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(Ed. Notes: First, we know this is sort of late, but we had to get Nugget up to speed on the system. Iowa State will come over the weekend, and future analyses will come in a more timely fashion. Second, a big thanks goes to Matt Mills () over at SB Nation's Georgia Tech site From The Rumble Seat for the Win Probability Graph and help with post development. If you like this post or even if you don't, go check out his work in their Football Analytics stream. Its pretty cool.
If you have any questions as to how these stats are found, let us know in the comments below. For definitions of most of these, visit Bill Connelly's Advanced Stats Glossary over at Football Study Hall, which is a pretty cool site too.)
Advanced Box Score
| Kansas State 55 - Stephen F. Austin 16 | |||||||
| Passing Downs | Quarter Performance | ||||||
| KSU | SFA | KSU | SFA | ||||
| Plays | 21 | 27 | Yards / Play | Success Rate | Yards / Play | Success Rate | |
| Yards / Play | 7.52 | 5.33 | Q1 | 6.38 | 76% | 1.89 | 9% |
| Success Rate | 62% | 37% | Q2 | 7.29 | 71% | 7.91 | 29% |
| Standard Downs | Q3 | 4.82 | 33% | 4.50 | 29% | ||
| KSU | SFA | Q4 | 5.31 | 38% | 1.92 | 27% | |
| Plays | 60 | 33 | Down Performance | ||||
| Yards / Play | 5.41 | 4.55 | KSU | SFA | |||
| Success Rate | 60% | 36% | Yards / Play | Success Rate | Yards / Play | Success Rate | |
| Passing Plays | 1 | 5.60 | 51% | 5.28 | 32% | ||
| KSU | SFA | 2 | 7.04 | 61% | 5.60 | 45% | |
| Plays | 36 | 45 | 3 | 5.31 | 57% | 3.57 | 36% |
| Yards / Play | 7.00 | 5.76 | 4 | 1.67 | 67% | 0.00 | 0% |
| Success Rate | 53% | 27% | Drive Performance | ||||
| Sack Rate (SD / PD) | 4% / 10% | 11% / 0% | Num of Drives | Avg Start Spot | % Methodical | % Explosive | |
| Running Plays | KSU | 13 | 55.2 | 23% | 0% | ||
| KSU | SFA | SFA | 12 | 74.7 | 8% | 17% | |
| Plays | 45 | 15 | KSU | SFA | |||
| Yards / Play | 5.18 | 2.33 | % Possible Yards Gained | 67% | 33% | ||
| Success Rate | 60% | 13% | Turnovers | 1 | 1 | ||
On the surface this game played out exactly like you would expect for a Power 5 vs. an FCS game, and the advanced stats backed that up. Some observations:
- Kansas State consistently performed better on Passing Downs than Standard Downs, gaining almost two and a half more yards per play with a 60% Success Rate
- Kansas State's average starting position was 19.5 yards better than Stephen F. Austin's. Over the Wildcats' 13 possessions this was a sizable advantage.
- The defense performed very well in the first and last quarters, giving up no points and only allowing about two yards per play. This is especially true in the first quarter, where the defense held Stephen F. Austin to a 9% Success Rate.
- In the second quarter, Stephen F. Austin actually averaged more yards per play than Kansas State, although the low Success Rate (29%) points to low production outside a few explosive plays.
Win Probability Graph
As a small introduction to Win Probability graphs, each uses data from past games to develop a model for analyzing the change in probability of a team to win the game. This model uses game data from 2009-2012. Home teams and FBS teams (when playing FCS teams) receive a initial bias when the model lists a starting point, otherwise the model starts each team's Win Probability at 0.50 in neutral locations. Each team's possessions are notated by different colors on the graph. For more information, check out Matt's piece over at FTRS.
The Win Probability graph for this game really doesn't tell us much, as Kansas State was in control the entire game. Future graphs will show more changes, and I'll pull out some of the biggest plays from the game to show their changes in the Win Probability, but this time, we were just too consistent. If I can say that...
I plan on adding more figures and analysis in the future as I gain more resources. If there is anything you would like to see added, or any questions you might have then let me know in the comments.