After leaving the last two home football games in the fourth quarter, because I am getting tired of listening to the opposing teams fans moving down to field level and cheering their team, I thought about what are reasonable expectations for this football team and this coach. We are in the third year of a seven year contract. We had 3 conference wins in 2020 season, 2 in 2021 and 1 so far this season with one to play.
We play against OSU, Mich, PSU, MSU, Indiana, and Maryland. Since we have been in the BIG we have 0 wins against OSU and PSU, and 1 win against Michigan and MSU each. We are slightly more competitive against Indiana and Maryland. I believe we can be more competitive with MSU, Indiana, and, Maryland in the next 4 years. Add in three games against West teams, and three OOC each year and that is our 12 games.
We are not competitive against OSU, Mich, and PSU, so there are three losses each year. In a really good year say we beat all three OOC, all three west teams and MSU, Indiana, and Maryland. That would be a 9-3 record. I think this is the upside longshot. Conversely in a bad year we lose to OSU, Mich, and PSU; lose 2 of three to our remaining East opponents, lose 2 of 3 to our West opponents, and win 2 of our 3 OOC. that is a 4-8 record, similar to this year. An average year would be 7-5 or 6-6. I am basing this on Coach Schiano's performance in the Big East, and so far in his three years in the BIG.
Once USC and UCLA join the conference will realign. I believe the BIG will protect the OSU, Mich, and PSU trio and move either Illinois or Northwestern into the East. Our record will probably stay about the same because we will then be playing only 2 teams from the west. If Wisconsin or Iowa come into the East instead our record will suffer.
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I think this is a reasonable expectation of our future performance. With the portal and NIL we will not gain any ground on OSU, Mich, and PSU or the better teams in the West, we can only hope to catch up or surpass the other three teams in the East. Feel free to comment.