SFPI NWSL Power Rankings Week ending May 28, 2018

North Carolina found a way to win again, this time in their hardest challenge yet, on the road against 2nd ranked Orlando. They maintain a 9 point lead over Seattle (who has a game in hand) for 2nd place and are 13 points above the playoff line (with a game in hand over 5th place Houston) with 14 games to play. Portland won their second straight, and Sky Blue remained winless on the season.

No real “big winners” this week as Portland swapped places with Utah and Houston traded with Chicago, all for moves of only 1 slot. By points, the biggest winner was North Carolina gaining 1.5864 points, and the biggest loser was Sky Blue FC losing 0.7318 points.

As always a quick reminder of how I arrive at these rankings:

The SFPI has two main Components, “Performance Score,” which is determined 100% by on the field results, and “Strength of Schedule” which takes the average Performance Score of all of a team’s opponents to date, with a mechanism to account for games on the road.

PERFORMANCE SCORE

A team’s Performance Score is made up of the following components:

• Points Per Game (PPG) Score: This takes a team’s overall PPG and adds their PPG over their last five matches with the last five being given more weight. This is the single largest component of the SFPI
• Goal Difference Per Game: Overall goal difference divided by total games played
• Home/Away Bonus: Bonus points are awarded for earning results (W/D) on the road, and an equal number of points are subtracted for dropping results (D/L) at home. Accrues over entire season.

STRENGTH OF SCHEDULE

As stated above, a team’s Strength of Schedule is reached by taking the average performance score of all of a team’s opponents to date. It accounts for road matches by adding a percentage of an opponents Points Per Game at Home to their Performance Score. Teams faced multiple times are counted that amount of times. Weighted at less than 100%

Those combine to give a team’s TOTAL SCORE. Teams are then ranked in order of highest to lowest by Total Score. A negative total score is theoretically possible, although it requires an extended period of very poor play.

FEATURES OF NOTE (Due to me traveling this week, these features will be missing from this weeks rankings)

• Strength of Schedule: How tough is a teams schedule in relation to the rest of the league? numbered 1-9 with 1 being the hardest to date, and 9 being the easiest.
• Remaining Schedule: Same as above, only for games remaining. Also ranked 1-9 where 1 is hardest, 9 is easiest.
• Pace: How many points is a team currently on pace for given their current PPG? Also showing how results for this week impact that pace vs last week.

(Record is in W-L-D format, *Denotes in playoff position)

1 *North Carolina Courage (26pts 8-0-2) Score: 10.6531 (+1.5864) Prev: 1 (NC) High 1 Low 1

2 *Orlando Pride (15pts 4-3-3) Score: 8.4563 (+0.3974) Prev: 2 (NC) High 2 Low 3

3 *Seattle Reign (17pts 5-2-2) Score: 8.2589 (+0.4717) Prev: 3 (NC) High 2 Low 3

4 *Portland Thorns (15pts 10 4-3-3) Score: 6.9561 (+1.1526) Prev: 5 (+1) High 4 Low 5

5 Utah Royals (11pts 2-2-5) Score: 6.3423 (-0.2634) Prev: 4 (-1) High 4 Low 5

6 Houston Dash (13pts 3-4-4) Score: 5.2274 (+1.3606) Prev: 7 (+1) High 6 Low 8

7 Chicago Red Stars (12pts 2-3-6) Score: 4.0139 (-0.5352) Prev: 6 (-1) High 6 Low 7

8 Washington Spirit (8pts 2-6-2) Score: 3.5882 (+0.0794) Prev: 8 High 6 Low 8

9 Sky Blue FC (1pt 0-7-1) Score: 1.3536 (-0.7318) Prev: 9 High 9 Low 9

PREDICTIONS

Last week the SFPI went 4-3 (57.14%) to move to 6-5 (54.55%) on the season. Will keep the same formula 1.5 points added to home score, if within 1 point will be a draw.

North Carolina at Portland: NORTH CAROLINA

Chicago at Washington: WASHINGTON

Utah at Sky Blue: UTAH

North Carolina at Houston: NORTH CAROLINA

Orlando at Seattle: SEATTLE