Massachusetts Team Boards

The raw scoreboard treats every point the same, but not every opponent is the same. This board adjusts for that: an offense is judged against how good the defense it faced actually is, and a defense is judged against how good the offense it shut down actually is.

Shutting out a defense that gives up 40 a game means more than shutting out one that gives up 3. Blowing out a team that struggles every week doesn’t automatically read as a great performance here, and grinding out a close win over a strong opponent can outscore a lopsided win over a weak one. The raw score, the opponent, and the opponent’s rating are printed on every row so the adjustment never reads as a black box.

The defense number can print negative. It measures points allowed against what the opponent’s offense was expected to score, not a raw total, so zero means the defense matched expectation and a negative number means it beat it.