ESPN FPI projects Arkansas' record with new 2020 schedule

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It was already expected to be a tough road for Sam Pittman in his first season at Arkansas, but it got even more challenging when the coronavirus pandemic forced the schedule to be altered.

Instead of having two Group of Five schools and an FCS school on the slate in addition to Notre Dame and eight SEC games, the Razorbacks will now play a 10-game, conference-only schedule.

As if that wasn't bad enough, the conference added Georgia and Florida to Arkansas' schedule as the two extra crossover games.

What resulted was a murderous slate that puts the Razorbacks at risk of their first winless season in program history, which began in 1894. According to ESPN's Football Power Index, they have a 7.2 percent chance of going 0-10 this year.

Previously, with home games against Nevada, ULM and Charleston Southern, a winless season was highly unlikely. In fact, the FPI gave that just a 0.0012 percent chance of happening.

Arkansas is actually an underdog in all 10 games this season, with its best chance of winning being at Mississippi State (47.4%) and against Ole Miss (42.1%). The only other games it has more than a 10 percent chance of winning are at Missouri (38.9%) and against Tennessee (38.3%).

The game-by-game FPI projections are in the chart below...

Despite not being the favorite in any of the games, it would be inaccurate to say the FPI is projecting Arkansas to go winless.

The most likely record for the Razorbacks is 2-8, as it has a 33.1 percent chance of happening. It's also worth noting that they are more likely to win just one game (24.2%) than to win three games (23.5%).

As mentioned earlier, the odds of Arkansas finishing the season 0-10 - and extending its SEC losing streak to 29 games - is just 7.2 percent, or roughly 13-to-1.

On the flip side, the Razorbacks have a 0.00000045 percent chance of running the table and finishing 10-0. That works out to about 222 million-to-1 odds.

The likelihood of each record - 0-10, 10-0 and everything in between - can be found in the chart below...