Maryland’s 79-0 win over Howard was the program’s most lopsided victory since 1927. But how much value does a historic blowout against an overmatched FCS opponent carry moving forward?

According to ESPN’s Football Power Index, college football’s version of the Pomeroy Rankings, it could be enough to significantly increase Maryland’s postseason odds. The FPI projected the Terps to win 4.1 games heading into the season, but following the first week of action the formula now projects them to win 6.5 games. It also jumped Maryland from No. 68 to No. 33 in the team rankings, moving them ahead of future 2019 opponents such as Minnesota, Nebraska, Syracuse, Indiana and Purdue.

The FPI is a predictive rating system that factors prior performance, returning starters, recruiting and coaching into its formula. Based off last week alone, though, the Terps had the fifth-best performance in college football even after adjusting for opponent strength and “garbage time”.

While Maryland’s 31st-ranked offense garnered most of the attention Saturday, its sixth-ranked defense and special teams units were the biggest contributors to the lopsided final score, according to FPI. Maryland began six of its 16 drives in enemy territory (not including DJ Turner’s punt return touchdown and LaVonte Gater’s blocked punt/safety) and allowed the Bison just 68 yards of total offense. Howard’s mistakes -- a shanked punt, a dropped punt and a fumble -- led to three Maryland touchdowns, including the first two.

Virginia Tech transfer quarterback Josh Jackson, who wasn’t weighted as heavily into FPI’s formula as a returning starter would, said the win served as a major confidence builder.

“I think we made a good first impression,” he said. “79-0. That’s a good team, and I think that they have very good players on that team. Our defense played great. Lights out, honestly. The offense, after the first drive, produced. We got to get four quarterbacks in the game, a lot of running backs, receivers got in. Everybody got to get in. That all helps your offense.”

The Terps are now favored against six of their final 11 opponents according to the FPI, but have a better chance at losing a game they’re supposed to win than winning one they’re supposed to lose. Maryland has roughly a 66 percent chance of beating Syracuse and Temple each of the next two weeks, but just a 22.2 percent chance to knock off Penn State in its Big Ten opener. The most winnable remaining game is against Rutgers (76.7%) while the least winnable remaining game is against Ohio State (21.2%).

The win over Howard was a memorable debut, but Terps coach Michael Locksley wants to see an even bigger improvement next week. Another jump could be necessary to knock off the 22nd-ranked Orange.

“There are still some things we need to get corrected,” he said. “We had a few too many penalties, missed tackles. We had a few penalties where we were too sloppy without our alignments, with our receivers, with our touchdown called back. Those are all correctable moments. What I hope is that usually as a team, you make your biggest jump from game one to game two and we will watch the tape and get the things corrected that need to be corrected. We’ll celebrate this for 24 hours and then we're onto our next opponent.”