Background (skip this if you want)
So, in the past (linked post) I've figured out a success score for every team (based on how they perform against different quality of opponents) and a viewership score (complicated formula, but based on a combination of median viewership, avg viewership in rated games and avg viewers in all games - treating unrated games as 0 viewers)
So as background, here's the graph of every school's Viewership and Success Score
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/u/1/d/e/2PACX-1vQpjfzGL4aQZcNcAYRwLduNpS_rGQiNRFKbUkZAXLGzne9d2nBEZpuNdJTYwXFHRVewO2ODto88WJ_p/pubchart?oid=1287750268&format=interactive
Plus a zoomed in version for easier viewing (https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/u/1/d/e/2PACX-1vQpjfzGL4aQZcNcAYRwLduNpS_rGQiNRFKbUkZAXLGzne9d2nBEZpuNdJTYwXFHRVewO2ODto88WJ_p/pubchart?oid=1680908327&format=interactive)
Main Post
So I got to wondering which schools have viewership which over- and underperforms their expected viewership, given their level of on-field success. Looking at all of these schools, there's an equation for expected viewership as a function of team success. I then compared it to actual viewership score to get the Viewership over Expected (based purely on team success)
- Michigan 1.84
- LSU 1.18
- Auburn 1.17
- Tennessee 1.00
- Texas 0.967
- Penn St 0.946
- Florida 0.931
- Nebraska 0.869
- Army 0.834 (mostly Army/Navy game)
- Arkansas 0.813
- Texas A&M 0.690
- Indiana 0.540
- Ohio St 0.472
- Notre Dame 0.358
- Alabama 0.357
SEC 0.324
- Georgia 0.310
- Purdue 0.307
- Ole Miss 0.258
- Kansas 0.182
- Maryland 0.154
B1G 0.041
- Michigan St 0.026
- Colorado 0.012
- Kentucky 0.008
- Tulane 0.002
- South Carolina -0.005
- Iowa St -0.010
- Syracuse -0.022
- SMU -0.024
- Northwestern -0.064
- Navy -0.076
- Illinois -0.087
- Georgia Tech -0.110
- North Carolina -0.112
- Arizona -0.144
- UCLA -0.151
- Texas Tech -0.156
- Miami -0.186
- Mississippi St -0.200
- Oregon St -0.205
- South Florida - 0.208
- Virginia -0.221
- West Virginia -0.243
- Cal -0.259
- Virginia Tech -0.259
- UNLV -0.266
- Cincinnati -.307
- Rutgers -0.311
- Missouri -0.316
- Vanderbilt -0.321
- UCF -0.346
- UTSA -0.356
- Boston College -0.363
- Washington St -0.371
- TCU -0.376
- Louisville -0.383
Big 12 -0.392
- Wisconsin -0.399
- BYU -0.410
- Arizona St -0.433
- USC -0.449
- Wake Forest -0.451
- Memphis -0.467
- Florida St -0.471
- Oklahoma -0.481
- Oregon -0.504
- Minnesota -0.535
PAC -0.537
- NC State -0.559
ACC -0.576
- Kansas St -0.598
- Pitt -0.654
- Washington -0.680
- Baylor -0.705
- Duke -0.707
- Boise St -0.749
- Oklahoma St -0.753
- San Diego St -0.821
- Stanford -0.848
- Iowa -0.894
- Houston -0.987
- Utah -1.07
- Fresno -1.08
- Clemson -1.47
Of course there's lots of reasons to be high or low on this. You might be high or low because of opponents (Indiana, Army, most G5s + BYU) or because of timezones/TV slots (Oregon, Washington) or just because you're so good/bad that the expectations are absurd (Clemson, Kansas, Army and Indiana again)
So it's not a perfect measure as to why teams over or underperform, but interesting list to consider. The top 16 (except Indiana and Army) do a pretty great job of hitting the most dedicated fanbases.
Teams I'm surprised to see so low include Wisconsin (56), BYU (57), Florida St (62), Oklahoma (63), Oregon (64), Washington (69), Oklahoma St (73), Utah (78), and Clemson (80)