College Football “Week Zero” Predictions based on 3,000 simulations

Now, my personal prediction articles won’t begin until the first “real” week of football season, but the CSD Rating system doesn’t require a writeup, so without further ado, let’s reveal the official predictions for what I am dubbing as “Week Zero” of the College Football Year.

*The rating system can only predict FBS vs FBS games (sorry BYU fans ;(… sorry)

Methodology: It’s pretty complicated, but it’s mainly based off of past performances, recruiting rankings, returning starters, then I rank the top 25 in each position group, and those teams get a bonus along with bonuses for coaching, and subtractions for injuries, suspensions, and much more. That spits out a rating from -35 to +35, and then it’s just a simple random number generator, using the home teams rating – the away teams rating (Then add 2.15 for home field advantage) as the mean, you use standard deviation (I use 10.5 for college football) and use a Monte Carlo simulator to simulate the result X number of times. An average result of 12 means the home team will win by 12, and -12 will mean the home team will lose by 12.

Oregon State @ Colorado State – Sat, 8/26 – 2:30PM ET, CBS Sports Network

Vegas Line: CSU -4
CSD Ratings Projection: Colorado State by 4

Hawai’i @ UMass – Sat, 8/26 – 6PM ET

Vegas Line: Umass -2.5
CSD Rating Projection: Hawai’i by 5

#19 South Florida @ San José State – Sat, 8/26 – 7:30PM ET, CBS Sports Network

Vegas Line: USF -21.5
CSD Rating Projection: USF by 27

#14Stanford @ Rice – Sat, 8/26 – 10PM ET, ESPN

Vegas Line: Stan -30.5
CSD Rating Projection: Stanford by 38