So if you had you choice and could only win one of the two
- Thread starter hdhntr1
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I've said it before about these dichotomies: The Iowa game makes us nearly certain to be Big Ten West champs; it is a far more important game to win for what it would mean for this team.
But of course we should want to win both.
We're more likely to beat ND than Iowa by virtue of the fact that ND is a home game and Iowa isn't.
But of course we should want to win both.
We're more likely to beat ND than Iowa by virtue of the fact that ND is a home game and Iowa isn't.
You realize NU has played much better on the road this season. And the ND game will be like a road game, fan wise.
Both will be tough games, but hard to see how NU is more likely to beat a Notre Dame team that looks considerably better than Iowa.
Being the home team against ND gives us a relative 6 point advantage over being the away team against Iowa.
ND isn't 6 points better than Iowa; most models like ESPN FPI give us a better chance of beating ND (28%) than Iowa (21%) by virtue of that home-away factor.
Think about it like this: if we were playing ND in South Bend, our odds of winning would be around 12-15%.
Hell, Sagarin has Iowa as a better team outright than ND... (which I don't agree with but that's his model).
Based on how the two teams have played ND is around the 8th-12th best team in the country and Iowa is somewhere around the 20th best team in the country: ND has played a relatively easy schedule (only Michigan is currently ranked of their 8 opponents) and struggled to put away weaker teams like Ball State and Vanderbilt at home.
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That type of stuff doesn't really affect how you measure future games. In some sense games are somewhat independent from each other.
I realize that's a weird thing to say, but us being a better road team than home team the past couple of years is mostly just chance and circumstance. Teams should be better at home than away (by around a 6 point swing), but some teams like ours have spent a period of time being an anomaly...
It's like rolling a bunch of 5s and 6s on a die. You're still more likely in the future to roll 1-4.
ND has had either the #1 or #2 Strength of Record this season (currently #2).
And have you seen the difference between ND when they played BSU & Vandy compared to now?
Ever since ND switched to Book at QB & Dexter Williams came back at RB, ND’s offense went from scoring 23 ppg to over 40 ppg. And now that Armstrong is back from injury ND has both starting RBs finally.
Defensively ND might be weaker because Tranquil (5th year Captain) most likely is our for a while.
So was MICH. And actually we likely could have beaten MICH if we had a running attack in that game.
According to Sagarin, Notre Dame's schedule is #45 and Northwestern's is #20. I recognize that "strength of record" and "strength of schedule" may be two different things, but I don't know what Notre Dame - apart from an impressive victory over Michigan - did to get a top two ranking. I sure hope LSU is #1 in that metric.
Notre Dame is definitely playing better now than they did in games against BSU/Vandy/Pitt. The question is: is NU also playing better now? Certainly there have been good and bad games over the last month, but neither team has lost in a while. Looking forward to Saturday.
What? Talk about overhyped. Other than Mich who have you played? A 5-3 Stanford and a 4-3VT?
https://notredame.rivals.com/news/notre-dame-opponent-recap-week-nine
I refuse to answer such a question under the premise that winning one game meant losing the other. I’d rather not play God, role the dice, and go 2-0, 1-1 or 0-2.
However, if I could use “magical powers” to intervene and influence only one game, I’d pick Notre Dame. If NU beats Notre Dame (even with my divine help), they’ll go into Kinnick on fire and destroy the Hawkeyes.
Heck, would the CFP take a 10-3 Big Ten Champion Northwestern team on a 9 game winning streak that includes a 5-0 record against ranked teams [MSU, Wisconsin, (top 5) Notre Dame, Iowa and a (top 5) Michigan in the B1G Championship game] including 2 wins over top 5 teams?
Maybe... I’ll hold out for that scenario for now.
However, if I could use “magical powers” to intervene and influence only one game, I’d pick Notre Dame. If NU beats Notre Dame (even with my divine help), they’ll go into Kinnick on fire and destroy the Hawkeyes.
Heck, would the CFP take a 10-3 Big Ten Champion Northwestern team on a 9 game winning streak that includes a 5-0 record against ranked teams [MSU, Wisconsin, (top 5) Notre Dame, Iowa and a (top 5) Michigan in the B1G Championship game] including 2 wins over top 5 teams?
Maybe... I’ll hold out for that scenario for now.
Let’s beat ND, watch Purdue to beat Iowa and take the pressure off, then play loose against Iowa and curb stomp them too
The issue with some of this analysis is that the Ball State and Vanderbilt games were played without Book at QB and without Williams at RB.
The offense looks completely different, stylistically, than it did then.
As far as the offense goes, it’s of very limited value to look at games 1-3 and think you’ll face a similar offense this week.
Defense is fairly comparable, as the personnel is the same (although we may be without Tranquil)
If you want to convince yourself that the ND offense that you’ll face isn’t that good, you’d be better off focusing on the Pitt game, since that’s the personnel and scheme/style you’ll actually be facing.
(Book’s 1st start was against Wake Forest)
I seriously doubt that NW gets a 3 point homefield advantage agasint ND, considering that 50%+ of the stadium is likely to be ND fans.
The 3 point rule is an average, not an absolute.
For example, ND probably doesn’t get a full home field advantage for some of our games either. We have a pretty old/quiet fan base for our day time games.
I’d bet NW is getting 0-1 points for home filed this game, and ND would only get 1-2 for a day time homefield game agaisnt NW. maybe a 2-3 point swing, total.
I'll see NU beat ND again in my lifetime. Rose Bowl or B10 champs, maybe not. So definitely Iowa.
“Strength of Record” is a metric that looks at how a team actually did agasint their schedule, and what the probability that an average Top25 team would do that would be.
Theoretically, a team could play a weak schedule, but win every game 100-0, and end up with the #1 “Strength of Record”.
But typically it favors undefeated teams how have wins over good teams.
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