Sad Points

Michigan's defense is better than you think.

"Yay we finally scored!" Photo: Patrick Barron

Michigan's 2018 defense has been dominant. The numbers don't lie. Through 9 games, they're 1st nationally in overall defense, passing defense, pass efficiency...8th in rushing, 5th in scoring, 7th in 3rd down defense and 4th in first downs allowed.

Impressive, right?

I mean this is an incredible season Don Brown and his boys are having. Every week this group seems to be getting better and hungrier and revenge-ier.

But what if I told you these numbers should be better?

It's no mystery that Michigan, regardless of their recent years of struggles, is still a prime time matchup for any opponent. Even bad teams get up to play Michigan. But sometimes, things don't always go the way you want them to...especially at the Big House. Michigan jumps out to an early lead and never looks back, or you just get ground into a pile of dust while Michigan pulls away in the 2nd half. Either way, suddenly a multi-score deficit is your new reality.

When Michigan is comfortably ahead, in come the backups for some much needed playing time. Some opponents see this as their opportunity to make a lopsided score look better than it should, or try to avoid a shutout. This is a term many in the Michigan twitterverse have dubbed as "sad points" that come in the form of a "sad field goal" or a "sad touchdown"...such as the case just this past weekend when Penn State all of the sudden strung together an 11-play 75 yard touchdown scoring drive to make the score 42-7 on their last possession of the game.

Don't ever upset this man. 

So I got to thinking...what if you took away these sad yards/points/1st downs/3rd down conversions? What would that do to Michigan's stats and rankings?

My criteria for sad points was any opposing team scoring drive that occurred in the 2nd half while they were down by at least 3 scores. By my tabulation, there have been 9 such drives by Michigan opponents this season.

Opponent	Plays	Yards	Points Scored	Current M Points	1st Downs	3rd Down Conv.
WMU Drive 12	13	57	3	49	4	1
SMU Drive 7	16	87	6	28	6	3
SMU Drive 8	12	80	7	35	4	1
NEB Drive 9	8	55	3	46	3	1
NEB Drive 13	7	80	7	56	4	0
MD Drive 9	15	75	7	27	3	0
MD Drive 11	6	78	7	42	3	0
WIS Drive 11	8	75	6	38	2	1
PSU Drive 12	11	75	7	42	3	0

For a defense that only gives up an average of 216.2 yards per game and 13.6 points per game...you can see how even these numbers are driven up as a result of these sad garbage time drives.

Let's see what would happen if you removed these sad drives and what that would do to the numbers.

Opponent	Total Yds (sad)	Adj. Total	Total Points (sad)	Adj. Points	1st Downs (sad)	Adj. 1st Downs	3rd D Conv (sad)	Adj. 3rd D Conv
WMU	208 (57)	151	3 (3)	0	17 (4)	13	4 (1)	3
SMU	319 (167)	152	20 (13)	7	22 (10)	12	5 (4)	1
NEB	132 (135)	-3	10 (10)	0	12 (7)	5	3 (1)	2
MD	220 (153)	67	21 (14)	7	11 (7)	4	5 (0)	5
WIS	283 (75)	208	13 (6)	7	11 (2)	9	2 (1)	1
PSU	186 (75)	111	7 (7)	0	11 (3)	8	2 (0)	2

Obviously, Michigan's numbers are pretty terrific without the sad numbers removed, but if nothing else, this helps give you a glimpse of just how dominant Michigan's defense really is if you take away these frivolous drives. I mean, just look at Nebraska...their adjusted total after the sad yards were removed was -3. Minus 3 total yards...for the game!!!

In terms of national rankings, it doesn't change much overall. It really only further separates Michigan from the pack, especially in the Big Ten.

New Michigan Rankings

	Value	Nat. Rank	B1G Rank	Adj Value	Adj Nat Rank	Adj B1G Rank
Total Defense/Gm	216.2	1	1	142.7	1	1
Scoring Defense/Gm	13.6	5	1	7.6	1	1
3rd Down Conv/Gm	3.67	7	1	2.9	3	1
1st Downs Allowed/Gm	14.6	4	1	10.9	1	1

This week, Michigan travels to Rutgers where even sad drives are hard to come by. Rutgers is really awful. However, as we see here, when teams start to empty the depth chart, anything can happen.