re: Do you know why we are confident in our teams chances in the BCSNCG?

Avello, the sports operations director who sets the lines at Wynn Las Vegas, watched Auburn beat Missouri, locking up the No. 2 spot in the BCS after Ohio State lost to Michigan State in the Big Ten title game, and tried to gauge the public temperature regarding the SEC champion. Just how much do people believe in Gus Malzahn's Tigers?

He made a four-point Auburn adjustment -- an uncommon swing this late in the season -- and set the Wynn's opening line Monday morning at Florida State minus-9. Immediately, Auburn money began to roll in.

Avello actually might be more generous to Auburn than other Vegas experts who either set lines or analyze them. The guys at Don Best Sports, Chief Operating Office Kenny White and analyst Todd Fuhrman, who also serves as FOX Sports 1’s Vegas insider, believe the actual divide between Florida State and Auburn is far wider than the public seems to realize.

"You would think in a game between the No. 1 and No. 2 teams, [the spread] wouldn't be that big of a gap, but this isn't the No. 1 versus No. 2,” White told me. "This is our No. 1 team versus our No. 13 team."

How is it that the SEC champion -- the "best team in the nation's best conference," as some might commonly label the winner of the SEC title -- falls so far behind other teams with seemingly inferior credentials?

Well, simply, Vegas doesn't sing the same narrative tunes that made-for-TV BCS debates do.

Instead, it's basing its evaluations on three cold realities that zoom by the emotional radar of the general fan.

1. Georgia, Alabama and the matter of luck

"Our calculations are based on performance on the field," White said. "We want to know how efficient a team is moving the football."

"My defense is they lost to Georgia and Alabama," White said.

White marks them as defeats for the power rating calculations because of the extraordinary fortunate involved.

The point, as White or Fuhrman or Avello or anyone in Vegas would note, is not to knock Auburn. It's just their jobs to discover the true talent level of teams so they can predict future performance as accurately as possible, and that process requires cutting the narrative layers that harden on top of each magnificent victory.

"In the end, winning is the name of the game, but beating Georgia took the hand of God, and beating Alabama also took some luck," Fuhrman told me. "It makes for a good story."

2. Another reason Vegas is more bullish on Florida State in the BCS championship is that it’s not being influenced by the orchestra that accompanies SEC teams on fairy-tale runs.

All of which is totally irrelevant when gauging one team against another at a neutral site. There's no powerful conference powder Auburn can take to Pasadena and sprinkle on the field before kickoff, but its league affiliation and destiny narrative are two other factors driving up Auburn’s valuation.

3. More importantly, FSU is just more talented

The Seminoles rank third in yards per pass at 10.3 and ninth in yards per rush at 5.69. Auburn ranks 18th at 8.5 and fourth at 6.46, respectively. Vegas analytic guys count this as an edge for Florida State.

On defense, they count the 'Noles as a massive favorite. FSU ranks first in yards per pass allowed at 4.9 and ninth in yards per rush allowed at 3.14. Auburn's ranking in those categories: 83rd (7.4) and 86th (4.59). Don Best considers the Tigers worse than that against the pass.

"A lot has been made about how Auburn has performed in spurts," Fuhrman said. "But if you look at the defensive metrics, they give up a substantial amount of yards."

"I’m not saying Auburn can't win," White told me. "We have them at a 23 percent chance of winning. So if they play [Florida State] four times, we think they’d win one of them."