They're all winnable, at least in my terms of winnable, which personally means that I don't see the other team as having to beat themselves as the sole way we can win. This team is built to be in every game until the end since we should have the ability to pound the rock. Only game I see as a real long stretch is OSU, but who knows, outdoors in November against a speed based team with us at home could have all the makings of an upset. I don't see anything as a program changing type of win unless it becomes circumstantial. This team is expected to be in the running come November. No one is truly head and shoulders picked to be the best this year; everyone has question marks, even the supposed big dogs in the conference.
If you were really grading them at a difficulty, in my eyes it'd be as follows:
OSU at about a 9 for difficulty; New line coming in for them though so if Miller goes down, all bets are off in this one.
Wisconsin at a 7.5; on the road, haven't beaten them in seemingly forever but that could be motivating. If this team is in the running or has the chance to knock Wisconsin out of the BT championship, it could get extremely intense. you never know what can happen in a rivalry game.
Nebraska at a 7; not sold on their QB situation yet and I'd take our defense over theirs; Lincoln is a tough place to play; If things don't work out this year for Nebby, Pelini could be coaching for his job by this point with 4 games that could provide some challenges for Big Red before this point.
Michigan at a 6 purely based on this one being on the road. These 2 teams appear to be headed in opposite directions with Michigan trending down. I think we will be inspired after a 4-0 start and think we can take this one for sure. Really only see Michigan as favored for being at home and having name recognition.
TCU at a 6 based on this being on the road and in the Texas heat and that they have time to prepare for us. It's our only NC road game but TCU only has one tune up prior against Samford. We should have figured out our identity by this point and I feel we're the better team as it sits right now. But TCU will have the edge in prep time and the homefield
Iowa at a 5. Honestly I expect us to be 6-2 at least with 7-1 or 8-0 a possibility at this point. And I wouldn't be shocked to see Iowa at near the same record as they have a favorable slate prior to playing us. But we get 2 weeks to prep for this, the crowd should be raucous if we play to our potential and win the games we should, and Mitch should have truly settled in by then. The plays were there to beat them last year and it'll be plays like the ones we missed that will dictate if we can pull it off this year.
So I view most of them as definitely in striking distance for us. November is going to be a hell of a month for our team. We'll definitely see then how much progress we've made.
