I'm not sure I can support this writer's premise. Eight games in a row to finish season is not good news!

Oregon Ducks On SI

Oregon Ducks Are Big Winners of Big Ten Schedule Release

The Oregon Ducks enter the 2026 season aiming to capture the first national championship in program history. Oregon reached the College Football Playoff in 2025

This is the 3rd time i have read this article and I don't see where the Ducks are BIG Winners in their 2026 schedule....

Where is the benefit of 8 straight games after the break? With 4k plus round trips to play, tOSU, Illinois and MSU?

The schedule difficulty from school to school is too unbalanced, PSU and tOSU travel west just once. PSU schedule is so soft that they should be favored in all their games except Michigan, USC and the Huskies. They can go 1-2 in those games and hit 10-2. NO IU, tOSU or Oregon on their schedule?

Michigan has PSU, IU, tOSU and Oregon on their schedule in 2026. And for a tune-up the Sooners come to Ann Arbor.....WTH?

DL and the team will not complain and they will take that schedule one game at a time. Only good part of the schedule is OBD's have until November to gell before playing tOSU.

Gonna be another nerve wracking season and I can't wait. 11-1 and a 3 way tie with IU and tOSU. Hope we lose the BIG tie breakers. Looking forward to a first round home game.

GO DUCKS!

I just posted on another thread the requirements the B10 uses to schedule games. I agree with you HappyToBeADuck ... it just doesn't make sense. Oregon is going to be beat up after 8 straight B10 games with additional travel to the east. The Penn State schedule is totally out of whack. They say the schedule is set "years in advance" ... what like 2 years since the 4 Pac12 teams joined?

I would think in today's world of high tech and even AI ... the B10 could come up with something more even(fair) in scheduling. PSU (Iowa State) with a new coach will be THE surprise contender for the B10 Championship with two possibly three games they could lose but should win ... USC, Michigan and Washington.

As an IU fan I would like a first round home game in the playoffs but after the weather in 2024 at Notre Dame and the weather in Bloomington this year when you played JMU ... I would not want a home game in that freezing cold weather in Bloomington.

Declaring “big winners” of the future schedule is a bit tricky. We certainly don’t have a very common 3 or 4 week stretch without a home game is nice.

Start sliding around where the bye could have taken place and I’m not sure it makes that big of a difference. We play 4 then 8. Is that significantly worse than 5 then 7? 6 and 6? 7 and 5?

What is the ideal bye week? Really hard to say.