Baylor Bears vs. Texas Tech Red Raiders Statistical Preview

Let's start with Tech's absolute stats, which show an interesting dynamic in their offense. Let me know if you see what I see.

Texas Tech

Baylor

Advanced Stats

Just like last week, there's a lot going on here and I want to make sure everyone understands what I've done. The column heading indicate which side of the ball each stat addresses. For example, Baylor's offense ranks #2 in F/+ (the combination of FEI and S&P+) while Tech's defense ranks 60th. Likewise, our defense is 106th against their 24th-ranked offense. Each stat after that pertains directly to a specific part of FEI and S&P+. I'm fairly certain everything is referenced correctly, but if I made a mistake in transcription, I apologize profusely. Obviously, the second and third columns from the left are general rankings of each team as a whole. This week, I added F/+ Special Teams, which is again a combination of the applicable measures from both FEI and S&P+.

Last week, I had sort of a feeling that Baylor might perform well against Kansas State because our strengths lined up with their weaknesses and their strengths our strengths. We don't defense the pass well but they weren't able to exploit it because their passing game is relatively weak. I highlight methodical drives as an area where we could potentially have success given their tendencies. It was an easy call that turned out to be pretty much correct; we gashed them repeatedly on the ground en route to a huge rushing day. What I didn't expect, and no rational person probably could have, was how well our defense would perform against their offense. Coming into the game, Kansas State's offense ranked quite well in nearly every facet except methodical drives, to see our defense rise up again and again was and probably should have been a tremendous shock. Our trend lines above on defense have jumped in correlation with that effort. We don't look good, but we look a hell of a lot better than we did before. After the season is over, I hope to put together a series of posts showing how we progressed in each stat. If we can continue our strong defensive momentum, that should be a rewarding endeavor.

As far as Tech is concerned, they are not nearly as strong defensively as you've probably been lead to believe or expected given their strong start. Their major strength, so much as it is one, is in stopping methodical drives. Everywhere else, they're vulnerable. They give up an above average amount of first downs, they're not great in adjusted yards, and they allow a similarly above average amount of value drives. Of course, they're better in every single one of those categories than we are, but that's not really the point. Considering how we are on offense, Tech should be quite concerned. Baylor did what we did last week against a much better defense statistically and our trends (nearly all positive where positive movement can occur) are good. They should be particularly concerned about our rushing game when posed against their rushing defense. I've been trying to figure out why the results on standard and passing downs are better than the correlative results against the run and pass, and I've basically come up dry. If someone can help me out there, I'd greatly appreciate it.

Offensively, Tech is about as you'd expect: much better at passing the ball than running it. I have a sneaking suspicion, actually, that they're even worse in the rushing game than they look here. I think that area, considering our relative strength against the run, might be our best chance to make them one dimensional. Conversely, it may be exactly what they want; unlike last week where we matched up well, I'm much more concerned about our defense when faced with a team that wants to pass as much as Tech.

The good news, so much as it exists, is that Mike Leach isn't walking through that door. The days of the Red Raiders offense ranking extremely high in FEI appear to be over, and though Tech is still a formidable passing offense, they are no longer amazing. In terms of efficiency, we actually stopped a better passing offense last week against Kansas State. Whether that bears out on Saturday is anyone's guess-- I'm more apt to believe that this is one of the situations where the statistics don't reflect perfectly the reality of the situation. Stated differently, Tech's passing offense is probably going to have at least a decent day against our defense, as resurgent as it seems to be.

From a Baylor fan's perspective, there are still too many triple digit numbers on that graph for me to feel extremely confident about any game, but we're heading in the right direction. The offense is as incredible as we hoped it might be, and the defense may have found its legs in the huge win last week. If we can continue our positive momentum, I feel good about this week's game. If we revert back to the Bears of old, I feel less so. Overall, if you look at the stats underlying the ranks (which I don't post because the ranks tell enough of the story without causing confusion), the gap between our offense and their defense is bigger than that between theirs and ours, so if we are destined for a shootout, I think we're bringing the bigger gun.