ever since they added sos to team history, i've wanted to go back and see how my lone undefeated season stacked up with the competition. it seems reasonable to rank undefeated seasons by SOS and by # of away games, although right now i'm just going by sos first and then away games (home/away does not impact SOS ever, and not even rpi when you are undefeated or lost all your games). maybe a better heuristic could be used? seems like 10 away vs 10 home is worth a lot more than 1 rank on the sos list. regardless, i was wondering how those undefeated seasons looked - are most against gimpy schedules? how many are against the #1 sos? this data was not available until seble recently (in my timeline, which might mean a year or two ago, i can't remember) added SOS to the team history page. i never was big into records, only about championships in those days, and generally played in tough conferences with tough non conferences. but there is undoubtedly something appealing about that pretty 35-0 to end the season :) there was never a time when an undefeated champion would be anything but 35-0, was there? (asking the old old timers there, it was 35-0 when i started).

anyway i figured it would be interesting. 167 undefeated seasons in HD history - if this program is worth a damn! that could go either way. i wrote the original dynasty lists several years ago over 3 late nights with lots of booze, but i haven't been drinking much lately and can't make sense of programs i wrote drunk without at least a couple drinks. or more accurately, i don't have the patience - no documentation, and zero recollection - makes for a tough reintroduction :) so finally, i had a few and took the plunge. have one error which is hopefully going to be resolved on this next run... just impatiently waiting now i suppose. will post in a few. possibly will run the rest of the dynasty rankings too, its been a long time... 167 undefeated seasons. is that a lot? theres about 75 seasons per world, i guess with 30 divisions, thats 2250 national championships in HD history. damn, thats a lot! 167 undefeated seasons is about 7.5% of all championship seasons. i guess i can buy that, maybe the damn program works after all?

edit: uhg, i am an idiot... i ran the wrong version of the program, so it just spent a couple hours mining the data without parsing the damn SOS :/ i have to re-mine the whole thing. hopefully WIS doesn't get mad about the extra ten thousand page requests im throwing at them right now in prime time... probably will be like 2 hours now before the damn thing finishes :( 

Rank, Team Name, World, Season, Coach, SoS, Away Games
0 S. Illinois, Edwardsville 8 56 coach_billyg 1 18
1 S. New Hampshire 6 27 daalter 1 17
2 Longwood 5 19 bbunch 1 15
3 Millsaps 3 1 brianxavier 1 14
4 Salve Regina 3 66 justwerty 1 14
5 LeTourneau 7 16 plane129 1 14
6 Sonoma St. 7 4 bbunch 1 13
7 E. Mennonite 1 69 rarlinghaus 1 13
8 Wisconsin, Parkside 10 48 cubs171717 1 12
9 CSU, San Bernardino 4 21 smw1763 1 11
10 S. New Hampshire 6 30 daalter 2 18
11 Missouri S&T 6 41 hutchbrett 2 14
12 Hamline 3 68 losbravos 2 14
13 Texas, Dallas 5 22 bunkerbuster 2 14
14 Palm Beach Atlantic 10 32 chapelhillne 2 14
15 Bowie St. 3 19 alblack56 2 13
16 E. Oregon 1 52 lostmyth2 2 13
17 Roanoke 3 63 grrr77 2 13
18 Westminster (MO) 10 40 aejones 2 13
19 Oakland City 3 69 weasel65 2 12
20 Lynchburg 3 73 pasdabru 2 12
21 LIU, CW Post 8 15 jwinner5 3 17
22 UNC 9 51 lostmyth2 3 16
23 Thomas 2 28 adambrag 3 16
24 Wisconsin, Platteville 7 10 platoisek 3 16
25 Texas 1 6 johnsensing 3 15
26 Johnson and Wales 3 14 spasticity 3 15
27 Maryville 7 7 tarvolon 3 14
28 Quincy 2 1 jmorgalis 3 13
29 St. Johns 3 17 jake_marley 3 11
30 Hamline 2 18 ike1024 4 15
31 Johnson St. 1 68 ua_dk 4 14
32 DeSales 3 71 sac_lambs 4 14
33 Bethany 6 28 kraljmeister 4 14
34 Oregon St. 4 6 waynedrayer 4 13
35 Ashland 10 32 mikesons1973 4 13
36 E. Oregon 1 64 godmaker 4 13
37 Texas, Dallas 5 14 bunkerbuster 4 13
38 Kentucky Wesleyan 2 10 cjwolf 5 18
39 Hamline 8 1 piman314 5 18
40 N. Florida 2 0 oldman_sons 5 16
41 Bluefield St. 4 10 kypride 5 14
42 LIU, CW Post 10 3 trophaeum 5 14
43 Palm Beach Atlantic 10 29 chapelhillne 5 14
44 Dallas 7 15 windixies 5 13
45 U. of New England 2 69 kilukt 5 12
46 Moravian 3 72 gdawg5886 5 12
47 E. Oregon 1 53 lostmyth2 6 18
48 Milwaukee Engineering 9 36 benwf 6 15
49 Mount Olive 7 0 devilowl14 6 14
50 Maine Maritime Academy 6 24 jazzcog 6 14
51 Maryville 7 1 tarvolon 6 14
52 Midwestern St. 7 37 shucky 6 13
53 Lawrence 9 59 gbous314 6 13
54 Michigan Tech. 2 26 jetsonsa 7 17
55 Yeshiva 10 8 yanks250125 7 17
56 Beloit 2 20 xulapaul 7 16
57 Lewis 8 26 storm71 7 14
58 Penn St. Altoona 3 17 frankgrimes1 7 14
59 DeSales 4 69 pianoman1012 7 14
60 Shippensburg U. 9 29 cjwolf 7 13
61 Wisconsin, Stout 10 38 pumphead 7 13
62 SUNY New Paltz 2 57 blakesdad 7 11
63 Wisconsin, Superior 3 23 rockafe11a 8 16
64 Dickinson 6 6 mfnmyers 8 16
65 W. Connecticut St. 8 78 ryan75 8 16
66 Queens 1 12 bow2dacowz 8 14
67 St. Lawrence 1 70 meany27 8 13
68 Johns Hopkins 2 71 bluedog129 8 13
69 California Tech. 3 69 bluedog129 8 13
70 Anna Maria 6 25 HalfAstros 8 13
71 Suffolk 4 21 kkyutzy 8 12
72 Michigan St. 7 2 oldman 9 18
73 Angelo St. 10 23 ledfoot 9 18
74 St. Bonaventure 5 27 lostmyth2 9 17
75 Pacific Lutheran 4 2 bleedblue25 9 17
76 Westminster (MO) 10 0 aejones 9 16
77 Lander 6 36 mpollon 9 15
78 Abilene Christian 3 48 nacronin 9 14
79 Midwestern St. 9 23 sharrow 9 14
80 Coastal Carolina 10 65 lostmyth2 9 13
81 Lees-McRae 8 13 platoisek 9 13
82 S. Vermont 3 59 conman1 9 12
83 Defiance 3 13 carl3298 9 8
84 Manchester 9 2 mattster24 10 18
85 Armstrong Atlantic St. 10 11 blapo21 10 14
86 S. New Hampshire 6 42 livermore 10 13
87 Rivier 3 51 drubrally 10 13
88 Augustana (IL) 10 2 Kevutz 10 13
89 St. Thomas 10 18 curtismc 11 16
90 Howard Payne 8 53 gillispie1 11 14
91 Louisiana St. 10 19 mmt0315 12 15
92 Oregon St. 4 8 waynedrayer 12 14
93 S. Mississippi 1 47 oldresorter 12 10
94 Angelo St. 10 27 ledfoot 13 16
95 U. of DC 10 12 rogelio 13 15
96 Washington Adventist 8 11 kcwizards 13 13
97 Wilkes 6 61 bmill237 13 13
98 Greensboro 8 43 narcotico 13 13
99 Livingstone 10 17 treyomo 14 17
100 Beloit 2 24 xulapaul 14 15
101 Texas A&M 7 23 roguedog 14 14
102 W. Chester (PA) 8 79 Rails 14 12
103 Texas A&M 5 3 lwbraun 15 17
104 Michigan St. 7 6 oldman 15 16
105 Findlay 6 9 hogstench 15 16
106 Texas, Dallas 5 18 bunkerbuster 15 14
107 St. Thomas 10 26 curtismc 15 14
108 St. Johns 3 20 jake_marley 15 12
109 Roanoke 3 55 cashew 16 11
110 Arizona St. 9 50 jerkstore33 17 17
111 Bridgewater St. 7 17 duece_duece 17 16
112 California U. (PA) 2 13 sergei1991 17 15
113 Arkansas, Monticello 7 2 spookg 17 14
114 Hanover 8 26 bhizzy04 17 14
115 Midwestern St. 10 2 sniperx 17 13
116 S. Illinois, Edwardsville 4 12 gambler62245 17 12
117 Becker 9 46 carlbuzz 17 12
118 Le Moyne 3 45 zhawks 19 14
119 San Francisco St. 4 16 paland 20 16
120 Wisconsin, Stout 10 3 pumphead 20 13
121 UNC 10 39 lostmyth2 20 9
122 Ripon 3 24 tianyi7886 21 15
123 Marietta 5 1 whitechoco 21 12
124 Bloomsburg U. (PA) 8 37 fussyd 21 10
125 Kentucky 4 1 cimmy426 22 14
126 W. New England 8 60 coachyutzy 22 11
127 Occidental 4 20 deweycox 23 17
128 Findlay 8 9 bro_lunardi 24 18
129 S. Vermont 9 14 irrev0cable 24 14
130 Methodist 6 7 zwatts82 24 13
131 Drew 8 25 tianyi7886 25 17
132 U. of DC 6 15 penskefile 25 13
133 St. Rose 1 60 chovy24 26 13
134 Illinois 1 10 lwbraun 27 17
135 Wisconsin, Stevens Point 10 7 ricosuave21 27 13
136 Linfield 9 51 alliem605 28 12
137 Illinois 1 7 lwbraun 32 17
138 Texas A&M 5 24 mpollon 32 13
139 St. Bonaventure 5 18 bubbakincaid 33 18
140 Utah 1 73 Sim AI 33 13
141 SUNY, Maritime College 4 19 jana23 33 13
142 Monmouth 7 38 fredpaull 33 11
143 W. Connecticut St. 8 89 oldresorter 33 8
144 DePauw 9 7 sol_phenom3 34 14
145 Millsaps 9 12 ericksonp 38 13
146 Maranatha Baptist Bible 8 66 palewhiteboy 39 13
147 Texas, Tyler 10 22 acroth2 40 13
148 W. Chester (PA) 8 22 meeper123 41 13
149 Yeshiva 1 9 j1013 41 11
150 Manhattan 8 78 acn24 42 13
151 CSU, Chico 5 21 twiddlebug 45 13
152 Abilene Christian 1 0 bow2dacowz 46 12
153 La Grange 4 62 shawnyboy_us 48 14
154 Lakeland 5 59 oldresorter 50 14
155 California U. (PA) 2 15 sergei1991 50 12
156 Rose-Hulman Tech. 1 21 barjaz 50 12
157 Arcadia 6 44 arborius 55 12
158 Anderson 2 55 camrun 57 13
159 Florida A&M 8 74 opshutdown34 57 12
160 Shaw 3 26 dacj501 60 15
161 SUNY Fredonia 4 12 coach_ludlow 62 14
162 Piedmont 6 26 jh00 65 13
163 Concord 4 57 blindwillie 93 13
164 E. Connecticut St. 4 71 CinCityRed 109 13
165 Cabrini 8 69 pnedwek 112 12
166 Fort Valley St. 8 28 mchristman 150 18

I would suspect that most 35-0s have pretty solid SOS, because you've at least played good teams in the NT. I've done it twice, with top ten SOS both times. 

My 35-0s have not been my best teams though. One of them might've been my second-best team, but my first 35-0 team (with SOS of 3) is probably not even in the top five. Most of my top five failed to win championships, and my best team ever didn't win it all. 

Anything that updates the dynasty rankings would be awesome in my book! I've been itching for an update for a LONG time to see where my past and current streaks are looking in the total context. Cross world comparisons within HD is about the coolest thing in the game and it's been too long since they last came out. Thank you!!!

To echo tarv's thought though, if I could see the 10 best teams I've ever had, maybe 3 or 4 of them actually won the title. It's just such a crapshoot. I also find SOS by itself to be a completely worthless end of season stat. If whatif somehow gave you access to final numerical RPI numbers that would probably be much more valuable.

Gill, have you ran across anyone who had to play the 11th non-con game and still ran the table, thus finishing 36-0?  I've often wondered if anyone had ever done that but was just too lazy to look.

I remember in Rupp many seasons ago that there was a very strong, highly ranked team who had the extra game and the coach (and for what it's worth, several others including myslef) thought that he might be able to pull off the feat.  Unfortunately, he lost a game late in regular season play and then got bounced fairly early in the NT (I'm thinking like 2nd round or Sweet Sixteen), so he fell way, way short.  Don't know of anyone else who was in the situation of having the extra game PLUS having a badass team capable of winning the NT, but THAT would be really cool to have (possibly) the only 36-0 season in HD history!!

Posted by jsajsa on 8/21/2014 10:23:00 PM (view original):
Anything that updates the dynasty rankings would be awesome in my book! I've been itching for an update for a LONG time to see where my past and current streaks are looking in the total context. Cross world comparisons within HD is about the coolest thing in the game and it's been too long since they last came out. Thank you!!!

To echo tarv's thought though, if I could see the 10 best teams I've ever had, maybe 3 or 4 of them actually won the title. It's just such a crapshoot. I also find SOS by itself to be a completely worthless end of season stat. If whatif somehow gave you access to final numerical RPI numbers that would probably be much more valuable.

agreed... rpi numbers would be better. but at least sos/away games is something? strangely, i never cared for 35-0, i had some really good teams and would lose regular season games because i scheduled so hard or played young players early to optimize for the NT. but my one 35-0 team was actually my best ever... good for 3 straight and the #1 spot on the d2 rpi list. i don't have a "undefeated seasons by coach" part of the program but always wondered who had the most, i know of a couple coaches with multiple but not many. definitely not me on that front, but its a pretty cool accomplishment, wonder if anyone has like 5? ill run the dynasty lists later when the thing is mined and such.

Posted by emy1013 on 8/21/2014 10:26:00 PM (view original):
Gill, have you ran across anyone who had to play the 11th non-con game and still ran the table, thus finishing 36-0?  I've often wondered if anyone had ever done that but was just too lazy to look.

I remember in Rupp many seasons ago that there was a very strong, highly ranked team who had the extra game and the coach (and for what it's worth, several others including myslef) thought that he might be able to pull off the feat.  Unfortunately, he lost a game late in regular season play and then got bounced fairly early in the NT (I'm thinking like 2nd round or Sweet Sixteen), so he fell way, way short.  Don't know of anyone else who was in the situation of having the extra game PLUS having a badass team capable of winning the NT, but THAT would be really cool to have (possibly) the only 36-0 season in HD history!!

ohh... very interesting. this is a sign of the last several hours... stupidly, the undefeated check looks for 35 wins, not 0 losses. why the hell didn't i do 0 losses? its in the same spot as number of wins. uhg. ill definitely re-run (the re run is only a couple mins) after the data mining finishes to catch the possible 36-0. 

Posted by jsajsa on 8/21/2014 10:23:00 PM (view original):
Anything that updates the dynasty rankings would be awesome in my book! I've been itching for an update for a LONG time to see where my past and current streaks are looking in the total context. Cross world comparisons within HD is about the coolest thing in the game and it's been too long since they last came out. Thank you!!!

To echo tarv's thought though, if I could see the 10 best teams I've ever had, maybe 3 or 4 of them actually won the title. It's just such a crapshoot. I also find SOS by itself to be a completely worthless end of season stat. If whatif somehow gave you access to final numerical RPI numbers that would probably be much more valuable.

I would tend to agree with both you and Gill that just because a team finished 35-0 doesn't "necessarily" make it the "best" team that season.  Sure they were the team that ended up with the best results, but that doesn't necessarily mean that there weren't teams that season that weren't stronger than them, if that makes sense.  (***Edit***, after rambling a bit, in the third paragraph I think I explain my position a bit clearer.  The undefeated team was obviously the best team that year, that's why they had a perfect record.  But perhaps another team was "stronger" and just suffered an inexplicable, "the RNG was against you tonight no matter what you did" loss.  Semantics, maybe).

(Be forwarned, this is me patting myself on the back, but only just a bit) I've had 19 teams that won titles (I know there are coaches with more titles, but the list is fairly short.  Back patting over).  Oddly enough, I've yet to have a 35-0 team.  Several 1 loss teams (probably 20+, although obviously all of those didn't win titles.  Those teams include runner-up, FF, E8, S16 eliminations, etc).  Always, always took that one or two losses somewhere before the NT (and some of those were very inexplicable losses, but I digress).  The point I'm trying to make through all of this rambling and what you and Gill have somewhat agreed with is that I have had 34-1 or 33-2, 32-3 teams (you get the picture) that I believe to have been significantly stronger than some of the 35-0 teams I've seen.  Significant enough to the point that I would have felt "very" comfortable playing and expecting to dominate (to be quite frank) those 35-0 teams.

Not trying to be the contrarian here, hell a 35-0 team is badass and one of the goals in HD I'm still trying to achieve.  Just saying that we'd have to be careful about annointing one of those teams the "best" ever (even if it is a rather distinct possibility that one of those teams IS, in fact, the best ever).  Of course, I guess to be considered for the title of "best" ever, a team would really HAVE to have an unblemished record.  Maybe what I'm trying to explain would fall more under the "strongest" team ever category?  Make sense or have I totally confused everyone?  Ramble over, I think I may have confused myself.

emy, thats why i called it greatest individual seasons ever, not best teams ever :) no denying you are out of the running for best individual season if you didn't win the big game. undefeated probably really isn't greatest individual either, those top RPI teams on confused's best rpi thread are probably better. just one more way to slice it :)

summary: sorry for the insanely ugly formatting :O
10 teams went 35-0 on the #1 sos. thats pretty many! 133 of 167 had top 25 SOSs. that is VERY surprising to me. i guess the folks who schedule soft aren't usually the folks utterly killing it, but i didn't think it would be to that extent! 

lostmyth had SIX undefeated seasons. he scheduled pretty soft from what i saw but apparently not THAT soft. i don't see anyone in the list who has more than lostmyth, pretty crazy, 6 times.

only one team had the 35-0 #1 sos with a 10 game road non conference, my SIUE team that lead into the 3peat. daalter pulled #1 sos with 9 road games and nobody else had more than 7 road games. daalter is also the only other top 4 SOS team with 10 non conf road games. that is attempting to play to the "who went 35-0 on the hardest schedule" thing. there is huge variance within #1 sos, so really the numbers would be a lot better, but sadly, don't have them!

funnily, emy's comment caused one team to be removed from the list. not sure who it is but apparently someone had an 11 non conf and ended 35-1. 

hmm... some of the seasons listed there are right, some are wrong. i wonder wtf is up with that. the wrong season i noticed was a legit 35-0 title season, with the right coach and world. so maybe just half ignore the season until i figure that out...

edit: ok i take that back, ALL the seasons are wrong. i took the number off the wrong end... that is really the # of seasons since the accomplishment at the time the things were run. ill probably fix that later. so if it says season 5, it means 5 seasons ago, which is roughly season 69 in most worlds.

Posted by gillispie1 on 8/22/2014 12:20:00 AM (view original):
emy, thats why i called it greatest individual seasons ever, not best teams ever :) no denying you are out of the running for best individual season if you didn't win the big game. undefeated probably really isn't greatest individual either, those top RPI teams on confused's best rpi thread are probably better. just one more way to slice it :)

Yeah, I guess in my mind I just blended them to be one and the same.  Certainly a difference between the two and a large one in some cases.

Agree with you guys, emy and gilllispie. 35-0 is a very nice achievement and should be applauded. It's nice to do, but as someone who plays in some ridiculous conferences and rarely uses my best lineup until the NT, it's not something I go into a season especially trying to accomplish.

Great work. Do you have a breakdown of number of undefeated seasons by division?