Last week, I broke down Pitt's football schedule over at SB Nation Pittsburgh. Later in the week, ESPN.com's Brian Bennett did the same.
He sees the end of the non-conference schedule as a big test for Pitt:
Gut-check time: The final three nonconference games. No one in the Big East is playing a harder out-of-league schedule, with three tough BCS opponents (Utah is in the Pac-12 now, and Notre Dame is for all intents and purposes an AQ team). Playing Iowa, Notre Dame, South Florida and Utah in a five-game span is as difficult a stretch as any league team will see in 2011.
We'll know a lot more about the Pitt team after those two games than we'll know after the opening two games against Buffalo and Maine. Utah at home will be a tough game, but even if Pitt goes flat against Iowa and/or Notre Dame, they have games against Rutgers and South Florida to try to regroup before Utah.
Bennett points out that Pitt again has the toughest non-conference schedule in the Big East. I haven't looked at the others yet, so I'm not sure how accurate that is. But with this schedule, I'd say that 3-2 would be a fair record in the non-con and 4-1 would be a great one.
5-0? Sorry, don't see it.