It's worth noting upfront the ratings do not consider any of this information. At this point, they are based purely on the historical performance of the teams, with more recent seasons carrying exponentially more weight. As the season progresses, the weight of each team's historical performance will decrease to eventually become negligible, leaving the on-field results as the primary factor in a team's rating.

Please note this is not an apology for the ratings of Colquitt County, Grayson, or any other team. They have their proper rating based on their historical performance, which is the best indicator of future performance. I am underscoring that I make no attempt to subjectively deduct or add points for any other factors outside of historical performance. While these other considerations are appropriate for subjective polls, they are not appropriate for a quantitative analysis. I can quantitatively demonstrate that Colquitt County and Grayson should be rated where they are. I cannot make a quantitative judgment on whether Mickey Conn leaving and Jeff Herron arriving will make Grayson better or worse. The season will tell us and the ratings will adjust appropriately.

- This year, the slot normally reserved for the fourth place team in Region 1-AAAAAAA will be an At-Large bid, given to the highest rated team between the fourth place Region 1-AAAAAAA team and the fifth placed teams in the remaining regions.

According to the season simulator, here are the regions to most likely receive the At-Large bid:

1 - AAAAAAA 67.8%

4 - AAAAAAA 8.9%

6 - AAAAAAA 7.5%

3 - AAAAAAA 8.0%

8 - AAAAAAA 4.2%

2 - AAAAAAA 1.3%

5 - AAAAAAA 1.9%

7 - AAAAAAA 0.5%

And here are the top teams most likely to receive the At-Large bid:

1 - AAAAAAA 47.4% Tift County

1 - AAAAAAA 11.2% Camden County

1 - AAAAAAA 9.0% Lowndes

4 - AAAAAAA 4.0% Lassiter

6 - AAAAAAA 3.5% Mountain View

3 - AAAAAAA 2.8% North Paulding

3 - AAAAAAA 2.2% Marietta

8 - AAAAAAA 1.9% Newton

6 - AAAAAAA 1.7% Collins Hill

3 - AAAAAAA 1.6% North Cobb

Maxwell GHSA Football Ratings

As this season's games are played, the Maxwell Ratings will be based on a modified logistic regression of the current football season's results in combination with each team's historical performance. More recent games and games against similarly rated opponents carry more weight and the weight of each team's historical performance diminishes as the team's season progresses.

The current total weight of all team's historical performance is 100.00%.

For the current season, the ratings accurately account for the winner of 0 of 0 total games including 0 tie(s) (--.--%) and accurately reflect approximately 68.3% of all game margins within --.-- points.

The ratings are scaled so that 100.00 is the rating required to win 91.5% of all games in an infinite round robin tournament against all teams in the highest classification. The schedule strength is the rating required to win 50% of all games in an infinite round robin tournament against a particular team's opponents.

All data is courtesy of the Georgia High School Football Historians Association.

The Maxwell Ratings are a regular feature of Georgia High School Football Daily, a free e-mail newsletter. To join the mailing list, click here.

Visit the Maxwell Ratings for more ratings and information, including Maxwell's Georgia High School Football Archive.

Home Advantage: 1.50

By Class

All-Class

Classification rankings are shown in [brackets]. Each team links to its page at the Georgia High School Football Historians Association. Please submit errors or omissions through their forums.

Regions

Each region is shown with its “Competitive Rating”, which is the rating required to win 80% of all games against the region’s teams in an infinite round robin competition, and its “Average Rating”, which is the rating required to win 50% of all games against the region’s teams in an infinite round robin competition.

Least Likely Results

These are the least likely results of the season using the ratings above. These may change as the season progresses. Each row shows the game data, the difference in the teams after accounting for the home advantage, the expected winning percentage of the favored team, and the likelihood of the on-field result.

Highest Rated Matchups

These are the highest rated matchups of the season using the ratings above. The game rating is the rating required to win 50% of all games in an infinite round robin competition against the expected rating of the loser of the game, which favors games with highly rated and closely matched opponents. These may change as the season progresses. Each row shows the game rating, the game data, the difference in the teams after accounting for the home advantage, and the expected winning percentage of the favored team.