East vs. West

[CrunchGriz]

Okay, here's my take on the omnipresent "East vs. West" debate.

Conclusion: Based on the historical record (at least as far as champions are concerned) there is little statistical basis to conclude that the East is significantly better than the West in the FCS (/I-AA).

Reasoning: There have been 31 champions crowned through the NCAA I-AA/FCS championship game since the inception of I-AA in 1978. For purposes of this analysis, I used the traditional dividing line between "East" and "West" in this country. Counting all schools east of the Mississippi as "Eastern" and all those west of the great river as "Western", there are now 29 of 126 FCS teams that are "Western".

The ratio of "Western to Total Teams" is 29/126, or 23%. Although the ratio has changed through the history of the division, there have been both additions and subtractions on both sides of the river, and I'm not about to do a year-by-year analysis, so I'm using the current ratio. I'm also including all those teams that either do not participate in the playoffs or have never participated (non-scholarship, mostly). It's not the fault of either side of the country if the other has a bunch of teams that either don't have the talent, stones, or wherewithal to compete; they're all teams in our division, and playoff-participating teams in their areas do pad their schedules from time to time with them.

I'm also putting teams in the I-AA conference in which they played if they've since moved "up" (e.g., Boise State, Louisiana Tech, Marshall), or if they were independent at the time, I've put them in the conference to which they now belong (e.g., Georgia Southern, Youngstown State).

Since the beginning of I-AA, here's the breakdown of championship game participation and success:


Conference Champ Games Championships
Southern 21 12
Big Sky 11 5
Missouri Valley 9 6
CAA 8 4
Ohio Valley 4 2
Southland 6 1
MEAC 1 1
Patriot 2 0

All conferences that have a decent number of participations have approximately a 50% rate of success in the championship game, with the Southland being the only exception. The Southern is slightly higher, the Big Sky slightly lower, but neither difference is statistically significant.

The "West" has won 5 championships (all by the Big Sky) and has 16 title game appearances (some teams in the Southland are east of the river, and Northern Iowa is west). This gives the West a winning percentage of 16.1%, and a championship game participation percentage of 25.8%, which matches favorably with the West's total membership percentage of 23.0%.

All you can say derogatorily about the West is that they haven't quite gotten it done as often as they should have in the chipper (and Montana can take the blame for part of that, at 2-4 in the championship game, but the Southland is what has hurt the West the most in this percentage).

The mighty CAA has both less championship game appearances and championships than the Big Sky, despite having more members for the entire life of I-AA/FCS.

It's the Southern Conference that has kept the East slightly better historically than the West, with the bulk of championship game appearances and championships. The Missouri Valley is helping more than the CAA, at 9 and 6, respectively, as compared to the CAA, at 8 and 4.

The CAA might be ascendant at the moment, but you don't have to go back very far to find a period where they were non-existent at the top of the division (in the 15 years from 1983-1997 the CAA and its predecessor had zero championship game appearances).

Pendula turn, dontcha know? You're slightly on top now...it hardly means that it's going to last forever (and I could just as easily say the same thing about my beloved Griz).

[JDC325]

Torture numbers, and they'll confess to anything. ~Gregg Easterbrook

[griz8791]

This is going to get ugly in a hurry.

[CrunchGriz]

Torture numbers, and they'll confess to anything. ~Gregg Easterbrook

No torture necessary; just simple math.

The sample size is pretty darn small, I will admit.

And why are you bitchin'? The Southern Conference comes out smellin' like a rose in this analysis. xsmiley_wix

[FCS_pwns_FBS]

It's really simple...the east has a higher concentration of programs and generally has easier recruiting...that's why we have more championships.

[Tod]

Do this again in 10 years, and I don't think the west will come out favorably. The Eastern schools seem to be getting stronger, while the western schools seem to be stagnant.

I hope I'm wrong. I'd love to see Montana State, Weber State, Cal Poly (hell, any of them) win a NC (Yeah, I know MSU has already won a NC). I'd love to see McNeese or UNI win one for that matter, in arguably the two best programs to not have a NC.

But the CAA and SoCon seem to be pretty close to invincible for now. :(;)

[Bill Hanson]

Here we go again.

[JDC325]

No torture necessary; just simple math.

The sample size is pretty darn small, I will admit.

And why are you bitchin'? The Southern Conference comes out smellin' like a rose in this analysis. xsmiley_wix

Just a poke nothing more.

[93henfan]

Torture numbers, and they'll confess to anything. ~Gregg Easterbrook

xnodx

xdizzyx

[KAUMASS]

Interesting numbers..I for one don't care about any E/W bias. Bottom line is if you get to the NC game, you have a serious team that is peaking at the right moment. The current road to the NC game for the last 15 years or so has been through the CAA, SoCon & Big Sky, in no particular order.(Although I would lean towards the SoCon simply due to Georgia Southern's and App's runs) The eastern conferences have had more numbers in the playoffs, as they have more top teams in their conferences. This does not mean that they are better, there is just more of them. There have been more eastern teams battling each other in the second round of the playoffs from the same conference...simple math numbers...
You can twist the numbers any way you want to...just ask AIG...

[Silenoz]

Do this again in 10 years, and I don't think the west will come out favorably. The Eastern schools seem to be getting stronger, while the western schools seem to be stagnant.

I hope I'm wrong. I'd love to see Montana State, Weber State, Cal Poly (hell, any of them) win a NC (Yeah, I know MSU has already won a NC). I'd love to see McNeese or UNI win one for that matter, in arguably the two best programs to not have a NC.

But the CAA and SoCon seem to be pretty close to invincible for now. :(;)
This is why I'm glad I really only care about the Griz. The rest of the Big Sky could go 0-fer in their out-of-conference games and I wouldn't lose any sleep over it

Though I would like to see the UNI fanbase rewarded with an NC

[griz8791]

T. . . Though I would like to see the UNI fanbase rewarded with an NC

Ditto.

[89Hen]

The "West" has won 5 championships (all by the Big Sky)

The mighty CAA has both less championship game appearances and championships than the Big Sky, despite having more members for the entire life of I-AA/FCS.


Do this again in 10 years, and I don't think the west will come out favorably.
Tod has it right.

First, your facts are wrong. The Yankee had 7 teams in it before Delaware joined so it wasn't always this large. It's also improved by leaps and bounds over the last ten year. The Big Sky hayday were when you had Idaho, Boise, Nevada... your conference got FAR worse when these teams left and were replaced by SacSt, Portland State and UNC. Montana rarely won the Big Sky when Idaho, Boise and Nevada were around. Once they left, you haven't lost a share of the title. Did you think this was coincidence?

The west is Montana. Until another team makes it deeper in the playoffs, that's it.

[elkmcc]

Tod has it right.

First, your facts are wrong. The Yankee had 7 teams in it before Delaware joined so it wasn't always this large. It's also improved by leaps and bounds over the last ten year. The Big Sky hayday were when you had Idaho, Boise, Nevada... your conference got FAR worse when these teams left and were replaced by SacSt, Portland State and UNC. Montana rarely won the Big Sky when Idaho, Boise and Nevada were around. Once they left, you haven't lost a share of the title. Did you think this was coincidence?

The west is Montana. Until another team makes it deeper in the playoffs, that's it.

Ah but lest you forget that Montana won the Nat'l Championship in '95 when both Boise and Idaho were members of the BSC.

[CrunchGriz]

Tod has it right.

First, your facts are wrong. The Yankee had 7 teams in it before Delaware joined so it wasn't always this large. It's also improved by leaps and bounds over the last ten year. The Big Sky hayday were when you had Idaho, Boise, Nevada... your conference got FAR worse when these teams left and were replaced by SacSt, Portland State and UNC. Montana rarely won the Big Sky when Idaho, Boise and Nevada were around. Once they left, you haven't lost a share of the title. Did you think this was coincidence?

The west is Montana. Until another team makes it deeper in the playoffs, that's it.

Nice slam on Northern Iowa and McNeese State, as well, both of which are west of the Mississippi--and both of which have made it "deeper in the playoffs", with 3 total title game appearances.

So the Yankee/A10/CAA had less teams than the Big Sky for a few years--for the vast majority of them, it had more--and yet it still has less championships and championship game participation.

And again, pendula swing, and thinking that either the CAA or Montana will remain at the top forever runs contrary to the swings that constantly occur. Revel in your glory while you can.

[BearsCountry]

Though I would like to see the UNI fanbase rewarded with an NC

I would like to see their old head coach win one instead. xsmiley_wix

[JohnStOnge]

Nice slam on Northern Iowa and McNeese State, as well, both of which are west of the Mississippi--and both of which have made it "deeper in the playoffs", with 3 total title game appearances..

What really gets me about McNeese is that, each time they made it to the title game, they were faced with opponents the Cowboys were very capable of beating but didn't get it done; in fact getting blown out in one case by a team they beat 38-13 during the regular season. That time they got only 13 points out of over 400 yards of offense and something like 27 first downs. But the bottom line is that the McNeese program is sitting on a goose egg in terms of national titles. Another related thing that frustrates me is that, in my opinion, McNeese tends to play better during the regular season than during the playoffs. Like there is NO way they were as bad as the showings they put up against Northern Arizona in 2003 and Eastern Washington in 2007.

[JohnStOnge]

I don't think national championships is the only measure relevant to a question like this. You'd have to look at all games and maybe also all playoff games where teams from East and West of the Mississippi played each other.

I think the West may have suffered more from attrition to I-A/FBS. As noted, the Big Sky lost Boise State, Nevada, and Idaho. All of those programs were regular playoff participants. The Southland lost Louisiana Tech, Northeast Louisiana, North Texas, Arkansas State and Troy. Again, all of those programs were regular playoff participants and Troy is the only one east of the Mississippi.

Among those seven above listed teams that are west of the Mississippi, six made it at least to the semifinals at least once, five made it to the championship game, and two won national championships. Off the top of my head I'm not seeing the East as having lost as great a proportion of its quality programs. It did lose Marshall, Western Kentucky and Troy. I don't know if I'd put Middle Tennessee up there or not. Close. Anyway, there are many more teams in the East so I don't know if that region took as big a hit percentage wise.

[JohnStOnge]

Ok. I used Mapquest and made a database of teams from East and West of the Mississippi. The first thing I'll do is use Sagarin Ratings. Eventually I'll do something like see how they did head to head, etc. Anyway, here's how it came out.

There were 92 East teams and 32 West teams in 2008. The average Sagarin Rating for East teams is 43.99. The average Sagarin Rating for West teams is 48.63. If the Pioneer League and Northeast Conference are left out, the average for East teams is 45.54 and the average for West teams is 49.21. If you look just at teams in the eight automatic bid playoff conferences, the average for East teams is 48.73 and the average for West teams is 52.01.

The 90th percentile for the East playoff conference teams is 66.76 and that for the West playoff conference teams is 66.28. The 90th percentile for East teams that aren't in the Pioneer League or the Northeast Conference is 61.13, that for such West teams is 63.28. The 90th percentile for all East teams is 59.92 and that for all West teams is 63.28.

Not a whole lot there to suggest overall superiority for Eastern FCS football.

Note: Edited 6/14 to make slight corrections to numbers due to original errors of classifying Southeastern Louisiana as a "West" team and ommitting "West" squad Prairie View A&M from the database.

[ChickenMan]

Okay, here's my take on the omnipresent "East vs. West" debate.

The mighty CAA has both less championship game appearances and championships than the Big Sky, despite having more members for the entire life of I-AA/FCS.





The current CAA is a far cry.. both in quantity and more importantly.. QUALITY from the old Yankee and A10 days. Since '98 the CAA has had six champiomship game appearences.. by four different schools (UD, UMass, JMU, Richmond) and they have won four FCS titles. Meanwhile the Big Sky has had four championship appearences.. all by the same school (quess who).. winning just one FCS title. The Big Sky WAS the big dog some 20+ yrs ago.. the CAA IS the big dog now... ;)

[JohnStOnge]

It's really simple...the east has a higher concentration of programs and generally has easier recruiting...that's why we have more championships.

Agreed on the higher concentration but I don't know if there's easier access to recruiting being the reason that, in particular, the CAA is strong. The information at http://rivals100.rivals.com/content.asp?CID=259347 is a little old but I think it still paints the correct basic picture. You see the same thing with college recruiting.

Look at where the Southland is, all but one team in Texas and Louisiana, and look at where the CAA is. Two top of the top 15 talent-producing states, #7 Pennsylvania and #11 Virginia, are in the direct CAA footprint. Together, at the time, they had produced 110 NFL players. The Southland direct footprint includes #3 Texas and #5 Louisiana. Between them those states had produced 255 NFL players. Sam Houston State is in the #4 Metro Area (Houston). Stephen F. Austin's recruiting area includes both the #4 and #5 (Dallas). McNeese State's recruiting area includes both #4 Houston and #10 New Orleans metro areas. Same with Northwestern State. Just look at the map that I'm going to link at the bottom of this post. It indicates relative production of NFL players by various cities, with the bigger disks (called circles by the authors) indicating greater production. Think about where the Southland is. It's almost entirely in the Southern half of Louisiana and the Eastern portion of Texas (with now a team in Arkansas).

Whatever the problem with the Southland is, it's not being in a bad recruiting area situation.

http://vmedia.rivals.com/uploads/1014/133679.jpg

[89Hen]

thinking that either the CAA or Montana will remain at the top forever runs contrary to the swings that constantly occur. Revel in your glory while you can.
See, there's the problem... UMass > Delaware > JMU > UMass > Delaware > Richmond... it's a revolving door of CAA teams taking their turn in the NC game. Who knows, Villanova could be there this year. Chances are a CAA team will often be there. If Montana doesn't make it, that's it.

As far as McNeese and UNI, they are a midwest and southern team.

[JohnStOnge]

See, there's the problem... UMass > Delaware > JMU > UMass > Delaware > Richmond... it's a revolving door of CAA teams taking their turn in the NC game. Who knows, Villanova could be there this year. Chances are a CAA team will often be there. If Montana doesn't make it, that's it.

As far as McNeese and UNI, they are a midwest and southern team.

Geeze, though. If you take teams like that out you'd only have 18 "Western" teams in FCS and one of those is in the Pioneer league. And that's counting transitionals North Dakota and South Dakota.

[89Hen]

Geeze, though. If you take teams like that out you'd only have 18 "Western" teams in FCS and one of those is in the Pioneer league. And that's counting transitionals North Dakota and South Dakota.
Your point? We all know there just aren't many teams in the west.

[JohnStOnge]

Your point? We all know there just aren't many teams in the west.

The point is that if there are only 18 teams in the West it should not be shocking that "only one" of them has been in national title games in recent years.

[twentythreeOh4]

Tod has it right.

First, your facts are wrong. The Yankee had 7 teams in it before Delaware joined so it wasn't always this large. It's also improved by leaps and bounds over the last ten year. The Big Sky hayday were when you had Idaho, Boise, Nevada... your conference got FAR worse when these teams left and were replaced by SacSt, Portland State and UNC. Montana rarely won the Big Sky when Idaho, Boise and Nevada were around. Once they left, you haven't lost a share of the title. Did you think this was coincidence?

The west is Montana. Until another team makes it deeper in the playoffs, that's it.

As a matter of fact, yeah it is largely coincidence -- Montana's football rise has far more to do with changes Montana made (mainly facilities) rather than the changes to the makeup of the Big Sky Conference.

Before 1986, Montana played in Dornblazer stadium. To say it was bad would be a gross understatement. It was off-campus stadium that was supposed to be a temporary home for 2 or 3 years, but the Griz ended playing there for nearly 2 decades. It was bunch of rickety old wooden bleachers. It was a standing joke that several of Montana's larger high schools had better facilities. Former Idaho QB and Walter Payton winner, John Friesz once said in an interview after his playing days that Montana heavily recruited him, but he just couldn't see himself playing in Dornblazer.

Montana moved into 12,000 seat Washington-Grizzly stadium midway through the 1986 season. By any standard, it was a very modest facility, but it was light years ahead of Dornblazer. So yeah, before 1986 Montana didn't fare all that well in the Big Sky. However, from 1986 - 1995 when Idaho and Boise were in the conference (Nevada left in '92) Montana advanced to the playoffs 5 times in 8 years (88, 89, 93, 94, 95). Twice UM advanced to the semi-finals (89, 94) and Montana won the national title in 95 beating Marshall at Marshall -- an accomplishment very few I-AA teams can claim.

And it was in 1995 that Wash-Griz endzone expansion added 7,000 seats, which really made the stadium. It was an okay stadium before, but adding the endzone seats really changed the makeup of stadium, it's atmosphere and really allowed the program to take off.

I'm not saying that UM would have won every conference title they did if Boise, Idaho and Nevada had been in the conference the whole time, but clearly UM started competing well before they left and built the program before they left. Montana didn't become good, because those teams left the Big Sky.

[JohnStOnge]

Ok. Another thing consistent with my belief that FCS teams West of the Mississippi River were stronger on average in 2008 than teams East of the Mississippi were. Below are the records of East/West against each other. There may be some error as there always can be when inputing scores into a database, but I don't think enough to change the basic picture.

For all games, it was West 50 wins, East 35 wins.

For games not involving Pioneer League or NEC teams, it was West 40 wins, East 29 wins.

For games in which two teams from automatic bid conferences faced each other, it was West 25 wins, East 17 wins.

I don't at all disagree with the idea that the CAA was the strongest conference. However, the CAA overall was just 3-3 against teams from West of the Mississippi River as well as 2-3 in the playoff games against them. That one should be pretty easy to check in terms of errors so let me know if I missed any games.

[JohnStOnge]

Now for why I expected going in that teams West of the Mississippi were stronger on average. Here are the Sagarin 2008 final FCS conference rankings (independents included):

1. CAA
2. Southern
3. Big Sky
4. MVC
5. Southland
6. Patriot
7. Great West
8. Ivy
9. Big South
10. OVC
11. Northeast
12. MEAC
13. Pioneer
14. Independents
15. SWAC

Look at the 7 lowest rated groups (Big South through SWAC). Schools in the Big South, Northeast, MEAC, and Independents are located East of the Mississippi. All but one school in the OVC is located East of the River. Seven of the 9 Pioneer schools are in the East as well as 6 of the 10 SWAC teams.

Five of the 9 MVC schools are in the East, but the ones in the West (Northern Iowa, South Dakota State, North Dakota State, and Missouri State) were stronger on average than the ones in the East were. The Southland has one school, Southeastern Louisiana, in the East. Southeastern Louisiana tied for last in that conference.

If you look just at the playoff leagues it's kind of the same basic picture. The three lowest rated leagues for 2008, the Patriot, OVC, and MEAC, together include only one school that is West of the Mississippi River. The Southland is in the lower half of the 8 as well, at 5, and is predominantly in the West. But including that league still leaves us at having 26 of the 34 teams from the lower half of the group of auto bid conference teams located East of the Mississippi River.

So, though the East did have what last year were the two strongest leagues, it also had the overwhelming majority of the lowest rated teams in the subdivision. One manifestation of what I'm talking about is that, though the East had 7 of the top 10 rated and 19 of the top 25 rated teams in 2008, it also had 9 of the 10 and 23 of the 25 lowest rated.

Another note is that, given that only 25.8% of the teams are West of the River, having 3 of the top 10 or 6 of the top 25 be from that region is not "statistically significant" in terms of what you'd expect to occur by random chance. 30% of the top 10 and 24% of the top 25 are from the West; right in line with what you'd expect. But the East having 23 of the bottom 25 is different from what one would expect by chance to a significant degree (p = 0.026). Having 92% of the bottom 25 is "out of line" with what one would expect given that 74% of the teams overall are in the East.

[I-AA Fan]

I think you need to look at the brackets. It is not where you came from, it is the bracket you were in ...at least up until 1998 or 1999. Independent teams were always placed in the west, as they needed teams. Also, one of the Big-3 usually went west as well.

[89Hen]

The point is that if there are only 18 teams in the West it should not be shocking that "only one" of them has been in national title games in recent years.
There are only 12 teams in the CAA and four of them have been to the NC since 1998. You were saying?

[elkmcc]

There are only 12 teams in the CAA and four of them have been to the NC since 1998. You were saying?

There are only 9 teams in the BSC and four teams have been to the NC game since '99. Never mind that they have all been Griz teams :)

[McNeeserocket]

Okay, here's my take on the omnipresent "East vs. West" debate.

The "West" has won 5 championships (all by the Big Sky) and has 16 title game appearances (some teams in the Southland are east of the river, and Northern Iowa is west). This gives the West a winning percentage of 16.1%, and a championship game participation percentage of 25.8%, which matches favorably with the West's total membership percentage of 23.0%.

Actually you are wrong in the above statement. The West has not won 5 championships, but rather the West has won 6 championships. You forgot that a Southland team, Northeast Louisiana which was a I-AA team, (now known as Univ. of Louisiana at Monroe and a FBS team) won the National Championship game in 1987 against Marshall 43 to 42. Monroe, LA is west of the Mississippi.

So you need to re-calculate your statistics.

[FargoBison]

See, there's the problem... UMass > Delaware > JMU > UMass > Delaware > Richmond... it's a revolving door of CAA teams taking their turn in the NC game. Who knows, Villanova could be there this year. Chances are a CAA team will often be there. If Montana doesn't make it, that's it.

As far as McNeese and UNI, they are a midwest and southern team.

If you go by that logic there are even less western teams because the four Dakota schools are located in the midwest.

The FCS west....home of 12 schools.

[JohnStOnge]

There are only 12 teams in the CAA and four of them have been to the NC since 1998. You were saying?

The thread's about East and West of the Mississippi; not conferences. I agree that the A-10/CAA has been the toughest conference during most of the past 11 years. But if you're going to define the "West" as just the 18 teams way out there those teams are going to be WAY stronger on average than anything you reasonably define as FCS in the "East."

[CrunchGriz]

Actually you are wrong in the above statement. The West has not won 5 championships, but rather the West has won 6 championships. You forgot that a Southland team, Northeast Louisiana which was a I-AA team, (now known as Univ. of Louisiana at Monroe and a FBS team) won the National Championship game in 1987 against Marshall 43 to 42. Monroe, LA is west of the Mississippi.

So you need to re-calculate your statistics.

Rocket: Oops. I actually looked at the physical locations of the other Southland teams that have made the championship game, but didn't look at NE La./ULM simply because of the "Northeast" in their name. Definitely my bad.

[89Hen]

But if you're going to define the "West" as just the 18 teams way out there those teams are going to be WAY stronger on average than anything you reasonably define as FCS in the "East."
Only compared to themselves. National rankings are worthless when west teams only play west teams. The playoffs are the only games we really have anything on which to base.

[JohnStOnge]

Only compared to themselves. National rankings are worthless when west teams only play west teams. The playoffs are the only games we really have anything on which to base.

I disagree. If you're going to compare the overall strength of regions you have to look at all games and not just playoff games.