A New Way to Pick Bowl Winners

Shad Powers is a sports reporter for the Desert Sun.  Prior to the bowl season we stumbled on his betting methodology while reading through Yahoo and were intrigued.  We reached out to Mr. Powers for more information on his methodology.  He graciously provided guidance on how to use his methodology.  The Power’s methodology is based on “Quality Games”.  A team earns points based on their performance against the better teams on their schedule.  The season-ending AP Top 25 serves as the basis for “ranked” opponents.  Points are earned in the following manner:

Wins:

• +3  Road win over a ranked team
• +2  Home or neutral win over a ranked team
• +1  Lopsided win (21 points or more) over an unranked team
•   0  Regular win (9-20 points) win over an unranked team
• -1  Narrow win (8 points or less) over an unranked team

Losses:

• +1  Narrow loss (8 points or less) to a ranked team
•   0  Regular loss (9-20 points) to a ranked team
• -1  Lopsided loss (21 points or more) loss to a ranked team
• -2  Regular loss (Less than 20 points) to an unranked team
• -3  Lopsided loss (21 points or more) to an unranked team

The Powers Quality Games methodology doesn’t provide a measure of covers or over/under, just winners.  We applied the Powers Quality Game methodology to our G5 Bowl Games and measured it against Las Vegas (favorites).  The table below shows the performance of Shad’s methodology against Vegas. In cases where the Powers methodology yielded the same points for each team, we classified the game as a “draw”.

		Vegas (Initial)		Powers Method
Bowl Game	Matchup	Pick		Pick
Bahamas Bowl	Toledo vs Middle Tennessee State	Toledo	✘	Toledo	✘
Cure Bowl	Coastal Carolina vs Northern Illinois	Coastal Carolina	✓	Coastal Carolina	✓
Boca Raton Bowl	Appalachian State vs Western Kentucky	Appalachian State	✘	Western Kentucky	✓
New Mexico Bowl	Texas-El Paso vs Fresno State	Fresno State	✓	Fresno State	✓
Indepdendence Bowl	Brigham Young vs Alabama-Birmingham	BYU	✘	BYU	✘
Lending Tree Bowl	Liberty vs Eastern Michigan	Liberty	✓	Liberty	✓
Kimmel LA Bowl	Utah State vs Oregon State	Oregon State	✘	DRAW	–
New Orleans Bowl	Louisiana vs Marshall	Louisiana	✓	Louisiana	✓
Myrtle Beach Bowl	Tulsa vs Old Dominion	Tulsa	✓	Tulsa	✓
Famous Idaho Potato Bowl	Kent State vs Wyoming	Wyoming	✓	Wyoming	✓
Frisco Bowl	San Diego State vs Texas-San Antonio	UTSA	✘	DRAW	–
Armed Forces Bowl	Army vs Missouri	Army	✓	DRAW	–
Gasparilla Bowl	Florida vs Central Florida	Florida	✘	Florida	✘
Frisco Football Classic	Miami(OH) vs North Texas	Miami (OH)	✓	Miami (OH)	✓
Camellia Bowl	Georgia State vs Ball State	Georgia State	✓	Georgia State	✓
Quick Lane Bowl	Nevada vs Western Michigan	Nevada	✘	Western Michigan	✓
Birmingham Bowl	Houston vs Auburn	Auburn	✘	Houston	✓
First Responder Bowl	Louisville vs Air Force	Louisville	✘	Louisville	✘
Sun Bowl	Washington State vs Central Michigan	Washington State	✘	Washington State	✘
Cotton Bowl Classic	Alabama vs Cincinnati	Alabama	✓	Alabama	✓
TOTALS			10		12
RECORD		10-10		12-5-3

As you can see, the Powers methodology beat Vegas handily, finishing 12-5-3 versus Vegas at 10-10.  The Powers methodology picked the correct upset winner in Western Kentucky vs App State, Western Michigan vs Nevada, and Houston vs Auburn.   In the three cases where the Powers method computed a “draw”, the underdog won two of the games. 

We were very impressed with the success rate of the Power’s model and we plan to apply it next year for our bowl picks (it would have definitely helped our panel with their picks this year).  Again, thanks to Shad Powers for his help in understanding and applying his formula.