Having Trouble Choosing Your EASCFB25 Dynasty Team? This Might Help.

[Hooe]

Many of you are probably waiting on player and team OVR ratings before choosing your dynasty team of choice, but if you are impatient and don't want to wait that long, I did some math to divide all the teams into groups which might help you out.

I started with the ESPN Football Power Index of each FBS team, then additionally computed each conference's average FPI to plot each team on an 2D plane. Then I used K-Means Clustering to categorize each of the 134 teams into similar clusters.

The teams subdivided nicely into twelve different groups, which I will detail below:

College Football Playoff Contenders (15)

Spoiler

Teams in this cluster each play in a Power 4 conference with an automatic bid to the CFP and have a strong FPI rating relative to other teams in their conference. This cluster also includes independent Notre Dame.

• ACC: Florida State, Clemson, Louisville, Miami
• Big XII: Kansas, Kansas State, Arizona
• Big Ten: Oregon, Ohio State, Penn State, Michigan
• Independents: Notre Dame
• SEC: Georgia, Texas, Alabama

College Football Playoff Crashers (9)

Spoiler

Teams in this cluster each play in a Group of 6 conference. They are exceptionally strongly rated in FPI relative to their conference peers. They are likely strong enough to compete against and defeat many Power 4 teams.

• American: UTSA, Memphis, Tulane
• Conference USA: Liberty
• Mountain West: Boise State, Fresno State
• Sun Belt: James Madison, Appalachian State, Troy

Power 4 Dark Horse (16)

Spoiler

Teams in this cluster each play in a Power 4 conference. They aren't quite at the top of the league, but they are strong enough where they can hang in out-of-conference games against fellow Power 4 teams and could reasonably compete for a conference championship if they get a few breaks. Oregon State also falls into this cluster.

• ACC: SMU, NC State
• Big XII: Oklahoma State, Utah, TCU, Texas Tech, UCF, Colorado, West Virginia
• Big Ten: USC
• Pac-12: Oregon State
• SEC: Oklahoma, Tennessee, Missouri, LSU, Texas A&M

Group of 6 Dark Horse (5)

Spoiler

Teams in this cluster each play in a Group of 6 conference. They either are the top teams in a weaker league, or a second-tier team in a stronger G6 conference. Teams in this tier are probably on the outside looking in for the College Football Playoff unless everything goes their way.

• Conference USA: Jacksonville State
• MAC: Miami (OH), Toledo, Bowling Green
• Mountain West: San Diego State

Group of 6 Conference Contenders (11)

Spoiler

Teams in this cluster each play in a Group of 6 conference. They represent teams in the middle of the pack in stronger G6 conferences. They could reasonably make a prestigious non-playoff bowl game with a great season including some key upsets over the teams ahead of them in the conference, but are not necessarily favored to do so.

• American: Florida Atlantic, South Florida, East Carolina, Rice
• Mountain West: San Jose State, UNLV, Air Force
• Sun Belt: Texas State, South Alabama, Marshall, Georgia State

Power 4 - Solid (11)

Spoiler

Teams in this cluster each play in a Power 4 conference. As rated by FPI, they are rated strong nationally and are in the upper half of their respective conferences, but would not be favored against any team belonging to the College Football Playoff Contender or Power 4 Dark Horse clusters.

• ACC: California, North Carolina
• Big 12: Iowa State
• Big Ten: Washington, Iowa, Wisconsin, UCLA, Nebraska
• SEC: Ole Miss, Auburn, Florida

Group of 6 - Solid (8)

Spoiler

Teams in this cluster each play in a Group of 6 conference. They won't be favored against Power 4 teams and likely won't be favored to win their conference either, but they aren't so devoid of talent that they can't offer a competitive experience at their level of play.

• Conference USA: Middle Tennessee, Western Kentucky, UTEP
• MAC: Northern Illinois, Ohio, Central Michigan, Buffalo, Western Michigan

Power 4 - Mid (13)

Spoiler

Teams in this cluster each play in a Power 4 conference. They are generally strongly rated in FPI nationally and still above most Group of 6 teams by FPI, but are well off the pace within their conference and the Power 4.

• ACC: Virginia Tech, Duke, Pittsburgh, Georgia Tech, Boston College
• Big XII: Baylor
• Big Ten: Maryland, Rutgers, Northwestern
• SEC: Kentucky, South Carolina, Arkansas, Mississippi State

Group of 6 - Mid (10)

Spoiler

Teams in this cluster each play in a Group of 6 conference. They are generally the weaker teams in the better G6 conferences, but there's likely a path to bowl eligibility if you are a good coach.

• American: UAB, Tulsa, North Texas
• Conference USA: Louisiana Tech
• Mountain West: Wyoming, Utah State
• Sun Belt: Coastal Carolina, Louisiana, Arkansas State, Georgia Southern

Power 4 - Basement (15)

Spoiler

Teams in this cluster each play in a Power 4 conference. They have above-average FPI ratings nationally but are the weakest teams in their respective conferences. They may be underdogs in games against teams at the top of the Group of 6. Six wins is a good season for any team in this cluster. Washington State also falls into this cluster.

• ACC: Stanford, Syracuse, Wake Forest, Virginia
• Big XII: Arizona State, Cincinnati, BYU, Houston
• Big Ten: Purdue, Minnesota, Illinois, Michigan State, Indiana
• Pac-12: Washington State
• SEC: Vanderbilt

Group of 6 - Basement (13)

Spoiler

Teams in this cluster are either members of a Group of 6 conference or an independent. They are not rated well by FPI and are projected to finish towards the bottom of their respective conferences where applicable.

• American: Charlotte, Army
• Conference USA: New Mexico State, Sam Houston
• Independents: UConn, Massachusetts
• MAC: Ball State, Eastern Michigan, Akron
• Mountain West: Colorado State, Hawaii
• Sun Belt: Southern Miss, Old Dominion

Group of 6 - Rebuild (8)

Spoiler

Teams in this cluster each play for a Group of 6 conference. They are the worst teams in their league. Their 2024 outlook is generally dire. There's room for upward mobility if you are patient, but it's going to take time.

• American: Navy, Temple
• Conference USA: Kennesaw State, FIU
• MAC: Kent State
• Mountain West: New Mexico, Nevada
• Sun Belt: UL Monroe

Comments: This exercise was mostly done as an exercise to teach myself how to do K-Means Clustering. I have no idea how accurate these clusters will be relative to the launch-day team ratings in EASCFB25, but for now it may prove useful to you as a broad guide.

ESPN FPI strongly favors Power 4 teams across the board; only teams in the CFP Crasher cluster have stronger FPI ratings than any Power 4 team, and even then, none of the CFP Crasher teams have FPI ratings stronger than the lowest-rated team in the Power 4 - Solid cluster. Further, every team in the Power 4 - Basement cluster has a higher FPI than all G6 teams not in the CFP Crasher cluster. Given that the sport of college football is rather strongly defined by upsets — especially the further one moves away from the top of the sport — I don't believe this disparity between the bottom of the Power 4 and the second tier of the Group of 6 to be truly accurate.

[Hooe]

Forgot to add the plot: here's how the clusters look plotted against each other. You should be able to figure out which cluster is which fairly easily, the chasm between the Power 4 and Group of 6 is fairly obvious.

The X-Axis is a team's FPI relative to other members of their conference, the Y-Axis is a team's FPI relative to all other FBS teams.

[cjacks17]

Insanely helpful - appreciate this!

Obviously some pieces debateable, but laid out extremely well.

[GoCougs236]

I don't appreciate that my Cougs are in the basement ... but you're not wrong.

I think I am going to reverse merger the MWC into the PAC and see if over time we can't get some contenders back into the conference of champions.

[simbayless]

EA should make a recruiter rankings online for bragging rights against other users and to show whose the top 20 best recruiters in world 🏆

[WeArePSU40]

This is awesome! A couple comments:
1. You have SJSU twice
2. Kansas too high
3. Utah and Ole Miss too low, especially Ole Miss.
4. Also might have missed it but pretty sure Oklahoma isn’t listed at all…

[Hooe]

Quote: Originally Posted by WeArePSU40

This is awesome! A couple comments: 1. You have SJSU twice 2. Kansas too high 3. Utah and Ole Miss too low, especially Ole Miss. 4. Also might have missed it but pretty sure Oklahoma isn’t listed at all…

1,4 - I didn't transpose my spreadsheet correctly, which resulted in Oklahoma and San Diego State being omitted. They're in now, thanks for catching that!

2,3 - the only input data for this worksheet is the ESPN College Football Power Index (FPI) ratings. If you disagree with where the teams landed, please take it up with ESPN lol.

[Hooe]

Quote: Originally Posted by GoCougs236

I don't appreciate that my Cougs are in the basement ... but you're not wrong.

As a fellow basement-dwelling Virginia Cavalier, welcome!