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Indiana football's post-spring projected win total is 8.5 — its highest ever

0a7j0Tm2_400x400 (1)by: Colin McMahon05/20/25ColinMcMahon31
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Dec 20, 2024; Notre Dame, Indiana, USA; Indiana Hoosiers head coach Curt Cignetti before a first round playoff game against the Notre Dame Fighting Irish at Notre Dame Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Trevor Ruszkowski-Imagn Images

After a magical 11-2 campaign in 2024, Indiana looks to get to double-digit wins for the second time in its history in 2025, but the oddsmakers believe a step back is the most likely outcome. The Indiana projected win total stands at 8.5, with opening odds being released this week.

This 8.5 over/under win total for the Hoosiers is the highest in their 100-plus year history, with the only other contender coming before the 2019 season when IU was projected to win 6.5 games. While sports betting has only become mainstream in recent decades, it’s still reasonable to assume that the Indiana teams of the past wouldn’t have ever had a 8.5 win total.

This 8.5 win total slots the Hoosiers tied for third place in projected wins, one spot lower than they finished in the 2024 regular season, as IU was tied with Penn State for second place at the conclusion of the 2024 campaign.

Here is the full list of projected wins, via FanDuel:

What might even be more fascinating than Indiana never having a higher preseason win total than 8.5 is the fact that the Hoosiers’ expected win total for 2024 was just 5.5. Of course IU exactly doubled this over/under with its 11 wins during the season, but it begs the question: why would oddsmakers expect a dip in wins after a underestimating Indiana a year ago?

There’s several reasons that this could be, such as losing Kurtis Rourke and others, or just overall declining productivity, but there’s one reason that is the most clear as to why Indiana’s win total is just 8.5 and that’s the upcoming schedule.

Indiana’s 2025 schedule projects to be much tougher than 2024, meaning that even if the Hoosiers play at the same level as they did a season ago, they might not be able to reach double-digit wins.

Indiana plays at Iowa, Oregon and Penn State, all tough games that could result in losses, while Indiana’s home game against Illinois to open up Big Ten play is also expected to be tightly contested.

If the Hoosiers do lose all three of its daunting road matchups, they’d have to go 9-0 in their other games to surpass 8.5 wins, while if it loses to Illinois in week four, it would have to go on the road and defeat an expected top-25 team in order to go over on wins.

Indiana has won over 8.5 games just three times in its history, with one of those being the 2024 season and the others coming all the way back in 1967 and 1945 when Indiana won nine games in each season respectively.

This affords the oddsmakers a little bit of slack, as it would be hard to project Indiana to win more than 9 games, considering that’s a feat that the program has accomplished only once. Given that, it’s not crazy to assume that Indiana can win 10-plus games once again, especially because its schedule might not pan out as tough as it seems.

It’s still early, and the win totals may shift before the season kicks off on August 30, but for now the Hoosiers have their highest preseason win total in program history at 8.5.

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