College football rankings: Top 25 teams re-ranked by Win Out Percentage
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2023-09-15 08:18
Where would each team in the AP Top 25 sit if the college football rankings were based on computer calculations for who has the greatest chance to win out in 2023?

It's Week 3 in the 2023 college football season and already the story of the season is being written.

Texas' victory over Alabama in Tuscaloosa and Florida State's beat down of LSU in Week 1 have made the Longhorns and Seminoles the teams to beat in Big 12 and ACC respectively.

But there is still a whole lot we don't know, like who will come out on top in the Big Ten with Michigan and Ohio State or which Pac-12 team will survive the conference guantlet.

We obviously won't know until everything has a chance to play out, but the computers behind ESPN's Football Power Index have run the simulations and given us a guess at which teams have the best chance at running the table from here.

College football rankings: Comparing "Win Out" percentages

  1. Florida State [Actual AP rank: 3] — 18.0%
  2. Georgia [1] — 15.7%
  3. Ohio State [6] — 15.5%
  4. Alabama [10] — 15.5%
  5. Texas [4] — 14.9%
  6. Oklahoma [19] — 9.9%
  7. Notre Dame [9] — 9.6%
  8. Penn State [7] — 9.4%
  9. USC [5] — 8.5%
  10. Michigan [2] — 4.8%
  11. Miami [22] — 3.2%
  12. Oregon [12] — 3.2%
  13. LSU [14] — 1.2%
  14. Oregon State [16] — 1.0%
  15. Washington [8] — 0.9%
  16. Ole Miss [17] — 0.8%
  17. Utah [12] — 0.7%
  18. Kansas State [15] — 0.7%
  19. North Carolina [20] — 0.5%
  20. Tennessee [11] — 0.3%
  21. Iowa [25] — 0.2%
  22. UCLA [24] — 0.1%
  23. Colorado [18] — 0.0%
  24. Duke [21] — 0.0%
  25. Washington State [23] — 0.0%

First things first, what is "Win Out %"? It's the "percent of season simulations in which team won all remaining scheduled games as well as conference championship game."

So who has the smoothest sailing from here? Florida State. The Seminoles got their biggest threat of the season out of the way early with the win over LSU. Clemson doesn't look like much of a threat. Duke and Miami are the biggest threats left on the schedule and while those are good teams, FSU gets both at home.

Then comes Georgia, and it's not hard to see why. Not only do the Bulldogs have one of the best rosters in college football, but their schedule might be the most fortuitous schedule in SEC history. The only currently-ranked teams on the slate are Ole Miss and Tennessee. The trip to Knoxville is their biggest hurdle.

Interestingly, it's Ohio State with a significantly better Win Out % than Michigan. That's easy to figure out because FPI is far more skeptical of the Wolverines than the AP voters. FPI ranks Michigan 10th and Ohio State second. The computers favor the Buckeyes in their regular-season finale even though it's at the Big House.

Ryan Day and company need to make it through Notre Dame and Penn State first. Jim Harbaugh's squad has a relatively easy road until they play Penn State in November.

The only Top 25 teams the computers say have zero chance to win out? No. 18 Colorado, No. 21 Duke and No. 23 Washington State. Basically, their schedules are too difficult.

The Buffaloes face Oregon, USC, UCLA, Oregon State, Washington State and Utah. All are ranked.

The Cougars face a similar state with Oregon State, UCLA, Oregon, Colorado and Washington coming up.

The Blue Devils have to get through Notre Dame, Florida State and North Carolina.

Tags ohio state seminoles college football rankings georgia bulldogs florida state seminoles michigan wolverines alabama crimson tide eppersons