After reading in @Anwar Richardson's Sunday Pulpit about Sark's record against ranked teams, I decided to look a deeper into it for a little more context and perspective.
Note: The source I used has Sark at 15-30 against ranked teams while Anwar's source shows it at 17-28 but that's really neither here or there in what I looked at.
While Anwar broke down Sark's record against ranked opponent by tiers I approached it from a standpoint of how often Sark's team would have been favored to win against the ranked team he has played. And I think a case can be made that Sark's team has been a clear favorite in only 5 games against ranked opponents with 3 other games being tossups.
In 25 games against ranked opponents where Sark's team was unranked, he has gone 8-17. I'm thinking that's not that bad in games where you are the decided underdog in most, if not all, of them.
In 12 games against ranked opponents where Sark's team was also ranked but ranked lower than the opponent, he has gone 2-10 as an underdog but not a decided underdog. Not so good here.
In 3 games in which both the opponent and Sark's team were pretty equally ranked, Sark is 1-2 in games where it's virtually a tossup. He won by 3 and lost by 3 at USC with the other loss by 6 in last's years playoff game against Washington. That's more on the bad side than good side but I don't know that I would put it in the terrible category.
In only 5 games in his coaching career has Sark's team been the higher ranked team and pretty much a decided favorite. His record in those games is 4-1. I would say that's pretty good.
Note: The source I used has Sark at 15-30 against ranked teams while Anwar's source shows it at 17-28 but that's really neither here or there in what I looked at.
While Anwar broke down Sark's record against ranked opponent by tiers I approached it from a standpoint of how often Sark's team would have been favored to win against the ranked team he has played. And I think a case can be made that Sark's team has been a clear favorite in only 5 games against ranked opponents with 3 other games being tossups.
In 25 games against ranked opponents where Sark's team was unranked, he has gone 8-17. I'm thinking that's not that bad in games where you are the decided underdog in most, if not all, of them.
In 12 games against ranked opponents where Sark's team was also ranked but ranked lower than the opponent, he has gone 2-10 as an underdog but not a decided underdog. Not so good here.
In 3 games in which both the opponent and Sark's team were pretty equally ranked, Sark is 1-2 in games where it's virtually a tossup. He won by 3 and lost by 3 at USC with the other loss by 6 in last's years playoff game against Washington. That's more on the bad side than good side but I don't know that I would put it in the terrible category.
In only 5 games in his coaching career has Sark's team been the higher ranked team and pretty much a decided favorite. His record in those games is 4-1. I would say that's pretty good.
