SP+ Predicts No. 12 Georgia Tech-Duke Final Score

When you look at the oddsmakers, Duke has been the favorite all week, but most are expecting this to be a close game. According to Bill Connelly's SP+ metric, Georgia Tech is being given a 51% chance to win this game and the Yellow Jackets are projected to win by a score of 30-29.

Coming into this game, Georgia Tech is ranked 29th overall in SP+, with the No. 21 offense, No. 53 defense, and No. 34 special teams.

Duke ranks No. 42 overall with the No. 28 offense, No. 57 defense, and No. 94 special teams.

What is SP+? Here is how Connelly describes it:

"In a single sentence, it's a tempo- and opponent-adjusted measure of college football efficiency. I created the system at Football Outsiders in 2008, and as my experience with both college football and its stats has grown, I have made quite a few tweaks to the system.

SP+ is indeed intended to be predictive and forward-facing. It is not a résumé ranking that gives credit for big wins or particularly brave scheduling -- no good predictive system is. It is simply a measure of the most sustainable and predictable aspects of football. If you're lucky or unimpressive in a win, your rating will probably fall. If you're strong and unlucky in a loss, it will probably rise."

Looking for DB's to step up

Head coach Brent Key announced at Thursday's press conference that starting cornerback Ahmari Harvey and defensive lineman Akelo Stone would be out for this weekend, but the good news is that Harvey's injury is not going to be season ending. His injury means that other defnesive backs will have to step up and Key is confident that they will do just that.

"Well, I mean, we got a bunch. I mean, we played, we played, I know, I don't know how many Rodney Shelley, he's had because he missed the first couple of weeks, but really, we had five guys that have played, you know, high level of snaps out there. But no, we've got a lot of guys. We've played a lot of guys. And that's the reason we play a lot of guys early in the season. If you see the season, you get to this point, you know, you see it start to hone in really on who's the, you know, it's more reps, I guess you would say, for the guys that, whether it started or, you know, big factors. But Rod, obviously, has a big role, Rodney Shelley, and Daiquan has a big role. He does some really good things, and he has some busts that are, you know, some catastrophic things. He's working every day to improve on those things. Daiquan is. He's really been pleased with his development. We've got to continue to be consistent, though, and that's the big thing. And then some of the young guys have gotten some playing time and they're repping to, you know, be depth in that spot as well.

Yeah. Rodney, I think, is the best version of himself right now, too. He's been really proud of him and how he's worked this past year. I mean, I can remember back to recruiting and back to him being a freshman in the interim year. And we're playing down in Tallahassee. And he makes a heck of a play as a gunner on the punt team. And then stands over the guy, gets a 15 -yarder. Y 'all know that's what I remember now. So he came to the side, and he was so shook because he made a great play, made a dumb play, into about, you know, three seconds. It's stuck in my head, his reaction on the sideline. He thought I was about to just tear him one up. And I didn't. I just said, that's not what we do. You got to learn from that. You know, he's a fun guy to be around. He's opened up so much. He was a guy that was very quiet. All that about Rodney to say that I'm most proud of him because he's on track to graduate and be a graduate of Georgia Tech. "

Duke has one of the best offenses in the ACC and the secondary for Georgia Tech is going to play a huge role in being able to slow them down.