TNG 2023 Class 6A Week 8 Recap
See how the model did, review the top results of the week, and see the new Top 50
Week 8 was a wild one, with a number of massive results altering the course of district races as well as some truly impressive performances from teams heating up as we get closer to the playoffs. We’ll take you through all of the significant action below in today’s newsletter.
Model Performance
The model had a great week, despite the fact that there were a significant number of impactful upsets. The model correctly picked 82.9% of the winners this week, which is fantastic on its own, but even better when we compare it to our normal Week 8 performance, which is around 80%, historically.
The model went 7-3 in Top 10 featured games of the week, which you can see in the table below, but it went just 12-8 in the incredibly difficult set of games chosen for last week’s Pick ‘Em contest.
Looking at the entire season to-date, we’re correctly picking 79% of all games featuring 6A teams, and if we use the CalPreps’ standard of not counting results until 9/15 forward, we’re at 83.9%, so we are absolutely thrilled with how the model is holding up this year after some significant offseason tweaks.
Looking back at the Top 10 Games of Week 7
Biggest Upsets of the Week
We know there are going to be significant upsets every week, but it’s always interesting to see where they occur. The table below shows the biggest model surprises of the week.
Week in Review - Notable Results Around the State
Region 1:
Midland 38-28 over Frenship, was 13pt underdog, 20% to win - Dawgs prove their 6-0 start was no fluke. They are the only 2-6A squad allowing less than 40 ppg through 2 district games!? Can they ride that D to a district crown?
Odessa Permian 32-31 over Midland Legacy, was 22pt underdog, 9% to win - Permian needed an upset win after dropping the opener to Odessa last week and they got it! Only problem is that they’re on track for a tie with Odessa unless they grab another model “upset” win along the way.
Odessa 71-70 (OT) over San Angelo, was 19pt fav, 88% to win - The Bronchos are certainly high on entertainment value this year, wow! They follow up their district-altering win over Permian last week with a must-have victory over Central to keep on track for the playoffs.
Hurst Bell 29-27 over Boswell, was 11pt underdog, 24% to win - Bell gets an enormous win which keeps their playoff hopes alive, but they’ll probably have to beat Trinity in Week 11 to get in though because, even a potential 3-way tie between Bell, Boswell, and Weatherford isn’t going to break in their favor since they lost to Weatherford by 5 and only beat Boswell by 2.
Byron Nelson 67-3 over Keller, was 9pt fav, 72% to win - ok then Bobcats…sheesh. What a performance! Byron Nelson had only faced one team with an Elo over 1500 before this game, so it was hard to know just how good they were. If this result is any indication, Week 10 vs SLC could be a classic.
Timber Creek 52-27 over Northwest Eaton, was 4pt underdog, 41% to win - Timber Creek looks to be headed back to the playoffs with this impressive win. Eaton is left needing a win over Byron Nelson or SLC to get in.
Allen 31-7 over McKinney, was 1pt underdog, 47% to win - The reports of Allen’s demise appear to have been premature. Great performance by the Eagles on both sides of the ball, dominating an incredibly gifted, physical opponent. Allen has Guyer and Prosper the next two weeks and they are rolling, posting a +16 AOS and -22 ADS in their last 4 games…those are State Top 10 numbers.
Flower Mound 21-14 over Lewisville Hebron, was 10pt underdog, 27% to win - 6-6A has been wild all year and this result puts us on a path for a 3-way tie for 4th between Plano East, Hebron, and Flower Mound in which East comes out on top. Flower Mound would need to beat Coppell in Week 10 to get clear of the tiebreaker, but at least they’ve given themselves a shot.
Region 2:
Tyler Legacy 10-7 over Mesquite Horn, was 13pt underdog, 21% to win - Legacy may have just knocked Horn out of the playoffs and put themselves in! Legacy can likely get in with either a win over Royse City next week or a win over North Forney in Week 10. Horn will have to beat Heath and Royse City and hope Legacy loses out.
Hutto 52-31 over Temple, was 4pt fav, 59% to win - Hippos are officially back in the playoff hunt and now control their own destiny. A win over Bryan in Week 10 will get them in if they take care of Cove this week.
Tomball Memorial 27-21 over Tomball, was <1 pt fav, 51% to win - we expected a great game in a great atmosphere and this game delivered on both. Really nice bounce-back win for the Wildcats which should lock up the top D2 seed in the district.
Bridgeland 42-17 over Cy Ranch, was 4pt fav, 60% to win - a great performance from Bridgeland puts them in the driver’s seat on the road to the district title. Cy Ranch is still in good shape for the playoffs, despite the loss.
Cy Falls 24-17 over Cy Woods, was 7pt fav, 67% to win - massive result for Falls, giving them a crucial head-to-head advantage over their closest challenger for the final playoff spot, but both teams have winnable games in which they’re underdogs in the final weeks, so this race is far from over.
Region 3:
Katy Taylor 31-7 over Mayde Creek, was 7pt fav, 67% to win - Taylor is now one win away from a playoff spot after beating a Mayde Creek team that was still in the playoff race. The win pushes Taylor’s playoff odds to 80%+, which are consequently now Katy’s odds to go D1.
Dawson 21-7 over Pearland, was 9pt underdog, 28% to win - Dawson has now won 4 straight after losing their first 3. Keeping this Pearland offense to 7 points is a huge feat and bodes well for Dawson going forward. Dawson has Shadow Creek this week for the district title.
Strake Jesuit 24-15 over Alief Taylor, was 8 pt underdog, 31% to win - The Crusaders played themselves into a playoff spot with this win as long as they beat Hastings this week, which would knock Alief Taylor out and would shift Shadow Creek to D1. That means we’d have all 8 Region 3 projected district champs and 3 2nd place finishers all heading to the Region 3 D1 bracket.
Region 4:
Stony Point 7-0 over Vista Ridge, was 19pt underdog, 12% to win - Well, so much for any hope of clarity in 25-6A! This result has all but assured that the final playoff spots and the D1/D2 status for Vandegrift will come down to the final weekend. The win puts Stony Point in position to control their destiny, with their remaining 3 games all projected to be decided by 7pts or less against three of their challengers for the final two playoff spots behind Vandegrift and Round Rock.
Westlake 27-14 over Dripping Springs, was 21pt fav, 90% to win - tight first half with Drip taking two leads and Westlake answering. The Chaps scored right out of half then later returned a blocked punt for TD to put the game out of reach. That was the second Westlake TD on the night setup by their punt return unit; it’s unbelievable how dominant Westlake’s special teams continue to be, even on a night where they had kicking issues.
Austin Bowie 21-16 over Buda Johnson, was 1pt underdog, 47% to win - Bowie came out on top in an absolute brawl, surely securing their playoff spot and knocking Johnson out of the race, barring something completely unforeseen.
SA Reagan 41-27 over SA Johnson - Cole Pryor’s 4 rushing TDs led the Rattlers past the Jags to take control of the district title race. The win gives Reagan two in a row over their rivals after the teams had traded wins each year since 2016.
With all of the above playing out, how did it affect the new Top 50?
Week 8 Top 50
There was no significant movement of note in Top 17, as those teams largely did what was expected of them.
Byron Nelson moved up to #18 from #26 with their dominant win over Keller, while Allen moved up 11 spots to #21 with their 31-7 win over McKinney. San Antonio Reagan moved up 6 spots to #36 after defeating Johnson.
Pearland Dawson made a huge jump of 21 spots, up to #41, thanks to their surprising and convincing win over Pearland.
As we often say, think of these as more or less approximations and less as being discrete definitive rankings of each team. Pay close attention to the Elo ratings out to the right and note how close or how far apart those are from teams nearby to get a sense of the tiering of the teams. And yes, some teams that lost are still above teams that beat them…we will see that throughout the year. It’s a feature of the Elo system that can be a little off-putting, even to us, but the system doesn’t try to overreact by design, which can sometimes lead to obvious underreactions. On the whole, it works really well, but it can break down a bit on too much scrutiny of individual, specific cases in a specific point in time.
Full Scoreboard
And, with all of that covered, check below for every result in the state this weekend!