Editor's note: This article was adapted from Phil Steele's college football preview magazine, which is available here.
College football season is right around the corner, and one way to determine how teams will fare this season is by looking at their schedule strength. While every team plays 12 games, the makeup of each team's schedule is different.
There are those teams that must go on the road and face ranked teams multiple times, while other teams get the good fortune of playing their tougher games in front of the home fans. Also, depending on the composition of a team's conference schedule, certain teams miss the big boys, while others must go through their conference's top squads.
Below, I list the teams with the most daunting slates of games for 2019 and how it could affect the outcomes of their seasons.
Note: Odds courtesy of Caesars Sportsbook.
1. South Carolina Gamecocks (5.5 wins, 300-1 to win title)
South Carolina returns 14 starters and comes in at No. 30 on my experience chart, but it will face my toughest-rated schedule for 2019. The Gamecocks also face a schedule that had a combined win percentage of 67.9 in 2018, the highest percentage of any FBS schedule. South Carolina will face three teams that finished in the top seven of the AP Poll last season: Alabama, Georgia and Clemson. In addition to those juggernauts, Will Muschamp's team faces Florida, Texas A&M, North Carolina and Appalachian State.
