Week 3 of the college football season has come and gone and SP+ is starting to show its true colors. That is, the built in UNC booster factor.
After struggling to put away NC Central for the first three quarters of the game, SP+ was so thoroughly impressed with the Tar Heels’ performance that it rewarded them with a bump of 17 spots in the rankings. A +4.2 increase in UNC’s rating is ridiculous, but hey, you know what they say about numbers.
The other big mover amongst ACC teams in the week was Georgia Tech, which saw its own 17-spot jump in the rankings following their smackdown of VMI. Virginia Tech moved up 10 spots following their win over Old Dominion.
Virginia and Wake were the big losers of the week, both falling in their respective games. At least Wake had the excuse of playing a really good opponent.
As for the Wolfpack, the overall rating improved 1.9 points following the victory Louisiana Tech, corresponding to a 5 spot improvement in the rankings. State’s offensive rating improved by 0.8 points (+5 improvement in ranking) while the defensive rating improved by 0.9 points (+4 improvement in ranking).
The Pack’s opponent this week, Clemson, saw their rating and ranking both drop despite being on a bye week thanks to Georgia’s struggles with Kentucky. Overall, the conference is improvement in the early going of 2024. That’s good news for the league, but bad news for State as the sledding looks to be tougher than initially thought.