Fans and reporters were not pleased after PSU’s loss to Michigan.
After Penn State fell to Michigan 24-15 last Saturday, a reporter questioned James Franklin on his two-point conversion attempt in a now-viral video.
The situation was this: Penn State just scored a touchdown and was down 9, with 1:59 remaining in the game. They opted to go for it, lined up in what we can all agree was a questionable formation, and the attempt failed.
The counter-argument to the go-for-two decision boiled down to this:
“If you kick the extra point, you’re down 8 and your team is still in it. Down 9 with 1:59 left, you’re done.”
So there are a few issues with this argument:
- The assumption that the game is over down 9 with 1:59 left is wrong. There’s about a 1% chance that you can win (based on NFL data) in that situation. If PSU held Michigan to a three-and-out on the next drive, they could have gotten the ball back with about a minute left.
- If you’re down 8 (and you score again), you still need to go for two. So unless you think your team will magically be better at 2-point conversions next time, there’s no difference. (Penn State is 0-3 on the year, two of them in that game.)
- Whether you know you’ve lost the game with 1:59 on the clock or 0:00s on the clock makes no difference.
Okay, so what does the math say?
It turns out, there may be no difference, which is kind of what I was getting at up above. It doesn’t matter. Fans very passionately want to feel like they’re in it to the last moment. Coaches prefer to know what their options are ahead of time. Do I need an onside kick? Because if so I’ll do it now rather than later.
I used Ben Baldwin’s 4th-down-calculator and the 2022 Lions-Packers to simulate this game since the Packers (Michigan) were 4.5-point favorites over the (Detroit, not Nittany) Lions (Penn State).
On average, whether you make or miss either attempt, you end up with about a 2% win probability. Not great either way. But in the end, it looks like the decision was a toss-up. So the strong anger and one-sided debate are a bit surprising. But I’ll chalk it up to a frustrated fan base.
What we don’t need to argue about is Franklin’s decision to go for two in the second quarter, down 14-9. Here, there was so much time left that going for two actually hurt their win probability.
Now, this is contrary to what I just said earlier about knowing what you need ahead of time, so I think this outcome speaks to the cost of leaving free points off the board early.
On the methodology: If I were more precise, I would pick my teams based on two-point conversion rates, PAT percentages, and two-point conversion defense, but there’s just not enough data to know that when PSU has only attempted three on the year and Michigan has only defended two (4th and short or 4th and goal can sometimes be a proxy for 2PA).
Staturdays 