Interestingly, just as with last year, the consensus prediction of N.D. for this year is 8.65 wins in 12 games. No game is viewed this year with the trepidation that last year's F.S.U. game was. Last year the consensus estimate of N.D.'s chances of winning that game was only 30%. As it turned out, of course, despite two cosmetic F.S.U. touchdowns at the end, N.D. thoroughly dominated that affair en route to a 34-24 win. The hardest game this year, in our collective view, is the road trip to Ann Arbor. Last year Michigan was viewed as being the second-hardest game, but that turned out OK too.

On the other hand, the collective wisdom last year was that we had two gimmes — Navy and Rutgers. Navy got our attention, leading the game by 8 points in the middle of the 4th quarter until some inspired play by Holiday, Battle and Jenkins got that one home safely. Proof that the Midshipmen got our attention is that although this is rated the easiest game, the collective estimate is not the certain victory we saw last year. There really isn't a substitute for Rutgers on the schedule. The home game with B.Y.U. is probably the closest thing, but last year we saw the chances of beating Rutgers as 95% (the 42-0 final confirmed the wisdom of this estimate), but we see the chances of beating B.Y.U. as a more modest 85%.

Here is how we size up each game. For each team I list Howell's computer ranking at the end of last year and his pre-season ranking. His pre-season rankings are a weighted average of a team's performance over the last several years, giving the most weight to most recent performance. He doesn't attempt to make any subjective assessments, such as adjusting for number of players returning and the like. Notre Dame was 13th last year and 16th for pre-season 2003.

Washington State

2002: 16
2003: 20
High estimate: 90%
Low estimate: 40%
Consensus: 75%

Michigan

2002: 10
2003: 8
High estimate: 85%
Low estimate: 25%
Consensus: 45%

Michigan State

2002: 75
2003: 64
High estimate: 90%
Low estimate: 55%
Consensus: 80%

Purdue

2002: 38
2003: 37
High estimate: 95%
Low estimate: 45%
Consensus: 60%

Pittsburgh

2002: 22
2003: 35
High estimate: 90%
Low estimate: 45%
Consensus: 55%

U.S.C.

2002: 2
2003: 11
High estimate: 90%
Low estimate: 40%
Consensus: 65%

Boston College

2002: 27
2003: 33
High estimate: 95%
Low estimate: 55%
Consensus: 75%

Florida State

2002: 14
2003: 5
High estimate: 90%
Low estimate: 55%
Consensus: 70%

Navy

2002: 107
2003: 110
High estimate: 100%
Low estimate: 90%
Consensus: 95%

B.Y.U.

2002: 84
2003: 65
High estimate: 95%
Low estimate: 75%
Consensus: 85%

Stanford

2002: 85
2003: 63
High estimate: 100%
Low estimate: 75%
Consensus: 85%

Syracuse

2002: 73
2003: 52
High estimate: 90%
Low estimate: 55%
Consensus: 75%

The teams that we give the least respect to given their pre-season rankings are Washington State and Florida State. However, both games are at N.D. and we know something the computer doesn't, which is that Washington State has lost its coach and its key players and that F.S.U. is a mess.

The teams that we give the most respect to relative to their pre-season rankings are Purdue and Pittsburgh, but given that they are road games and these teams played us tough last year, this makes a certain amount of sense.

The probabilities as we estimate them thus fall between 10-2 and 7-5. 12-0 and 11-1 are seen as being only roughly 1% and 2% chances respectively and the same thing for anything below 7-5.

The games can be grouped accordingly:

Hardest: Michigan, Purdue, Pittsburgh and U.S.C.
Middle: Washington State, Florida State, Boston College and Syracuse
Easiest: Michigan State, Navy, B.Y.U and Stanford

Some likely scenarios for each record:

7-5
Hardest: 1-3
Middle: 2-2 or 3-1
Easiest: 4-0 or 3-1

8-4
Hardest: 1-3 or 2-2
Middle: 3-1 or 2-2
Easiest: 4-0

9-3
Hardest: 2-2
Middle: 3-1
Easiest: 4-0

10-2:
Hardest: 2-2 or 3-1
Middle: 4-0 or 3-1
Easiest: 4-0

Of course, we have to line up and play them. Starting this fall, we'll find out if this begins to match reality.