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SPAM - NCAA Football 2021 - Week 11 Preview - Week 10 Recap

WHERE WE'VE BEEN

WEEK 10 B1G ACTION (RECAP)

So, in the Year of Our Lord, Two Thousand Twenty One, the University of Iowa Hawkeyes played a "football" game against the Northwestern Wildcats. The most entertaining thing that happened during this game is that some Northwestern undergraduates wandered onto the field for a protest of sorts. From the videos on-line, they appear to have been incoherently protesting multiple unrelated things, one of which was to abolish the Northwestern campus security organization, which does not appear to exist, since nobody was there to prevent the students from slowly wandering onto the field, or to remove them once they set up. The students stood in awkward bewilderment for several minutes, apparently as confused as the rest of us by the absence of any apparent consequences to their actions.

Eventually, an unknown man dressed in black and gold ran out onto the field and took or broke the signs or something (I don't know, I read about it on Twitter). This man, whose legal name is "Local Hero," did what the various security personnel at Ryan Field were unable to accomplish by staring vacantly at the protestors from the sidelines, and the students shuffled off the field so "play" could resume.

The scene was baffling on so many levels, but it at least broke up the excruciating misery of watching this game for a few minutes.

LOOKING AHEAD TO WEEK 11 - IOWA SEASON PROJECTION UPDATE


Game by Game

Opponent Margin Win%
Indiana 12.7 W (1-0)
@Iowa State -5.3 W (2-0)
Kent State 7.9 W (3-0)
Colorado State 6.5 W (4-0)
@Maryland 5.1 W (5-0)
Penn State 1.7 W (6-0)
Purdue 3.5 L (6-1)
@Wisconsin -3.7 L (6-2)
@Northwestern 6.3 W (7-2)
Minnesota 2.9 59.7%
Illinois 8.6 71.4%
@Nebraska -0.6 45.6%

Record Projection

Record Odds


7-5 6.2%
8-4 30.2%
9-3 44.1%
10-2 19.5%




B1G West Chaos is upon us. If I were to draw a tree graph of which B1G West teams have beaten which, it would like a spider dropped acid and then tried to spin a web. Although Iowa's projected margins (including post-game win expectancy margins) continue to shrink almost across the board, SPAM still thinks the Hawkeyes have a better shot at 9-3 or better than otherwise. I guess that's encouraging? Every game left on the schedule fills me with dread.

Division Championship Odds

Big 10 West

Team Champ. Odds
Wisconsin 33.04%
Iowa 21.96%
Minnesota 15.51%
Purdue 8.52%


Iowa won its game against an opponent that is not playing for a division title, and by holding serve, Iowa held on to its #2 spot in the B1G West projections. You know who did NOT hold serve? Minnesota. By losing to the Fightin' Berts, the Gophers drop down to third place and Wisconsin, having heads-up wins already over Iowa and Purdue, and a laughably easy schedule to finish the year, slides comfortably into first place.

Iowa needs some help to win the Division, if you are delusional enough to entertain such scenarios. And, Purdue is technically not out of it. With the heads-up win over Minnesota, the branch of the spiderverse in which Purdue wins the West occupies 8.52% of the conceptual space. Huh.

Figuring out your rooting interests for the rest of the year is difficult, but basically, Iowa needs to win out and somebody needs to beat Wisconsin. The rest is likely to take care of itself.

Note that Nebraska is a better team than Wisconsin (or Iowa, for that matter), and they could do it if they could just one complete game of mediocre, boring, clean, field position football. Which they won't do, so your hopes and dreams are pinned on Minnesota at this point.

If Iowa wins out, Wisconsin will be 9-2 when they play Minnesota. We will watch that game with great interest and then slowly have our souls crushed as Wisconsin runs away with it.

Big 10 East

Team Champ. Odds
Ohio State 70.62
Michigan 22.16%
Michigan State 3.67%





Losing to Purdue took some starch out of the Spartans' season, though really, they just need to beat Ohio State heads-up and they're in. It's just that easy, right? No, it isn't.

Though, the Buckeyes play Purdue next. They should take that seriously.


B1G GAMES

Last week, SPAM projected:

  • Minnesota over Illinois by 9.7
  • Iowa over Northwestern by 5.1 (Iowa won by 5)
  • Michigan State over Purdue by 2.0
  • Wisconsin over Rutgers by 0.4
  • Penn State over Maryland by 3.6
  • Michigan over Indiana by 17.9
  • Ohio State over Nebraska by 9.6 (Ohio State won by 9).
SPAM went 5-2 this week, missing only on the Illinois and Purdue upsets.


This week, SPAM projects:
  • Rutgers over Indiana by 1.8
  • Michigan over PSU by 3.9
  • Michigan State over Maryland by 9.4
  • Ohio State over Purdue by 14.5
  • Wisconsin over Northwestern by 12.2
  • Iowa over Minnesota by 2.9

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