Syracuse spent its offseason patching the one thing that sank last year's team. The defense finished 120th out of 138 teams in 2025, so Brown went out and hired Vince Kehres off Toledo, whose unit finished second nationally last season. Add in portal quarterbacks Amari Odom and Malachi Nelson stacked behind Angeli for insurance, and the roster looks nothing like the one that lost eight in a row to close out last fall.
None of this erases the fact that Syracuse just posted a 3-9 season, and national outlets are still projecting the Orange for something like 4-5 wins in the ACC. Phil Steele is bullish, ESPN and CBS less so, but nobody is picking against Syracuse in this particular game. That's the split screen here: a program still trying to convince people it's for real, opening against a team trying to convince itself it belongs on the same field.
Games like this are usually more about tape than drama. Angeli gets live reps against a defense that isn't going to punish mistakes the way Clemson or Miami will later this fall, Odom and Nelson get a look if the score gets out of hand early, and Kehres gets his first read on whether the new-look defense actually fixed what was broken. For New Hampshire, it's a chance to see what Bentley looks like under pressure before Colonial Athletic Association play starts to matter.
Dome openers like this rarely stay competitive into the fourth quarter, and Syracuse has too much invested in getting this season off on the right foot to let it turn into a letdown spot. The story worth watching is less about the final score and more about whether Angeli looks like the guy who had the ACC buzzing before he got hurt.