2024 College Football Win-Loss Projections and Conference Champions
PLUS - Simulating the first ever 12-team CFB Playoff
Last week, I published my pre-season college football rankings. That provides a good baseline as to where teams stand heading into the season. Now, what can we expect as to how the season will play out? Who will ultimately be crowned champion on January 20th in Atlanta? Using those pre-season ratings, I simulated the season 10,000 times to forecast how the season will unfold.
How the Simulation Works
Each team started the season with their preseason Elo rating from my model. From there, I ran a Monte Carlo simulation, which simulated the season 10,000 times using the win probability derived from the difference in Elo ratings between the two teams. Some adjustments were made to a team’s pre-game Elo based on a few factors. The home team received an additional 50 points of Elo - assuming the game was played at their home field - and teams coming off a bye week got a 30-point Elo boost.1 These ratings were run hot, meaning that within each of the 10,000 simulated seasons, Elo was adjusted for each team after each game based on that week’s results. As a reminder, Elo is a closed system in which every point of Elo gained by the winner comes directly from the loser’s Elo rating. Elo was adjusted by a factor (the ‘K-factor’ in Elo jargon) of 30. The higher the factor of K, the more sensitive the adjustment is to recent outcomes. The home-field advantage adjustment and K-factor were based on research by FiveThirtyEight on the NFL and their now-defunct NFL predictive model. I raised the home-field advantage slightly, as home-field advantage is stronger in college than in the pros, and upped the K-factor as the shorter season and greater unpredictability in college football calls for more sensitivity to recent results. What resulted from this was projected records and final Elo ratings for all college football teams.
Projections
Although they begin the season ranked second in pre-season Elo, Oregon projects to be the best team when all is said and done, with pre-season number-one Georgia coming in second. Six SEC teams are projected to finish the season in the top-10.
Conference Forecasts
Below you see projected conference standings, ranked by conference win-loss record, with ties going to the team with the higher Elo.
Projected conference champions are as follows:
ACC - SMU
American Athletic - Memphis
Big XII - Kansas State
Big Ten - Oregon
Conference USA - Liberty
MAC - Toledo
Mountain West - Fresno State
SEC - Georgia
Sun Belt - Appalachian State
Projecting the First-Ever 12-Team College Football Playoff
The CFB Playoff is at long last expanding to 12 teams.2 For reference, the five highest ranked conference champions will automatically qualify, with the next seven highest ranked teams getting an at-large bid. The four highest ranked conference champions will receive a first round bye.3 The first round games will be played on the campus of the higher ranked team, with subsequent rounds played as part of the most prestigious and historic bowl games. Here is how I project the field to look…
Appalachian State emerged as the best “Group of 5” conference champion and 5th-highest ranked overall conference champion, slotting in just one spot behind SMU (watch out, ACC!). I then simulated the playoff, using the same specifications as in the full-season simulation.
I’m predicting an Oregon-Georgia showdown in Atlanta, with at-large Notre Dame and Michigan advancing to the semi-finals. I can’t seem to take my eyes off of the potential first-round game of Ohio State at Michigan, though. That would be something!
Biggest Surprise
SMU
Could SMU really win the ACC? The conference is fairly balanced at the top, with no clear runaway favorite. Even 2023 champion Florida State has a lot to replace, and could very well wind up falling short of last year’s 13-0 campaign. SMU frankly got robbed of a New Years Six bowl appearance last year, and this year will face arguably the easiest conference schedule in the ACC. The Mustangs visit FSU, but will face six teams picked to finish between 10th and 17th in the newly expanded 17-team ACC. ESPN’s FPI currently gives SMU the 5th-best odds to win the ACC at 9%.
Buckle up folks, a season like we’ve never seen before is ready to kick off, and college football never seems to disappoint!
Stay up to date
Keep up with my college football rankings and weekly game predictions in the College Football tab on my Substack’s home page. If you want regular updates and forecasts straight to your inbox, and be notified when updates come out, I encourage you to subscribe.
No home-field advantage was applied for games played at a neutral site.
Hallelujah!