Getting the most out of Billingsley’s Encyclopedia

This encyclopedia contains every aspect of my research on college football, including conference standings, a comparison of the strength between every conference for every year, complete final rankings and bowl games. But without a doubt, the core of the encyclopedia will always be the All-Time Schedules and Scores. The presentation of this section took more programming time than everything else combined. I tried to include everything here that holds an interest to me as a fan. In this section you will find a one of a kind list of the top all time performances of every program.....a list sure to create more interest (and perhaps more controversy) than any data in the Billingsley Report. Keep in mind these lists were not compiled and sorted solely by wins and losses, rather by rating values derived from a combination of wins and losses relative to strength of schedule. Side by side you will also find another all time list, this one of the top 5 most difficult schedules each team ever played.

Each team’s home page gives a fan the opportunity to trace that team’s rating history all the way back to their very first game. Season by season, game by game you will find the date and site of the game, the team and opponent rankings on game day (AP, Coaches, and Billingsley), and the won, lost, tied records of both team and opponent on the day the game was played. The score of the game and a projected point spread of every game are also included. I do not approve of gambling and these projections have nothing to do with gambling, they are merely an interesting, fun glimpse of how the Billingsley Report expected two teams to perform against one another on game day.... if both teams played up to their highest potential .

One of the greatest features in this section is the “mouse over” ability on several fields, like the site of the game (in case of a neutral site), or the footnote field (Ftn). If you see a trophy icon, mouse over to reveal the bowl game in which the two teams met. Most importantly, click on the link to any opponent to reveal the series history between the two teams.

Originally the Billingsley Report used margin of victory in it’s calculations, but in 2002, after much deliberation and agreement with the BCS, margin of victory was completely removed. In order to make the ratings comparable from one season to another, I re-ran the entire history of college football through the new formula. Those results are what you see recorded in the encyclopedia and are actually my preferred rankings. They are the rankings used by the BCS. The rankings recorded in the encyclopedia are what would have been turned over to the BCS if it had existed previous to 1998. The #1 and #2 teams in the Final BCS Standings have agreed with the Billingsley Report 12 out of 14 years.

In the re-calculation from one system to the other there were only 11 instances where the National Champion changed from one team to another (out of 142 seasons). Both selections are valid National Champions in the Billingsley Report and notations have been made in the Final Rankings Section in the following seasons:

1911: Billingsley- Minnesota Billingsley MOV- Princeton

1913: Billingsley-Chicago  Billingsley MOV- Auburn

1914: Billingsley- Illinois  Billingsley MOV- Texas

1915: Billingsley- Minnesota   Billingsley- Oklahoma

1916: Billingsley- Georgia Tech  Billingsley MOV- Pittsburgh

1919: Billingsley- Illinois  Billingsley MOV- Texas A&M

1921: Billingsley- Iowa  Billingsley MOV- California

1922: Billingsley- Iowa  Billingsley MOV- California

1944: Billingsley- Ohio State  Billingsley MOV- Army

1976: Billingsley- Pittsburgh  Billingsley MOV- Southern Cal

1997 Billingsley- Michigan   Billingsley MOV- Nebraska

Richard Billingsley