Tulane Odds to Reach College Football Playoffs Rise Dramatically After UAB Win
The Tulane Green Wave continues to be seen as one of the best teams in the country heading into the second half of the year.
After a blowout win against AAC rival UAB Blazers, the Green Wave has seen another jump in ESPN’s power index. They are now seen as the team with the best odds in the country to win out the rest of their games.
According to ESPN, the Football Power Index (FPI) is a measure of team strength meant to be the best predictor of a team's performance going forward for the rest of the season. Rating results are based on 20,000 simulations of the rest of the season using FPI, results to date, and the remaining schedule.
The team took another massive step forward and continued to catch national attention after their 71-20 victory over the struggling head coach Trent Dilfer and the Blazers. Tulane shined with all three phases of the game. Once they got ahead, UAB could not find any way to answer.
That scenario would place Tulane with a 10-2 record in the first year under head coach Jon Sumrall and make a solid case for them to be the Group of Five representative in the College Football Playoffs. According to the ESPN metrics, they believe there is a 15.1% chance that could be a reality.
The Green Wave moved to 10.1 in the FPI ratings, moving up 17 spots to 23rd in the country in this predictor. Only Army (3.1) and Memphis (1.0) are the only other times to join Tulane with a positive FPI in the American Athletic Conference.
The Green Wave still have a few tough games on their schedule as they look to run the table in the American Conference. They will finish the season with two tough games against Navy and Memphis. The Navy Midshipman joined fellow AAC team Army this week as they both moved to 5-0 for the first time since 1948.
It will be no easy task, and as Sumrall likes to remind everyone on social media, things like this could be seen as rat poison.
Tulane has a week off after the blowout to UAB as it prepares for the final stretch of its season. It will be back in action in Week Eight, when it hosts the Rice Owls on October 19th.
