and UNLV made our top 50. It was the only group of five conference to do that. They also had six teams in our top 100.

CFB Top Conferences
Rank	Conference	Average Rating	Average Rank	Teams in the Top 25
1	SEC	36.5	26	9
2	Big 10	32.4	38	8
3	Big 12	28.9	45	3
4	ACC	28.5	47	4
5	FBS Ind	22.8	68	1
6	Pac 2	17.1	83	0
7	Mountain West	15.2	89	0
8	Sun Belt	13.8	91	0
9	AAC	12.5	94	0
10	MAC	7.3	106	0
11	CUSA	5.3	112	0