It's time. In less than a week, we will have actual college football games to watch for the first time in more than seven months. The longest offseason in the world is coming to an end. We've written and read all the previews and profiles. We've debated all the debates. Now there's only one thing left to do: make some projections!
Below are my final SP+ projections for the 2022 college football season. As mentioned previously, these are based on three primary factors: returning production (final rankings for which you can find at the bottom of this piece), recent recruiting and recent history. How good have you been recently? Who do you have coming back? How good are the players replacing those you don't have coming back? That's loosely what we ask when we're setting expectations for a team subjectively; it's also what these projections attempt to do objectively.
(Note: Some teams' projections have changed a bit compared to where they were in May, and it might not have anything to do with those factors above. I've also made a couple of tweaks to the SP+ formula itself.)
As always: SP+ is a tempo- and opponent-adjusted measure of college football efficiency. It is a predictive measure of the most sustainable and predictable aspects of football, not a résumé ranking, and, along those same lines, these projections aren't intended to be a guess at what the AP Top 25 will look like at the end of the year. These are simply early offseason power rankings based on the information we have been able to gather to date.
Here are the full rankings:
SP+ vs. conventional wisdom
For a majority of teams, SP+ and preseason prognosticators tend to agree. Both SP+ and the polls are unanimous about which three teams lord above the rest to start the season (Alabama, Georgia and Ohio State), and they agree about a lot of the teams that follow, too.
They don't agree about everyone, though. Here are a few teams (near the top of the rankings) that SP+ likes a decent amount more or less than the pollsters.
The teams SP+ likes more
Penn State. James Franklin's Nittany Lions are 13th in SP+ but came in just 29th in the AP poll. I don't think anyone will be too surprised if quarterback Sean Clifford stays healthy and PSU is indeed a top-15 team again, as it was for three of four years from 2016 through 2019.
The SEC's light heavyweights. Tennessee, Mississippi State and Auburn are all 15 spots higher in SP+ than in the AP poll. Florida is 12 spots higher, Ole Miss 11 and Kentucky nine. Two main things to take from this: First, SP+ really likes the SEC this season (as we'll see below). The combination of quality returning production averages and high-level recruiting and transfer portal usage should make for strong output in what is generally college football's strongest conference.
Cincinnati. Luke Fickell's Bearcats have to replace some stars from last year's CFP squad -- especially at QB and cornerback -- but they still have the deepest roster in the Group of 5 ranks, and while they still sneaked out a preseason AP ranking (23rd), SP+ likes them even more.
The teams the pollsters like more
USC. As I suggested in May's projections update, the Trojans are basically unprojectable in 2022. We have no evidence for how a team that takes on upward of 20 transfers and adds some genuinely All-American pieces in the process, will perform the next season. The Trojans will obviously improve, and I'm going to assume the polls are closer to right about USC (14th in the AP poll, 15th in the coaches poll) than SP+ is (46th). But I'm also willing to bet they'll fall somewhere in between.
Wake Forest. The Demon Deacons earned the No. 23 spot in the preseason poll, but with quarterback Sam Hartman out for an undetermined amount of time, I marked him as lost production for the purposes of these projections. The Deacons were already lower in SP+ than the polls, and now they're even further down.
Baylor. As I wrote earlier this week, the Bears check quite a few regression boxes this year, even though they still have Dave Aranda and they're going to have some fantastic line play. They earned a top-10 spot in the polls, but SP+ is skeptical.
Fresno State. This is another "power rankings vs. expected outcomes" disagreement, I think. SP+ likes the Bulldogs to win 9.5 games on average -- the eighth-best projected win total on the board, and one that would definitely get them ranked at the end of the year -- but it projects them to do so as only the 45th-best team in the country.
Oregon. After three blowout losses in their last four games in 2021, the Ducks tumbled into the 30s in SP+. It expects them to rebound into the 20s, but poll voters expect a little more (11th per the AP, 12th per the coaches).
Miami. Mario Cristobal's old team (Oregon) is overappreciated by the pollsters, and his new team might be, too. Like the Ducks, Miami starts in the 20s, but voters placed the Hurricanes in the teens (16th AP, 17th coaches).
Preseason conference power rankings
SP+ is a team ranking, but it can tell us a lot about conference expectations, too. So let's walk through some of the averages and projections for each conference heading into the fall. As mentioned above, the SEC is certainly projected to be pretty good this year. Shocking, I know.
1. SEC
Average rating: 15.0
Average offensive rating: 34.4 (first)
Average defensive rating: 19.4 (first)
Average returning production percentage: 65.6% (second)
Top 4 teams: No. 1 Alabama, No. 2 Georgia, No. 8 Texas A&M, No. 9 Ole Miss
2. Big Ten
Average rating: 9.4
Average offensive rating: 29.9 (fourth)
Average defensive rating: 20.5 (second)
Average returning production percentage: 62.8% (fifth)
Top 4 teams: No. 3 Ohio State, No. 6 Michigan, No. 13 Penn State, No. 15 Michigan State
3. Big 12
Average rating: 8.9
Average offensive rating: 32.7 (second)
Average defensive rating: 23.7 (third)
Average returning production percentage: 60.1% (ninth)
Top 4 teams: No. 4 Oklahoma, No. 19 Oklahoma State, No. 22 Texas, No. 30 Baylor
4. ACC
Average rating: 6.0
Average offensive rating: 31.0 (third)
Average defensive rating: 25.0 (fifth)
Average returning production percentage: 65.5% (third)
Top 4 teams: No. 5 Clemson, No. 18 NC State, No. 23 Pitt, No. 27 Miami
5. Pac-12
Average rating: 3.4
Average offensive rating: 27.6 (sixth)
Average defensive rating: 24.4 (fourth)
Average returning production percentage: 64.0% (fourth)
Top 4 teams: No. 12 Utah, No. 24 Oregon, No. 36 UCLA, No. 46 USC
6. AAC
Average rating: 0.0
Average offensive rating: 28.4 (fifth)
Average defensive rating: 28.4 (seventh)
Average returning production percentage: 66.0% (first)
Top 4 teams: No. 16 Cincinnati, No. 32 Houston, No. 40 UCF, No. 43 SMU
7. Mountain West
Average rating: -5.8
Average offensive rating: 22.0 (11th)
Average defensive rating: 27.8 (sixth)
Average returning production percentage: 53.7% (10th)
Top 4 teams: No. 35 Boise State, No. 45 Fresno State, No. 53 Air Force, No. 59 SDSU
8. Sun Belt
Average rating: -7.8
Average offensive rating: 23.5 (10th)
Average defensive rating: 31.3 (ninth)
Average returning production percentage: 62.6% (sixth)
Top 4 teams: No. 55 Appalachian State, No. 67 Marshall, No. 68 Louisiana, No. 71 Coastal Carolina
9. Conference USA
Average rating: -8.2
Average offensive rating: 23.5 (10th)
Average defensive rating: 31.3 (ninth)
Average returning production percentage: 60.9% (eighth)
Top 4 teams: No. 52 UTSA, No. 60 UAB, No. 66 WKU, No. 88 North Texas
10. MAC
Average rating: -8.9
Average offensive rating: 23.7 (eighth)
Average defensive rating: 32.6 (10th)
Average returning production percentage: 62.3% (seventh)
Top 4 teams: No. 62 Toledo, No. 82 CMU, No. 84 NIU, No. 85 Miami (Ohio)
2022 Returning production rankings
Finally, let's share the year-end returning production rankings, too. I began tracking teams' production levels back in February, and I have since attempted to note as many injuries and late transfer portal changes as possible. After heading into 2021 with one of the lowest returning production totals in the country, BYU enters 2022 with the most. Let's see what the Cougars do with it.
After the roster wildness of 2021, we have returned to normal from a production standpoint. From 2014 through 2020 (the years for which I have compiled full data), teams averaged a returning production figure of 62.6%. It spiked to 76.4% last season, with so many extra players returning for their bonus year of eligibility; in 2022, that national average is ... 62.6%.
It's much, much lower for Nevada though. Conference mates Hawaii and Wyoming, too.
Here are the 10 lowest returning production percentages that I have recorded to date:
1. 2022 Nevada (22%)
2. 2015 Kansas (25%)
3. 2017 Air Force (27%)
4. 2022 Hawaii (27%)
5. 2020 Air Force (30%)
6. 2019 UAB (32%)
7. 2016 Ohio State (32%)
8. 2020 LSU (34%)
9. 2022 Wyoming (35%)
10. 2016 Cal (35%)
Ohio State remained excellent in 2016 despite the heavy turnover, and while UAB regressed in 2019, the Blazers still managed to reach the Conference USA championship for a second straight year. It's possible to avoid total collapse when you fall this far on the returning production list. It's not likely, though. On average, the seven non-2022 teams on the list above went from a 0.753 win percentage the previous year to a 0.481 and fell from an average SP+ ranking of 41.6 to 64.0. Nevada, Wyoming and Hawaii all achieved bowl eligibility in 2021 and averaged a 76.7 ranking between them; this year, they combine for an average ranking of 116.7 and an average win total of 4.3.