Ohio State vs. Michigan football prediction: What the analytics say

Posted by Admin November 27, 2024 Football

College football’s greatest rivalry kicks off this weekend from Columbus, as The Game pits Ohio State against Michigan on Saturday. Here’s the latest prediction for the matchup from an expert analytical football model that simulates games.

Ohio State moved closer to College Football Playoff contention after handing Indiana its first loss, and in dominant fashion, and just needs to beat the Wolverines to qualify for the Big Ten Championship Game.

Michigan has owned the last three editions of this rivalry, but the transition from Jim Harbaugh’s national title team to Sherrone Moore’s 6-5 debut leaves this program with just a chance to spoil its arch-rival’s postseason position this weekend.

Looking ahead to this week’s matchup, let’s check out the latest college football predictions from the Football Power Index computer prediction model.

The model simulates every NCAA college football game 20,000 times and uses key analytics from both teams and picks winners based on a projected scoring margin per game.

The computer models are siding very strongly with Ohio State over Michigan in the 2024 edition of The Game.

Ohio State comes out ahead in 91.9 percent of the computer’s most recent simulations of the matchup.

That leaves Michigan as the expected winner in the remaining 8.1 percent of sims.

In total, the Buckeyes come out on top in 18,380 of the index’s calculations of the game, while the Wolverines edge out OSU in the other 1,620 predictions.

How does that translate into an expected margin of victory in the game?

Ohio State is projected to be 21.3 points better than Michigan on the same field in both teams’ current capacity, according to the model’s latest forecast.

If so, that would be just enough for the Buckeyes to cover the big spread in this game.

That’s because Ohio State is a 20.5 point favorite against Michigan, according to the updated lines posted to FanDuel Sportsbook.

The book set the total at 43.5 points for the game (Over -105, Under -115).

And it lists the moneyline odds for Ohio State at -2800 and for Michigan at +1160 to win outright.

A slight majority of bettors expect the Wolverines will keep it close against the Buckeyes, according to the spread consensus picks for the game.

Michigan is getting 51 percent of the bets to either win outright in an upset or to keep the margin under 3 touchdowns in a loss.

The other 49 percent of wagers project Ohio State will win and cover the big spread.

Ohio State is second nationally and among Big Ten teams with a 99.3 percent chance to qualify for the College Football Playoff, according to the FPI’s metrics.

Oregon sits atop all 134 FBS teams with a 99.9 percent chance to make the playoff, and is the favorite to emerge as the No. 1 overall seed.

But the Buckeyes are No. 1 in the country with a 22.2 percent chance to win the national championship, according to the models.

Texas is second at 21.3 percent and Georgia is third at 11.6 percent.

Football Power Index (FPI) college football rankings and computer prediction model are a measure of team strength that predicts a team’s future performance.

Rankings and scores predictions are based on 20,000 simulations of a team’s season and games, using a combination of key analytics, including scores to date, quality of opponents, team talent, recruiting, and a team’s schedule.

Teams are ranked not in order of talent like in other rankings, but by a projected point margin per game against an average team on a neutral field.

Oregon
Ohio State
Texas
Penn State
Notre Dame
Miami
Georgia
Tennessee
SMU
Indiana
Boise State
Clemson
Alabama
Ole Miss
South Carolina
Arizona State
Tulane
Iowa State
BYU
Texas A&M
Missouri
UNLV
Illinois
Kansas State
Colorado

Playoff seeding is not necessarily the same as the CFP top 25 rankings position, given some teams will be given higher seeds as conference champions