Friday Flakes: Quick Thoughts on ESPN’s FPI for the 2020 Nebraska Football Season

H/T to Michael Bruntz of Nebraska 24/7.

ESPN’s Football Power Index is not too kind. That doesn’t mean they are wrong. Here is the chance, according to ESPN’s FPI, Nebraska wins each match-up in 2020.

At Rutgers - 66.9% chance
Illinois - 69.2% chance
Wisconsin - 15% chance
At Iowa - 27.5% chance
Minnesota - 50.2% chance
At Ohio State - 3.3% chance
At Northwestern - 32.2% chance
Penn State - 16.7% chance
At Purdue - 47.3% chance
Michigan State - 74% chance

Quick thoughts then flakes...

• I am extremely interested to see the logistics of getting the Nebraska football players, coaches, personnel and the like into and staying in Piscataway, New Jersey for the game. Can they book an entire hotel or would they be using dorms of some type. I’m extremely interested. Time to be flexible.
• Do not sleep on that Illinois game. I probably like Illinois better than most. Remember they beat Wisconsin last year and could have beaten Iowa. That game is huge. Going into that 4-game brawl it would be difficult to be 1 - 1.
• The loss of Micah Parsons is huge for Penn State. He’s a game changer. I know they have been recruiting at an extremely high level. I’d probably bump that percentage up to 25-30% just based off of Parsons leaving.
• I don’t understand why the Northwestern percentage is so low. That’s a 50/50 game in my opinion just based off of history. The fact that it is at Northwestern is irrelevant.
• I would put the Michigan State percentage at like 60-65%. If it was earlier in the year then it would definitely be higher but this will be the second year that Nebraska has faced a Mel Tucker coached team and he’s currently 1 - 0 against Nebraska.
• Nebraska will likely be extremely motivated in the game against Minnesota but I don’t think it’s a 50/50 game. I would put the percentage closer to 40% that Nebraska wins. They were extremely dominant last year to the point it was embarrassing. Until i see something different I am not going to expect something different when we get dogged like that.

SPORTS! SPORTS! SPORTS!

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