Syracuse fans, buckle up, because the 2025 schedule might feel like a college football rollercoaster built on quicksand. You’ve seen the opener (Tennessee in Atlanta) and the jarring road trips to Clemson, SMU, Miami, and Notre Dame, and you know what’s coming next: a few games at The Dome that no longer feel routine. The kind of games where if you don’t win, everything starts leaking. We send our wishes to Fran Brown for this season.

The way the schedule is set up for Fran Brown this season, the Orange can’t afford to drop a winnable home game. The secondary matchups this season aren’t cupcakes. They are coming from an amazing season, but comparatively, this schedule is at least 2x more difficult than the 2024 one. There are the kind of opponents that could derail Fran Brown’s second year if not handled cleanly. But lose those? And suddenly the bowl conversation shifts from “maybe” to “maybe not.” These matchups? Locked On Syracuse host Jackson Holzer did a good job of revealing the stakes.

He said, “In order for Syracuse to at least get to three to five wins, there are a couple of must‑win games on the schedule… the first opponent I’m talking about is North Carolina.” He added that UNC, under Bill Belichick and likely starter Gio Lopez, is one of the most unpredictable teams in the ACC. “I could honestly see that team being really good, winning nine, 10 games, or falling flat on their face.” That ambiguity makes the North Carolina game a season-defining punch or stumble. Nobody knows how well they’ll do. They can either be a 10-win team or a bottom-of-the-pack team. You cannot even bank on the Belichick factor on the field (except for selling out every game months before the first snap of 2025 is played). It’s proven in the NFL, but CFB ain’t NFL, Josh Pate will agree. 

And then there’s Boston College. Holzer said Syracuse has lost to BC in each of the past two seasons, including one last year that should’ve been a win. “And last year was much more egregious because Syracuse had a better team. But they went into Boston College and their defense did not show up, made too many mistakes, poor tackling, and they lost that game. And if they had won that game, they would have had 10 regular-season wins.” If they’d have just won that Boston College game last year, the playoff conversations would have been way more interesting. Ah, well, there’s always next (this) time. Moreover, they’d have to continue beating Georgia Tech this season too; they’re the favorite anyway. Simply put, beat everyone not named Clemson, Notre Dame, Miami, Tennessee, or SMU, and you’re alright. Lose 2 more and you’re out.

Holzer’s logic continues. With a brutal ACC road slate already looming (Clemson, SMU, Miami, Notre Dame), the Dome becomes sacred territory, where Syracuse must sweep home games against UNC and BC to build a cushion. Lose either, and their path to even five wins becomes a math problem no one wants to solve. Missing those games? Suddenly, you’re looking at Syracuse vs. Boston College to decide bowl fate. That’s a nightmare scenario for any Cuse fan. If there’s one thing Fran Brown can rally around, it’s this: flip those games, and two conference wins become foundation blocks and not lifelines. 

Syracuse football’s 2025 record predictions

As Syracuse inches closer to its 2025 season under Fran Brown, fans are cautiously optimistic but grounded in realism. On Locked On Syracuse, host Jackson Holzer broke down exactly where he sees the Orange finishing in the ACC for 2025. The verdict? Somewhere in the middle, but not without some major caveats.

“I think they’re going to win anywhere between three and five games in the conference this upcoming season,” Holzer said, echoing the results of a poll with over 220 fan votes. Nearly 60% of respondents picked ‘middle of the pack’ for Syracuse, with another third predicting a top-five finish. That’s a fairly confident read for a team coming off a transitional offseason and facing a daunting schedule that includes road trips to Clemson, Miami, Notre Dame, and SMU.

To get into that mid-tier range—finishing between 6th and 12th in the league—Holzer noted that Syracuse would need at least “three to five wins in the ACC.” He’s betting on the Orange hitting the four-win mark, enough to grab bowl eligibility and stay clear of the conference basement. “I think that they will win four ACC games at least. Therefore, you win at least four ACC games… you’re a middle-of-the-pack team in the conference,” he said. With some swing games like Duke, Pitt, and Georgia Tech on the schedule and a couple of ‘must-win’ opportunities against North Carolina and Boston College, the window for four or five wins feels slim but plausible.