1) At Cal/Home to SDSU (MWC 2025 co-champ) is a pretty rough start - not Michigan/OU tough, but still challenging. This year's team would lose both of those games. We'll find out if things are going to be different pretty quickly.
2) If we do manage to win those first two games, there's a very real opportunity to be 9-1 going in to the Michigan game. The conference road games (other than Oregon) are pretty manageable, if we're good enough to take care of business early in the year.
This is probably our last chance to get football right. Signs are hopeful, but you just never know.