If last season's University of Hawai'i football schedule was "Murderer's Row" for its degree of difficulty, then what does that make a lighter-regarded 2009 lineup: "Misdemeanor Row?"

Going in, at least, the projections add up to not only a less grueling grind for the Warriors than last year, when they played four teams that finished in the Top 20, but, with luck, a catapult to improvement.

With seven bowl teams, including eventual national champion Florida, last season the Warriors went 7-7 with a schedule that ranked, statistically, as one of the school's toughest in a decade. The NCAA ranked it No. 66 among 120 Football Bowl Subdivision (formerly known as Division I-A) teams.

But 2009 projects a lot less demanding in several respects. For example, magazine publisher Phil Steele, on his Web site (http://www.philsteele.com), has UH's schedule ranked 93rd purely on opponents' 2008 records and 100th when foes' relative strengths (number of returning starters, lettermen, etc.) are factored in.

According to the NCAA, which has been ranking strength of schedule for a decade, UH's weakest lineup (No. 111 of 119) was the one the Warriors rode to the Sugar Bowl in 2007-'08. Its toughest (61st) came in the bowl-less 9-3 run of 2001 that concluded with a 72-45 demolition of then-No. 9 Brigham Young.

This year, The New York Times has ranked four of UH's opponents — Idaho (119), New Mexico State (118), Utah State (115) and Washington State (114) — among the seven worst major college teams in the country. The Times has UH at No. 71.

You need look no further than UH's Bowl Championship Series conference opponents to gauge the major difference in the Warriors' two schedules. Last year there were Florida (13-1), Oregon State (9-4) and Cincinnati (11-3), Top 20 finishers all. This year there are Washington State and Wisconsin, neither of them forecast to finish in the top half of their conferences.

The Cougars, coming off 2-11, are the pick of most to finish at the bottom of the Pac-10. Wisconsin, 7-5 last year, is forecast an un-Badger-like seventh in many Big Ten preseason polls.

Two big reasons, no doubt, why Steele has UH cited as one of the 10 turnaround teams for 2009.

Of course the danger with putting too much on projections is that, as they like to say, the games are played on artificial turf, not paper. In that you need only look at the polar opposites of UH's 2008 season to see the pitfalls of crystal ball-gazing. The Warriors somehow managed to lose at Utah State and beat Fresno State, a then-ranked opponent.

But if the Warriors do their part, improvement should be right on, well, schedule in 2009.