Penn State is 3-0 and ranked No. 3 in the nation, but the Nittany Lions face a big test Saturday night when they host No. 6 Oregon.
Despite their undefeated record, Penn State has drawn criticism for the strength of its schedule. So far, the Nittany Lions’ three games have come against out-of-conference opponents Nevada, FIU, and Villanova — none of which play in a Power Five conference.
Here’s a look at what head coach James Franklin has said about Penn State’s non-Big Ten schedule, the team’s overall strength of schedule, and more.
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Penn State football schedule 2025
Here's a look at Penn State's schedule this year. All three of PSU's non-conference opponents are non-Power conference teams. The Nittany Lions do have three remaining games against Top-15 opponents in Oregon, Ohio State and Indiana remaining.
| Date | Opponent |
| Aug. 30 | vs. Nevada: W, 46-11 |
| Sept. 6 | vs. FIU: W, 34-0 |
| Sept. 13 | vs. Villanova: W, 52-6 |
| Sept. 27 | vs. No. 6 Oregon |
| Oct. 4 | @ UCLA |
| Oct. 11 | vs. Northwestern |
| Oct. 18 | @Iowa |
| Nov. 1 | @ No. 1 Ohio State |
| Nov. 8 | vs. No. 11 Indiana |
| Nov. 15 | @ Michigan State |
| Nov. 22 | vs. Nebraska |
| Nov. 29 | @Rutgers |
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Penn State strength of schedule
Penn State's strength of schedule isn't much to write home about. In fact, according to ESPN's Football Power Index, the Nittany Lions' strength of schedule ranks 136th—dead last—in the country.
Penn State's SOS also ranks far lower than other teams in the mix for the CFP, like Michigan (6th), Texas A&M (17th), Georgia (23rd), Texas (32) and Alabama and Ohio State, which are ranked 38th and 39th, respectively.
The Nittany Lions do rank much better in FPI's remaining SOS metric, which puts them at 23rd overall. But clearly, FPI isn't too impressed with Penn State opening with Nevada, FIU and Villanova—which have combined records of 4-7.
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Penn State schedule criticism
The Nittany Lions beat all three opponents by a combined score of 132-17. Still, PSU received plenty of criticism for how it started the 2025 schedule.
“I hate to beat up on [Franklin], he’s such a nice man and he's a very good coach,” ESPN's Paul Finebaum said on SportsCenter. “But he’s never won what I would call a major, big-time, have-to-win game, and I don’t think he’s going to do it this year. He may get to the national championship game, but he will not win it.”
He also compared the three teams to “the top three teams in the Catholic youth organization on“The Rich Eisen Show,”
“How do you get away with playing a schedule like that? It’s downright embarrassing.”
ESPN's Chris Low named Penn State's non-conference schedule the easiest in the Power 4. He even suggested that the Nittany Lions may not be ready for the game against Oregon:
It's Penn State by a mile, or about as long as it takes to get to Happy Valley from just about any major airport. This should be James Franklin's best and most balanced team, but one that will be untested when it rolls into Big Ten play against Oregon at home Sept. 27. The "warmups" come in the first three weeks of the season, all at home, against Nevada, Florida International and Villanova, followed by a bye week before facing the Ducks.
One person who is happy about Penn State's schedule is Nittany Lions head coach James Franklin. At Big Ten Media Days in July, he was asked about Penn State's scheduling strategy. He defended it, thanks to the Big Ten playing a nine-game schedule:
"It's not going to look the same," Franklin said of scheduling comparisons between conferences. "We're already playing nine conference games. Where does it make sense? If you look, when the Big Ten first went to nine games, you could make the argument [it was] maybe the worst decision the Big Ten has ever made. Just mathematically, we were going to have more losses. We're going to beat each other up.
"Over the last two years, we've been more strategic about that. It's worked out pretty well. So there's an easy solution to this. Everybody play the same number of games, everybody play a conference championship, and then everything else will take care of itself.
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Penn State poll rankings
Here's a look at where the Nittany Lions rank in the various polls.
- AP Poll: No. 3
- AFCA Coaches Poll: No. 2
- ESPN SP+: No. 2