Smurfs in Seasons?

I’ve barely played FIFA before, but since a lot of people around me play it, I figured it would be fun to learn. I’ve started playing FC24 more recently and have about 40 hours of gameplay on PlayStation, so I’m still extremely bad at it. I’ve tried both Ultimate Team and Seasons, but I feel like Seasons is much harder. I still prefer it though since I don’t really enjoy all the team management with UT.

One thing I’ve noticed is that many of the opponents I face have very few, or even no losses (although with few games played). For example, in three out of my last four games, my opponents had records like 14-0, 10-0, or 12-1, and they beat me by huge margins, the worst one being 20-1. I’m currently in Division 8.

So my question is: Are these players smurfs, or is the matchmaking just really unbalanced at lower divisions? Is this a common experience for newer players?