Big 12 projection, Round 7

Another wild and wacky round.  West Virginia's loss allowed the Mountaineers to
slip into third place behind Baylor.  Kansas State is the beneficiary of West
Virginia's loss, leapfrogging both TCU and Texas Tech into the upper division.
Although both TCU and Texas Tech lost, the Red Raiders arguably took the worse
loss of the two, so they sink behind TCU into seventh place.  And Oklahoma
couldn't ride their upset of West Virginia in Morgantown into a home win over
Iowa State, and with Oklahoma State's sizeable win over Texas Tech, the Cowboys
regain eighth place.

All the favorites are at home for Round 8, so no projected road wins, though
we'd love to see a road win in Morgantown.  One of Iowa State or Kansas State
will pick up their fourth conference loss.  Right now, Kansas is projected to
win 15 conference games, if the rounding works in the Jayhawks' favor, so four
conference losses would likely take that team out of contention for the
championship.  Winning in Morgantown would not only boost the projection for
Kansas over 15, it would give West Virginia that fourth conference loss.  It's
within reach, and Kruger showed us how to do it.  But we can't have as many
turnovers against the Mountaineers as in the previous two games.

                      Rnd 1  Rnd 2  Rnd 3  Rnd 4  Rnd 5  Rnd 6  Rnd 7
Pred                  Proj.  Proj.  Proj.  Proj.  Proj.  Proj.  Proj.   Conf                          
Rank  Big XII Team    Wins   Wins   Wins   Wins   Wins   Wins   Wins   Record  Next Game   Prediction 
----  --------------  -----  -----  -----  -----  -----  -----  -----  ------  ---------   -----------
#  8  Kansas          13.49  13.01  13.40  13.60  13.84  14.52  14.52    7  0  @WVU (Tu)
# 12  Baylor          12.36  12.69  12.73  12.17  12.63  12.68  13.27    6  1   TTU (We)   BU  by 10.1
#  2  West Virginia   14.75  13.76  13.84  14.26  14.23  12.95  12.04    4  3   KU  (Tu)   WVU by  5.4
# 18  Iowa State      10.34  10.24  10.29  11.02  10.42   9.79  10.18    4  3   KSU (Tu)   ISU by  6.9
# 31  Kansas State     6.38   6.95   7.43   7.26   6.72   7.62   8.63    4  3  @ISU (Tu)
# 33  TCU              7.25   7.24   7.21   7.72   8.57   8.13   7.49    3  4  @OSU (Mo)
# 39  Texas Tech       7.73   8.88   8.48   8.78   7.68   8.14   7.10    3  4  @BU  (We)
# 28  Oklahoma State   7.97   7.17   7.21   6.61   6.53   5.52   6.51    1  6   TCU (Mo)   OSU by  4.4
# 54  Oklahoma         4.88   4.62   4.11   3.87   4.56   6.01   5.61    2  5  @UT  (Mo)              
# 61  Texas            4.85   5.44   5.30   4.71   4.82   4.64   4.65    1  6   OU  (Mo)   UT  by  2.5

Pomeroy took honors for best prognostications in Round 7.  Honorable mention to Dunkel
for being the only one to pick Oklahoma State over Texas Tech.  Honorable mention to
Seven Overtimes for being the only one to pick Kansas State over West Virginia.
Sagarin regained the season lead.  The BPI's initial effort wasn't very good.

Predictions                                                                                                     Reality  Error         1     1                                         3           1           1
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  -------  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                Saga  Mass  Pome  Gree  Dunk  Vega  Coll  Dolp  Whit  ESPN  7 OT  Crot  Aste  A-HC  Trnd  DPPI           Saga  Mass  Pome  Gree  Dunk  Vega  Coll  Dolp  Whit  ESPN  7 OT  Crot  Aste  A-HC  Trnd  DPPI
BU  over TCU     2.4   4.0   3.0   2.5   5.0   2.5   4.3   1.5   3.5   2.7  -2.0   0.9   1.7   1.2   1.3            9     6.6   5.0   6.0   6.5   4.0   6.5   4.7   7.5   5.5   6.3  11.0   8.1   7.3   7.8   7.7      
TTU over OSU     3.1   4.0   3.9   6.5  -4.0   6.0   5.7   4.5   5.2   6.7   5.0   4.6   2.8   3.2   5.1          -19    22.1  23.0  22.9  25.5  15.0  25.0  24.7  23.5  24.2  25.7  24.0  23.6  21.8  22.2  24.1      
ISU over OU      4.2   2.0   3.3  -2.0   7.5  -1.0   5.1   4.0   2.4   2.9  -5.0   4.1   6.2   5.8   1.6            5     0.8   3.0   1.7   7.0   2.5   6.0   0.1   1.0   2.6   2.1  10.0   0.9   1.2   0.8   3.4      
WVU over KSU     7.6   2.0   4.0   3.0   5.0   2.5   1.8   6.7   3.4   6.9  -4.0   4.7   9.3   8.9   2.8           -4    11.6   6.0   8.0   7.0   9.0   6.5   5.8  10.7   7.4  10.9   0.0   8.7  13.3  12.9   6.8      
KU  over UT     14.7  19.0  16.1  16.5  26.0  17.0  23.4  14.5  17.0  19.9  13.0  17.0  16.6  17.1  13.5           12     2.7   7.0   4.1   4.5  14.0   5.0  11.4   2.5   5.0   7.9   1.0   5.0   4.6   5.1   1.5      

total this round                                                                                                         43.8  44.0  42.7  50.5  44.5  49.0  46.7  45.2  44.7  52.9  46.0  46.3  48.2  48.8  43.5      
previous total                                                                                                          207.1 210.0 211.4 202.0 252.5 203.0 258.8 220.4 214.9       229.0 233.0 231.6 235.8 235.8      
cumulative                                                                                                              250.9 254.0 254.1 252.5 297.0 252.0 305.5 265.6 259.6  52.9 275.0 279.3 279.8 284.6 279.3      
per game (total of 35)                                                                                                    7.2   7.3   7.3   7.2   8.5   7.2   8.7   7.6   7.4  10.6   7.9   8.0   8.0   8.1   8.0      

Two road wins were projected for Round 7, but three happened, and one of
the two that had been projected didn't happen, so two unexpeceted road
wins occurred.  No road wins are projected for Round 8, though we'd like
to see one in Morgantown.

Road wins (14 out of 35)                Home losses                             Differential (RW-HL)
-------------------------------------   -------------------------------------   --------------------
3 Baylor          OU  KSU TCU           0 Baylor                                +3 Baylor        
3 Kansas          TCU OU  ISU           0 Kansas                                +3 Kansas        
2 West Virginia   OSU UT                1 Iowa State      KU                    +1 West Virginia 
2 Iowa State      OSU OU                1 Kansas State    BU                    +1 Iowa State    
1 Kansas State    OSU                   1 Texas Tech      OSU                    0 Kansas State  
1 Oklahoma        WVU                   1 West Virginia   OU                    -1 TCU           
1 Oklahoma State  TTU                   2 TCU             KU  BU                -1 Texas Tech    
1 TCU             UT                    2 Texas           TCU WVU               -2 Oklahoma      
0 Texas                                 3 Oklahoma        BU  KU  ISU           -2 Oklahoma State
0 Texas Tech                            3 Oklahoma State  WVU ISU KSU           -2 Texas         

You read it here first:  "might just mean another loss for Huggy Bear."
The inconsistency for Kansas is just insanely small.  Not only are the
Jayhawks playing very consistently, they're somehow getting their
opponents to also play more consistently, because the average team
contributes about 7.8 points of inconsistency to the 11 point total.
Even if we assume the Big 12 as a whole is playing more consistently
than the national average, say 9 to 10 points, we're still looking at
6.4 to 7.1 points being contributed by each team.  Fraschilla tells
folks that teams will play five game "worse than you are".  Well, the
Indiana and Kansas State games qualify for Kansas so far.  Let's hope
we don't have any of those "worse than you are" games in the next three.

Performance (points)     Inconsistency (points)    
---------------------    ----------------------    
West Virginia   +2.27    Kansas            6.08    
TCU             +1.57    Kansas State      7.32    
Oklahoma State  +1.15    TCU               7.52    
Iowa State      +1.12    Baylor            8.98    
Baylor          +1.07    Texas Tech        8.98    
Kansas State    +0.82    Oklahoma         10.37    
Kansas          +0.65    Texas            12.05    
Texas Tech      +0.36    Iowa State       13.14    
Oklahoma        -0.79    West Virginia    13.42    
Texas           -1.10    Oklahoma State   13.96    

Trend (points per game)           Mental toughness
------------------------------    ------------------------------
Texas           +0.66 +/- 0.49    Kansas State    +0.30 +/- 0.12
Kansas State    +0.45 +/- 0.30    Texas           +0.20 +/- 0.25
Oklahoma        +0.11 +/- 0.48    Baylor          +0.19 +/- 0.19
Kansas          +0.07 +/- 0.26    Oklahoma        -0.01 +/- 0.21
Baylor          -0.02 +/- 0.42    Oklahoma State  -0.07 +/- 0.25
Oklahoma State  -0.09 +/- 0.65    West Virginia   -0.13 +/- 0.24
TCU             -0.11 +/- 0.35    Kansas          -0.19 +/- 0.16
Texas Tech      -0.45 +/- 0.37    Iowa State      -0.20 +/- 0.24
Iowa State      -0.53 +/- 0.60    Texas Tech      -0.20 +/- 0.15
West Virginia   -0.88 +/- 0.54    TCU             -0.24 +/- 0.15

Texas is the first Big 12 team to go negative in average scoring margin.
And it was Kansas that did it to them.  It will be interesting to see
where Kansas falls in strength of schedule one week from now.  It is
interesting to see Oklahoma State with the nation's toughest schedule
played to date; their conference schedule was rather front-loaded.  With
Kansas State on the road against Iowa State, it's fairly certain they'll
move into the top 100 in strength of schedule.  And with Texas Tech on
the road against Baylor, they'll also move up the rankings, but whether
it'll be enough to crack the top 100 isn't clear.

Average offense (pts)   Average defense (pts)   Total Points             Scoring Margin (pts)     
---------------------   ---------------------   ----------------------   ----------------------   
West Virginia   87.53   Baylor          61.61   Oklahoma State  166.06   West Virginia   +22.11   
Oklahoma State  86.94   Kansas State    65.16   Kansas          155.68   Kansas          +13.26   
Kansas          84.47   West Virginia   65.42   West Virginia   152.95   Iowa State      +12.44   
Iowa State      81.28   Texas Tech      66.32   Oklahoma        151.72   Baylor          +11.56   
Texas Tech      76.16   TCU             67.17   Iowa State      150.11   Kansas State    +10.58   
Oklahoma        76.11   Iowa State      68.83   Texas Tech      142.47   Texas Tech       +9.84   
Kansas State    75.74   Texas           69.11   TCU             141.78   Oklahoma State   +7.83   
TCU             74.61   Kansas          71.21   Kansas State    140.89   TCU              +7.44   
Baylor          73.17   Oklahoma        75.61   Texas           137.95   Oklahoma         +0.50   
Texas           68.84   Oklahoma State  79.11   Baylor          134.78   Texas            -0.26   

Schedule Strength
---------------------------
Oklahoma State  80.95 (  1)
Oklahoma        79.98 (  4)
Baylor          79.78 (  7)
Texas           79.27 (  9)
Iowa State      78.22 ( 15)
Kansas          77.75 ( 21)
TCU             77.16 ( 30)
West Virginia   73.50 ( 80)
Kansas State    73.02 (102)
Texas Tech      72.13 (126)