Game Analysis

Note: The line on this game crashed down to 3 this morning and Iowa would not be a Lean at that number.

Lean – Iowa (+5.5)  22   Vanderbilt  23

Both of these teams are intact for this game aside from Vandy TE Eli Stowers, who opted out to prepare for the NFL. This basically comes down to a strength versus strength battle between Vanderbilt’s elite offense and Iowa’s elite defense.

Vanderbilt was incredible offensively this season, as the Commodores averaged 7.5 yards per play against FBS opponents that would combine to allow just 5.1 yppl to an average attack. That’s the best offense in the nation based on compensated yards per play and they’ll be up against an Iowa defense that’s been 1.4 yppl better than average.

Vanderbilt has faced 6 very good defensive teams this season (South Carolina, Alabama, LSU, Missouri, Texas, and Auburn) and they were relatively worse in those games, averaging 6.5 yppl, which is 1.9 yppl more than an average offense would gain against those teams. That’s still very good but 0.5 yppl worse than their overall rating, as the Commodores had their way with mediocre and bad defensive teams, averaging 8.6 yppl or more against the other 6 teams on their schedule.

The regression equation predicting Vanderbilt’s yards per play as a function of the opposing team’s compensated defensive yards per play (adjusted for site) has a slope of 1.33, which teams that Vanderbilt was 1.33 yppl worse (relatively) for every yard per play that their opponent was better. That equation would yield a prediction of 6.45 yards per play for Vanderbilt against a defense the caliber of Iowa’s defense. That’s only 0.15 yppl worse than the math projection for this game, which works out to about a point. In fairness, I also took out the two games that Iowa played against bad offensive teams (UMass and Minnesota) and that made their defensive rating 0.11 yppl worse. Regarding Eli Stowers opting out, I really don’t think it makes much of a difference. Stowers averaged 9.3 yards on his 83 targets with a 59% success rate. However, the next two tight ends combined to average 12.8 YPT on 21 targets with a 67% success rate. I project 365 total yards at 6.6 yppl for Vanderbilt. I made no adjustment for Stowers being out.

Iowa’s offense got better as the season progressed but the Hawkeyes were still 0.3 yppl worse than average offensively (5.3 yppl against FBS teams that would allow 5.6 yppl to an average team). Vanderbilt is nothing special on defense (5.6 yppl allowed to teams that would combine to average 5.9 yppl against an average team) but they have the advantage in this game. I project 296 yards at 4.8 yppl for the Hawkeyes.

Vanderbilt has a clear advantage from the line of scrimmage, but Iowa has the nation’s best special teams rating (they’re always near the top and 3 points better than Vandy) and the Hawkeyes have the edge in projected turnovers (1.5 points worth). Overall, the math favors Vanderbilt by 3.4 points with a total of 46.5 points. Vanderbilt does apply to a negative 30-97-2 ATS bowl situation that plays against high scoring teams. That angle works because the extra time off between games can take highly-tuned offensive units out of their rhythm (extremely high scoring teams also tend to go under in their bowl games and a 40-13 Under angle applies to this game). Iowa’s special teams makes them better than they appear to be and is a big reason that they’re 9-2 ATS in games against FBS opponents this season. The Hawkeyes are 4-0 ATS as an underdog this season and their largest loss is by just 5 points. They lost by just 2 points to Oregon and by 5 points each to Indiana and at USC.

I will Lean with Iowa based on the situation.