Why? A team who wins a division game on Monday Night Football is pumped not only for winning on national television, but also for beating a rival. The extra motivation will propel them in a short week.
In a similar vein to last post, I did research on the game following a Monday Night winner and loser. I went back to 2006 to try to find any trends. There are only two that stood out.
*Division means the week after the Mon Night game is a Division game.
*Prev Division means the Mon Night Game is a Division Game
*As usual, Week 17 does not count
Teams that won a division game on Monday Night did extremely well the next week. They went 15-5, winning 75% of their next games. Teams that won a Monday Night non-division game are 18-11 (62%) the following week.
Let's take a closer look for even more trends.
[Caps = Home. Blue = Monday Night + Following Week both Division games]
As you can see, the teams that win a Monday Night division game do better the next week when not playing a division game.
The record of teams who win a Monday Night Division game is 9-1 when playing a non-division game the following week, and 6-4 when playing another division game. Granted, 8 of the 10 teams were favored, but only 3 of the 10 games had a -7 or more spread.
So, what do we learn from all of this?
You can be confident with a Monday night division game winner, as they probably have a better mental mind set after winning a rivalry game then have a short week. While these teams some times slip up in their division the following week, a non-division game is a very safe play.
[Side note: Since 2006, all teams that are coming off a division win are 123-111 the following week for a 52% win percentage. The 75% and 90% seen in this research are VERY high]
Here will be games to note for the upcoming season (note that these teams must first win the Monday Night Match up to qualify)
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