by M. C. Jennings | Dec 8, 2015 | Academics, COBA Faculty, Current Students, Research, Uncategorized
Alabama, Michigan State, Oklahoma, and Clemson are our top 4 teams, respectively, for week 15. Notre Dame falls to 5th, Ohio State is bumped to 6th, and Stanford rose to No. 7 on the strength of their strong win over USC (#13). All the major moves were by teams that played this weekend and most of their moves were upwards. Strangely, Texas (#29) has two wins over top 25 college football playoff (CFP) teams – there are very few teams out there with that distinction!
Prediction quality measurement
Out of the 87 games involving teams ranked in the CFP top 25, the CFP continues to correctly predict the winner (adjusted for home field advantage) 67% of the time. We can actually compute the probability of being that successful out of 87 games if you are purely guessing: it happens less than .001 of the time, or less than 1 in 1000 attempts. We look at something called a binomial distribution to obtain this “p value.” Our model continues to outperform the CFP system, correctly predicting the outcome 74% of the time for these same games. As of this weekend there have been only 14 games in which our system makes a different prediction than the CFP rankings and ours has “won” this competition 10 times. If our two systems were equal in predictive ability, then the probability of this happening would be less than .029, or about once in 35 tries.
A bug – or a feature?
George Box famously said “all models are wrong, but some are useful.” Similarly, we know that our system is flawed and this process of producing rankings each week has brought some of those flaws to the forefront. One of the goals of successful modeling is to seek out flaws so as to eliminate or minimize them. If we are trying to build better models, what good would it do to hide the flaws?
The primary weakness we have found in our system is that teams which play more games are ranked higher than those that play fewer games. In fact, nearly every team that played this weekend, win or lose, moved up in our rankings due to this fact. This clarifies why Clemson edged back into the top 4 and Notre Dame fell out – all three teams that moved ahead of them played this weekend. (On a sidenote, I am genuinely bummed that we have the exact same top four – though in a different order – as the CFP.) This flaw might also explain why we expected a large Michigan State win over Iowa and a narrow Stanford win over USC when in fact they won narrowly and largely, respectively. This issue is definitely one we will address in our college football offseason. Interestingly, the fact that our model is working better than its primary competitor, the CFP, suggests that it might be a feature instead of a bug!
In later posts, we will present some additional comparative analysis of our rankings and, further, list our predicted bowl winners and win margins.
Previous JP rankings posts
If you are interested in learning more about our rankings, feel free to read some of previous posts, linked below.
Post 1: Week 10: Introduction of JP ranking system and initial rankings (week 10)
Post 2: Week 11: Rankings and additional information on how the system works
Post 3: Week 12: Rankings
Post 4: Week 12: Addendum – Tears on my slide rule, or, What happened to dear old Texas A&M
Post 5: Week 13: Rankings
Post 6: Week 14: Rankings and a measure of comparative predictive performance
by M. C. Jennings | Dec 1, 2015 | Academics, COBA Faculty, Research, Uncategorized
Oklahoma, Notre Dame, Alabama, and Michigan State remain our top 4 for week 14. Ohio State’s decisive win over Michigan (#15) suggests a team that has re-awakened and moves them to 5th, bumping Clemson to 6th. Other notable teams are Iowa, up to #33 from #37 last week and Tennessee holding steady at #7. (See our first post for a brief explanation of our methodology.)
How to measure success
One of the things I teach is how to measure the quality of predictions. What good are predictions if they are no better than chance or no better than existing systems? After four weeks of college football playoff (CFP) rankings there have been 82 games involving ranked teams. After adjusting for the 4.5 point home field advantage, the CFP rankings have correctly predicted the winner 67% percent of the time, definitely better than chance (p < .002). Our JP rankings have been even better, correctly predicted the winner in 74% of those games. Most of the time our systems predict identical outcomes yet there have been 12 games in which they differed. In those 12 games, our system was correct 75% of the time, or 3 times more accurate than the CFP! Hence, I am not really concerned when our rankings look dramatically different from those of the CFP.
Though I am writing this before the CFP rankings are posted, it is likely that there will be only one game where the systems predict different winners: our system predicts Michigan State will win the Big 10 championship whereas the CFP will likely predict that Iowa will win, so that will be one game to watch.
But why is it so weird?
I want to briefly address three issues here: why is Notre Dame still #2 after their loss, why is Iowa so low and why is Tennessee so high? Notre Dame lost by less than the 4.5 point home field advantage to a very good Stanford team (#11) on the road, effectively making it a narrow win against a good team. Iowa is a 12-0 team that has had maybe one (vs. #55 Northwestern) or two (vs. #30 Nebraska) good wins. In contrast, Tennessee is 8-4 with large wins over decent opponents and four narrow losses to OU (#1), Alabama (#3), Arkansas (#8), and Florida (#14). So which is better: to defeat many lousy teams and remain undefeated or to have tight matches against very strong opponents? Our system says the latter.
Rankings are less informative than PageRanks
Lastly, as Dr. Don Pope previously demonstrated, not only do we have ordinal rankings, we can also simultaneously display the actual PageRank values that underlie the rankings. The dot plot displays these values on the horizontal axis. Interestingly, #1 Oklahoma is further from 2nd ranked Notre Dame than Oregon (#13) is from Louisville (#35), whereas teams 23 (Washington) through 29 (Temple) have virtually identical PageRanks even though there are 5 teams between them. So the rankings carry less information than the values that produce them.
by M. C. Jennings | Nov 24, 2015 | Academics, COBA Faculty, Current Students, Research, Uncategorized
Now that week 12 is in the record books, the College Football Playoff (CFP) selection committee will meet today and update their rankings which are a big deal because, when the smoke clears at the end of the college season, the top 4 ranked teams will play in the playoff bowl games to determine the overall number one team. Teams 5,6,… are left to play in such memorable bowl games as the Tidy Bowl.
So, I am sitting here by the phone, waiting for the CFP committee to call for advice. You see, over the last 3 weekends, the Jessup Pope (JP) ranking system has predicted 75% correctly for games involving top 25 teams, while predictions based on the weekly CFP rankings only got 66% correct.
Just in case you are wondering, our top 4 are now Oklahoma, Notre Dame, Alabama, and Michigan State. Clemson and Arkansas are the next 2 teams “on the bubble” of making it in. Our JP rankings continue to be less impressed with our regional favorites TCU, Baylor, and Okie State.
Surely the phone will ring any minute now….
by M. C. Jennings | Nov 23, 2015 | Academics, Careers In..., COBA Faculty, Current Students, Human Resource Management, Uncategorized
Every year, Dr. Malcolm Coco holds a business and dining etiquette dinner for students in his MGMT 373: Employee Planning, Recruitment & Selection class. This year, he held the dinner on Tuesday, Nov. 17th.
Throughout the course, students are taught the importance during the recruitment, interviewing, and selection process for filling jobs, and that personal appearance, non-verbal communication, and dining and business etiquette are very important to employers. Any one of these can disqualify you as a job candidate or make you a winner. After class instruction on all of these subjects along with a research assignment, the students have the opportunity to actually practice what they have learned with their classmates during a formal dinner and simulated meeting environment.
The dinner is the culmination of Dr. Coco’s planning, recruitment, and selection class. Students receive formal invitations and must RSVP to attend the dinner. Jennifer Ellison, ACU’s Director of University Events, partners with Dr. Coco in classroom instruction and constructive criticism during the event to give feedback and instruction to the students. A very elegant, five course meal is served and the students practice their dining manners and protocol. This has always been a highlight of the course. Unfortunately, in society today, proper manners and dining etiquette has become a lost art, but not so with hiring managers. Good manners and dining decorum can be the tie breaker during the interview process and cinch the job you really want.
by M. C. Jennings | Nov 19, 2015 | Academics, COBA Faculty, Current Students, Research, Uncategorized
I am enjoying my research with Dr. Ryan Jessup about the applications of Google’s page rank algorithm to other uses, including ranking sports teams. Believe it or not, this stuff actually relates to the courses that I teach at ACU. This data crunching and analysis of college football results involves statistics, mathematical optimization and model fitting, and cause-effect analysis, all of which relate to the 3 courses that I am teaching this semester: Statistics, Management Science, and Quality Management.
Now, about the title of this blog post. I am a proud Aggie Industrial Engineer, and it hurt my pride enormously when my Aggies dropped from our carefully calculated rank of 32 to 52 after the Saturday November 14th weekend. You see, our algorithm does not accept game results when a big school like Texas A&M plays “Roast Beef Tech” (with apologies to Western Carolina fans). So, A&M dropped in our rankings below such traditional football powers as Bowling Green and those unworthy academic establishments in Austin and Lubbock, Texas. Wow. That hurts.
by M. C. Jennings | Nov 17, 2015 | Academics, COBA Faculty, College Decisions, Current Students, Human Resource Management, Uncategorized
Senior management major, Hayley Griffin, was honored at the HR Southwest Conference (HRSWC) on October 26th, as she was one of four students who received The Excellence in Education Student Scholarship. Recipients of this scholarship are chosen based upon their academic standing, involvement in their community and campus, and by recommendations of their professors, advisors and/or employers.
Hayley Griffin
Dr. Malcolm Coco, professor and SHRM Student Chapter Advisor, nominated Hayley for the scholarship. Dr. Coco said that Hayley has proven to be an outstanding employee, currently working in the ACU HR department and as a student assistant to the COBA marketing and recruiting manager. He touted Hayley’s intelligence, personable demeanor, abilities, accomplishments and work ethic. As the current president of the SHRM student chapter, he said that Hayley has shown initiative and leadership as she attends professional chapter meetings and has supported the chapter’s request for student chapter involvement in joint activities and research. Hayley is also treasurer of the women’s social club Sigma Theta Chi, a member of Phi Eta Sigma Honor Society and is on the Dean’s Honor Roll.
Dr. Coco went on to say that, “Whether she is performing volunteer work for Meals on Wheels, Habitat for Humanity or volunteer tutoring for an elementary school, she is always totally engaged. The bottom line is that Hayley continues to excel in every aspect of her life and has demonstrated superb initiative and leadership. She is the epitome of an all-around outstanding person. Whether it is academics, service to the community, involvement in campus activities, she is always leading the way. She is a top drawer person.”
Hayley receiving The Excellence in Education Scholarship
The HRSWC is a regional human resources conference held in Fort Worth every October. The conference is a 3 day event filled with educational sessions, keynote speakers, and networking opportunities. The educational sessions focus on 8 different areas in HR ranging from benefits to HR development to recruiting the best talent. This year the keynote speakers were David Pogue, the founder of Yahoo Tech, and Soledad O’Brien, the founder of Starfish Media Group.
As a student attending HRSWC, Hayley said, “There are so many outstanding networking opportunities to grow your professional network. There is a market place in the convention center that over 200 companies set up booths to tell people about their company and solutions, so it’s almost like networking heaven! There are some educational sessions geared towards students and how to go about the internship/job search, how to network, and how to get the most out of the conference. This year my favorite session was titled ‘Essential Global Recognition and Engagement Insights’. The speaker presented research that was conducted on different companies across the global market and the differences in how incentive pay and culture are linked. For example, in Brazil, employees expect to be recognized differently than here in the US, in India, or in the UK. It was interesting to hear about cultural differences like this and I am looking forward to being able to use what I learned not only from this session, but the entire conference, into my future career.”
The Society for Human Resource Management student chapter is sponsored by the local professional human resources chapter. There are 27 professional and student chapters in the state of Texas. The Big Country SHRM is ACU’s sponsoring chapter and provides all types of support for the student chapter. Student officers are part of the professional chapter’s executive committee and regularly attend monthly meetings. The student chapter members are also invited to attend each month’s chapter meeting to hear the presentation for that month. The Big Country SHRM also supports the students by offering scholarships for attending the state SHRM annual conference and the student leadership conference. The student chapter provides support for the professional chapter by conducting surveys to gather information from its members and provides support for professional chapter activities.
The student chapter is one of 27 in the state of Texas and over 400 nationally. Over 10,000 students belong to SHRM student chapters. Each student must be chartered and sponsored by a professional chapter. ACU’s chapter is sponsored by the Big Country SHRM professional chapter. The Society of Human Resource Management is the world’s largest association devoted to human resource management. The society serves the needs of HR professionals and advances the interests of the HR profession. Founded in 1948, SHRM has more than 225,000 members in over 125 countries, and more than 575 affiliated chapters. Visit shrm.org
