ESPN released their preseason FPI rating for 2016. MAC members and WMU OOC opponents:
#53 -
Northwestern
#61 -
Western Michigan Projected W/L - 9.1-3.4
#71 - Central Michigan
#76 - Northern Illinois
#78 -
Illinois
#85 - Toledo
#86 -
Georgia Southern
#91 - Bowling Green
#101 - Ohio
#105 - Kent State
#106 - Ball State
#110 - Miami (OH)
#111 - Buffalo
#113 - Akron
#118 - Eastern Michigan
#124 - UMass (I know, not MAC anymore...but whatever)
http://espn.go.com/college-football/stat...eamratings
Takeaways:
- WMU highest rated in the MAC. Only 1 of our opponents is ranked higher: Northwestern at 53. And that's a winnable game.
- CMU ranked second in the MAC at 71. Interesting. If Rush takes one bad hit and goes down...their season is over. Not sure what else ESPN is seeing on CMU's team.
- Four highest-rated MAC teams are from the West. Highest East team is Bowling Green all the way down at 91.
- Akron is a bit of a surprise down at #113. Terry Bowden seems to have them on the rise. But they did just graduate something like 25 seniors, including much of their vaunted defense and their entire O-line.
- They give WMU a 34.4% chance to win the MAC, highest percentage in the MAC.
- They also give WMU a 1.2% chance to go undefeated, the highest percentage of all teams below them and all teams up to Boise State at #36, which has a 6.5% chance to win out. Only seven other teams have a higher chance than WMU to win out their season: #11 Michigan (5.8%), #9 Oklahoma State (1.7%), #5 Tennessee (4.0%), #4 Clemson (8.0%), #3 Oklahoma (15.2%), #2 LSU (5.6%), #1 Florida State (10.0%).