Where will the wins come from?
ESPN’s Football Power Index forecast for Arizona football is bleak to say the least.
FPI projects the Wildcats to go 3-9 in 2021 but gives Arizona a favorable win probability in only one game — against NAU.
As a refresher, FPI is a metric that represents how many points above or below average a team is. FPI runs 20,000 simulations factoring in past performances, primarily using the expected points added metric, which relies on yards, turnovers, red zone efficiency and other factors.
Arizona’s -8.0 FPI is worst among the Pac-12 and is 98th in all of FBS.
Here are the FPI win probabilities for each game on the Wildcats’ schedule:
- vs. BYU (19.1%)
- vs. SDSU (39.6%)
- vs. NAU (92.0%)
- at Oregon (4.5%)
- vs. UCLA (18.6%)
- at Colorado (16.3%)
- vs. Washington (16.3%)
- at USC (6.9%)
- vs. Cal (37.8%)
- vs. Utah (16.1%)
- at Washington State (21.3%)
- at ASU (9.4%)
Outside of NAU, Arizona’s best chances to pick up wins according to FPI are against SDSU and Cal, both homes games.
Surprisingly, FPI gives UA the same chance to beat Colorado on the road as No. 20 Washington at home, even though the Huskies are clearly a better team entering the season.
If Arizona wins more than three games on this schedule, the Wildcats will have vastly exceeded expectations this season. Then again, there are as good if not better odds that Arizona falls short of three victories.