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We are on the verge of perhaps the most important moment of the year for Florida’s 2016 win shares. After having their game against LSU rescheduled and relocated, and scoring a win over Missouri last week, the Gators are very close to hopping onto the three-or-fewer-losses plateau.
Originally, that would’ve been the nine-or-more-wins plateau, but, well, Florida’s only playing 11 games in this regular season. For the Gators to earn a win shares prediction over 9.0 from me, they will basically need to get to 9-1 — I have a hard time imagining predicting more than 1.0 wins from consecutive road games against LSU and Florida State.
But: Defeating Georgia might add close to half a win — both in regards to making the partial win share whole, and possible gains elsewhere — to a prediction that is already inching close to eight wins. And an 8-3 record that would have been a 9-3 record with the Presbyterian win included might be a fine mark.
| Opponent | Win Share |
|---|---|
| Massachusetts | 1.00 |
| Kentucky | 1.00 |
| North Texas | 1.00 |
| at Tennessee | 0.00 |
| at Vanderbilt | 1.00 |
| Missouri | 1.00 |
| vs. Georgia | 0.65 |
| at Arkansas | 0.35 |
| South Carolina | 0.90 |
| at LSU | 0.45 |
| at Florida State | 0.35 |
| Total | 7.75 |
My thinking:
- Topping Missouri only granted 0.20 wins, as I had Florida’s chances of prevailing last Saturday at a healthy 80 percent. But Florida only has one game, against South Carolina’s anemic offense, in the same realm of relative ease — and it’s also the Gators’ last home game of the year.
- I bumped up the Georgia prediction another five percent because it just doesn’t feel right to me that it would be closer to a coin-flip than a game Florida should win. Florida’s at No. 9 in F/+; Georgia’s allll the way down at No. 67 after its horrific loss to Vanderbilt (No. 95!), and fell from No. 47 — which was one spot ahead of Missouri, a team Florida beat by 26 points despite four turnovers and a missed field goal — entering last week. If Florida-Georgia were a home game, I’d have no problem giving Florida an 80 percent chance of winning.
- As noted above, a win over Georgia probably gets Florida’s win shares to slightly better than 8.0. But Florida would still need to win at least one of its road games against Arkansas, LSU, and FSU to actually win eight games, and may not be favored in any of them. (It also needs to hold serve against South Carolina, but, uh, South Carolina has scored 84 points this year, and Florida has allowed 72, so I’m not too worried about that one.)
As always, I want to know what your win shares are, too. Please feel free to leave your predictions in the comments of this post.