(08-06-2015 12:29 PM)Hokie Mark Wrote: So, if I understand this, you're pointing out that the most improved teams over the last 8 years are: Pitt, Clemson, Wake Forest, Ga Tech and Duke.
Whereas the teams which have declined the most in the last 8 years are: UNC, FSU, Miami, UVa and Syracuse.
Three teams are about the now as they were back then: BC, Va Tech and NC State.
Is that about right?
The use of trailing averages is a statistical smoothing technique designed to eliminate the noise of short term variation in data to identify long-term trends.
I would have reversed the order you used in your second paragraph, since Syracuse was the one with the strongest negative trend, not UNC. But essentially, you have it correctly, as long as you understand that the improvement/decline applies only to conference regular season play.
Considering where Wake Forest and Duke were starting from, they would have almost had to improve. In the 17 years after Steve Spurrier left Duke, the Devils averaged fewer than one conference win per year. At their lowest point, their 8 year average had dropped below 5% (one win every 20 games).
Likewise, the teams that started out at the very top were most likely to decline, just because there was almost no way they could improve. If you look at the time frame, 1999 was the first year after FSU joined the league in which you could calculate an 8 year average. For UNC, that coincided with the first recruiting classes post Mack Brown - their decline from that era isn't a big surprise. And I think anyone who has been paying attention realized that Miami has been a shell of its former self recently.
For a numbers geek like myself, I find data like this interesting. But it still only looks at the past, and isn't highly predictive of the future - especially in a sport like college football, where coaching changes have such a powerful influence on performance.
