Okay, I know it has been awhile since I have added anything to the blog, bottom line is I have been busy working on other things, and I have not felt like writing anything cause there just isn't any good things to write about Tennessee these days. However, something was brought to my attention today about strength of schedule and how polls such as www.collegefootballpolls.com understands it.
Lets for example look at Tennessee's strength of schedule, we all know that the first two weeks of Tennessee's schedule will be non-conference games and will usually be teams that are not ranked in the top 25.
This was the case when the Vols started their season against Montana and Cincinnati. It may not be important to some, but I feel as though it bears mentioning that Cincinnati has since been ranked and has been as high as 23rd in the AP Poll. They just fell out of the top 25 after losing to West Virginia by a field goal last week. This means that the Vols gave the Bearcats their only other loss of the season. Then we played our nemesis (as of late) the Florida Gators as our first conference game. Florida at that time was ranked 16th in the AP Poll. Then a weak team and weak non-conference game with Buffalo at home. Now here is where things start getting interesting regarding Tennessee's schedule. Georgia who was not ranked at the time, but is now ranked 14th in the AP Poll, then LSU ranked of course at #1 in the nation. Then we go to Alabama ranked #2, who is now ranked 3rd in the nation after losing to LSU. I could just stop there with my argument, but I won't. We then went on the next week to play 10th ranked South Carolina, who are now ranked 14th. Middle Tennessee State was next on the schedule and a well needed rest of competition for Tennessee, because the very next week Tennessee had to go back on the road to face 8th ranked Arkansas. Tennessee now faces an up and rising Vanderbilt team and then finishing off the season at Kentucky.
Now looking at the Tennessee Volunteers schedule and seeing that they played the #1 and #2 ranked teams in the nation. You would think that their strength of schedule would not only be note worthy but place them at least in the top 5 toughest schedules. Oh wait, not to mentioned that 5 other teams on their schedule were either ranked at the time the Vols played them or became ranked in the top 25 after the Vols played them. This means that the Vols scheduled had them playing against 7 teams that are either currently in the top 25 or have been in the top 25 this season. Do I need to mention here that it is a 12 game season? This would be about 60% of Tennessee's season that has been or is currently ranked in the top 25.
Tennessee has a strengh of schedule ranking of 19th by the website mention above. Here is something else, according to this same website, Alabama has a strength of schedule of 40th. I am still scratching my head on this.
