We will have a new champ. Stanford and USC’s long duopoly ended Saturday with the thrashings each received at home. That’s been a common theme this year. Take a look at the home/road splits starting 10 years ago for games within our Mythical California Cup “virtual conference”:
$ python3 ./home_road_splits.py -s 2011 totals for year 2011 home team is 8-3-0 totals for year 2012 home team is 7-3-0 totals for year 2013 home team is 6-4-0 totals for year 2014 home team is 6-4-0 totals for year 2015 home team is 8-3-0 totals for year 2016 home team is 5-5-0 totals for year 2017 home team is 7-4-0 totals for year 2018 home team is 6-5-0 totals for year 2019 home team is 5-6-0 totals for year 2020 home team is 1-4-0 totals for year 2021 home team is 1-7-0 overall: 60-48-0 0.556
Home field advantage was decaying but covid seems to have fully turned it inside out. The only home team that won this year was USC in the very first game of the year.
$ python3 ./mcc_schedule.py -v San José State 7 at USC 30 on Sep 04, 2021 Stanford 42 at USC 28 on Sep 11, 2021 Fresno State 40 at UCLA 37 on Sep 18, 2021 UCLA 35 at Stanford 24 on Sep 25, 2021 San Diego State 19 at San José State 13 on Oct 15, 2021 Fresno State 30 at San Diego State 20 on Oct 30, 2021 UCLA 62 at USC 33 on Nov 20, 2021 California 41 at Stanford 11 on Nov 20, 2021 Fresno State at San José State on Nov 25, 2021 California at UCLA on Nov 27, 2021 USC at California on Dec 03, 2021 Full Enumeration Simulation: UCLA 2 [25%] California 3 [37%] Fresno State 3 [37%] Monte Carlo [Sampled Home Margin Predictor] Simulation: California 3388 [33%] Fresno State 3522 [35%] UCLA 3089 [30%] Fresno State 2-0 California 1-0 UCLA 2-1 San Diego State 1-1 Stanford 1-2 USC 1-2 San José State 0-2 2021, 11, ,
Cal’s sprint to the finish will require one home win. The complete home field disadvantage calls into question the effectiveness of using the sampled margins at all; if recent years have turned the advantage upside down a ten year sample doesn’t really help us. Either way I need to get Elo working before the games run out so we have some projection space to play with.