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I said a while back I landed on 7-5 as my prediction mostly because I think our schedule is a lot less favorable than people are making it out to be. Particularly the front loaded nature of it that could cause things to go sideways before the easy part hits. In our first 6 games against P4 opponents, we have 4 road games - two we will likely be underdogs in (IU, UW) and one we’ll only be a slight favorite in (Duke) - and our only 2 home games will most likely be around a pick’em (USC) and one where we’ll be a multi score underdog in (OSU).

And in thinking about it more, it’s all about the home vs. away splits happened for us this year. We have an even mix of 5 home and 5 road games versus P4 opponents this year, but what if you flipped them as shown below:

WIU
Duke
WMU
Indiana
@USC
Purdue
@Ohio State
Washington
@Rutgers
@Maryland
Wisconsin
@Northwestern

Playing the same opponents and with the same number of home and away games, I think I might increase my prediction by 2 wins if we had this schedule instead. Sleepy cold weather November home games at Memorial Stadium vs. Rutgers/MD/NW is hardly a huge advantage compared to playing on the road at 3 of the least impactful home field advantages in the conference.

Conversely, flipping those early season Duke and IU games to be at home would be hugely beneficial, as would not having to play at Washington or Wisconsin. USC becomes a more likely loss so that’s the biggest one that has a negative impact, but then you just take a near certain OSU loss to begin with and simply move that to using up one of the away slots.

This is obviously a pointless thought exercise, but this is what happens inside my head once August syndrome kicks in.