All-time trophy update

Alabama, on a 5 game winning streak as the current trophy holder, takes on Florida this weekend. 'Bama took the trophy from Florida in the SEC championship game last season.

The trophy has been passed 270 times since Rutgers beat Princeton in 1869. Princeton then took the trophy a week later. Sixteen times the team lost the trophy back to the team they took it from:

Princeton from Yale 11/28/1878
Yale from Princeton 11/30/1893
Princeton from Yale 11/10/1894
Penn from Lafayette 10/23/1897
Harvard from Yale 11/23/1901
Yale from Harvard 11/22/1902
Swathmore from Penn 10/13/1906
Harvard from Carlisle 11/7/1908
Harvard from Princeton 11/2/1912
Brown from Colgate 10/27/1917
Stanford from USC 11/11/1934
Notre Dame from Northwestern 11/21/1936
Mississippi over LSU 11/3/1962
UCLA from OSU 11/20/1976
Washington over USC 11/15/1980
Alabama over Penn State 9/12/1987

The frequency definitely dropped after the strongest teams spread throughout the country and out of the Ivy League. In my preseason predictions I predicted Arkansas would take the trophy from the Tide, maybe I was off a week. Go Gators!

CFRC

With 81 reporting, M is #20.  On the schedule, only OSU and Iowa are higher.  (that would be 10-2)

Iowa (home game) is 6 spots higher (I'll count that as a win), but PSU and Wisconsin (road games) are 3 and 6 spots lower, respectively (two losses).  (that would be 9-3. Nice)

Iowa, M, PSU, Wis, NU and MSU are within 20 spots.  That implies there should be a lot of close games this year.

Indiana Prediction Based On Cake Frosting

m34, in 33

Indiana prediction based on historical data

M is 162-43-1 in all games I have attended (all stats are only for games I have attended unless otherwise mentioned)
M is 26-12 in games away from Michigan Stadium
M is 3-0 in Memorial Stadiums (at least stadiums known only as "Memorial Stadium")
M is 111-31-1 in conference games
M is 20-5 in the 4th game I have seen in a particular season
M is 29-3 with #16 as starting QB
M is 44-17-1 against human-ish mascots
M is 12-0 against Indiana
M is 3-2 when facing a team for the 13th time
M is 30-7 against schools from the Indiana
M is 2-0 on games played on October 2nd
M is 114-20-1 against unranked teams
M is 8-1 against coaches named Bill
M is 5-0 when ranked 19th
M is 23-3 when ranked 15-19th
M is 140-32-1 when ranked

It's simple when you add it all up:

M 45 - Indiana 27

WTKA Poll Question

Like a lot of WTKA Poll Questions, this one is more prediction than opinion.

What is going to happen on Saturday?
a) Michigan beats Indiana by 21+ points
b) Michigan beats Indiana by 10-20 points
c) Michigan beats Indiana by 1-9 points
d) Indiana upsets Michigan

Not surprisingly, M fans are extremely confident after going 4-0. +21 got 41%, and 10-20 got 39%. Unless everyone that voted c thinks M is going to win by 8 or less, more than 80% of voters think M is going to win by more than a TD. That stat concerns me almost as much as the total yards allowed by the M defense. (not really)

Winning the Coin Toss

It has actually been bad this season for M to win the coin toss 3 of the first 4 games. In all 4 games, the team with the ball first scores on their first possession. Fortunately M lost the toss this past weekend, so M scored first.

Great Northern UP Conference Ladder

Kingsley / Marquette
Menominee / Escanaba
Gladstone

Gladstone's predicted record using this tree: 0-4 in conference