Iowa State Had a 92 Percent Chance Of Beating OSU Near End of Third Quarter

ESPN has a great metric on their gamecast page which shows a running win probability throughout the course of a game. This tracks the possibility of the most likely win at any given point in time and even allows users to scroll over the timeline of the game and see each play corresponding to the current win probability. The probability chart for this past week’s ISU-OSU game is really an interesting one and deserves a second look and bit of analysis.

As you can see, OSU is favored pretty heavily for most of the game, but Iowa State is has a 92 percent chance of winning with just under 18 minutes left. I’ll run through several thoughts to take away from this:

• OSU is still projected to win down 17-14 after halftime. I’m not sure about all of you, but I attended the game and (ashamedly now) quite loudly declared “I can’t believe we’re going to lose to 1-4 Iowa State” midway through the second quarter I did not have as much faith in the Pokes as the metric. No one around me had any inclination but agreement with me at the time.

• At their high point, ISU had a 92.2 percent chance of victory. 92.2 percent!!!

• After the final Rudolph to Washington TD, OSU had a 92.5 percent chance to win while still kicking the ball back to the Cyclones and having to deal with another end-of-game #math debacle. I, in no way, shape, or form felt like we were that close to victory in light of recent, repressed memories.

• This somewhat give me even more faith in Gundy, who obviously trusts his team. After the game he was asked if he was nervous being down and responded with the following.

“Not really, because we can score fast. If we were in a conventional offense, we would have been in trouble. We have the ability to score really fast, and we have playmakers that can pick up big chunks of yards. I didn’t feel that way, but I didn’t feel very good either.”

He’s right that we can score in a hurry which is great for these metrics, but is also terrible for my blood pressure and peace of mind.

• This may not be a perfect way of looking at games, but it can open up some interesting discussion and is a bit more consistent than human opinion. I often get caught up in the immediacy of each moment and what I’m feeling. [quick cut to the inner thoughts in my brain] “Why would we take a knee?? We’re DEFINITELY going to lose now” meanwhile by the data OSU has a 99.8 percent chance of winning.

Talk about short-sightedness and a lack of belief in the coaches and players. Perspective may be the most difficult part of fandom — each win and loss is the “greatest” or “worst” moment of our week, month, year, life, etc…. Hopefully taking a step back and looking at some fact-based data will help us to enjoy the team we have, trust our coaches (even when we are standing on our chairs screaming at them in disagreement at the time), and appreciate the game not just for the number in the win column, but for the joy and agony that comes throughout the course a game while supporting a team and school close to our hearts.

Bonus: I guess computers aren’t always right? Or is it maybe, JUST MAYBE, possible that there is some human error involved here? I don’t want to jump to conclusions but the time, score, and probability stand out to me a bit…..