CFP Defense Comparison

This was a write up posted on another forum but is very nicely done.


know stats only tell part of the stories but I wanted to compare some of them. I think scoring defense and total defense only tell part of the story so I wanted to look at some of the stats I value. I used NCAA.com's stats.


Stats examined: Yards Per Play, Rushing Yards Per Attempt, PassingYards Per Attempt, Sacks, Interceptions, Fumbles Recovered, Scoring Defense, Total Plays Faced, Average total offense of opponents played (ATO) (FCS teams get a 100 for their ranking)

TEAM------------- YPP RY/A PY/A Sacks Int FR SD TPF ATO
Oklahoma------ 4.68 3.62 6.0 38 19 7 20.8 899 48.5
Clemson--------- 4.59 3.65 5.8 36 13 8 18.8 754 76.6
Alabama -------- 4.13 2.47 5.8 41 15 8 14.3 768 61.8
Iowa-------------- 4.81 3.39 6.1 27 17 8 18.7 828 81.5
Michigan State 5.39 3.64 7.1 32 14 11 21.1 778 54.7

North Carolina 5.21 4.67 6.0 23 15 9 20.8 910 73.5

Things that stood out:
Iowa truly has played no one, as their ATO indicates.
I would have bet that MSU, Clemson, and Bama's defenses were better across the board but only Bama's is. Michigan State has the reputation for a hard-nosed defensive team, but Oklahomas is better virtually everywhere. Clemson's is better in scoring, yards per pass attempt, and fumbles only, but their ATO is much weaker.
OU has faced 71-145 more plays than everyone else in the top 5 which is basically 1-2 more games.
This took more time than I should have spent, but I was curious. Let me know if there are any metrics you think I've ignored.