How did Indiana go from zero to hero?

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GophEnEspaña said:
We have to zoom out. Indiana is, culturally, a huge sports school. There is more buy-in from the admin, alumns, etc. Even if they have not won big in NCAAB recently, their past success has helped instill that into IU sports culture. Indianapolis and the surrounding regions love football and love HS football. They have notable alumni who are willing to throw money at the program.

Cignetti was the home run hire of home run hires. He's like prime NDSU Craig Bohl on steroids. He knows exactly how to build a winning program down to a science. Indiana plays disciplined, clean, tough, and together in ways I haven't seen since prime Saban Bama Death Star years. He brought all of his good JMU kids with him (under-recruited or transfers from bigger schools) who knew the system so he could go 0-100 right away last year. Indiana is also close enough to recruiting hotbeds to absorb talent easier than Iowa State or Minnesota.

Basically, they had a once in a lifetime coaching hire, pre-existing sports-obsessed school/state culture, and donors waiting in the woodwork to pounce on an opportunity like this. They really hit the holy trinity of program turn-arounds.
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So then why did the football program suck for so long?
 

gopherbadgerman said:
Home run hire. And yep it might not be sustained but I’d trade this two year run for 5/6 years of shit any day of the week.
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Problem is, with our program history we'd be trading a two year run for 30+ years of shit lol. Not worth it to me, I (hopefully) have too many years left
 

Jack jones said:
To answer your question - coaching.
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But it’s not like he runs some weird unique schemes that have never been seen before. He doesn’t do the play calling as far as I know. Does he do something special in game? To me it seems like his biggest strength has been talent identification and acquisition from coaches, to the high school players, to the portal.
 

One thing I really like about Cignetti is his refusal to simply accept the notion his team can't win. He doesn't believe tOSU's of the world can't be beaten.
He gets his team to believe as well.

I don't think a single person on the Gopher football team, from the head coach on down, has that belief. They are beat before the airplane lands in Columbus.
 



PMWinSTP said:
So then why did the football program suck for so long?
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  • The state's good HS talent historically went to Notre Dame, Purdue, Michigan, OSU, ACC schools, etc. They were never anyone's first choice.
  • Decades of mediocre or mismatched coaching hires for years. And because their donors were hoops-focused, there was never a push to buy out bad coaches and splurge on a bigger name.
  • Big Ten East was a gauntlet and IU had no hope.
 

USAF said:
One thing I really like about Cignetti is his refusal to simply accept the notion his team can't win. He doesn't believe tOSU's of the world can't be beaten.
He gets his team to believe as well.

I don't think a single person on the Gopher football team, from the head coach on down, has that belief. They are beat before the airplane lands in Columbus.
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It helps when Cignetti knows that the school/donors will pay whatever he needs for NIL and coaching staff salaries.

PJ sees the writing on the wall. He knows there aren't big donors coming out of the woodwork to magically bolster our NIL. He knows the administration will not pay competitive salaries to attract and keep talented assistants.

Two different worlds.
 

Two things happened that needed to happen. Financial commitment and hiring the right coach. As someone who has family that attended IU I would say going back to when they hired Kevin Wilson they've wanted to be a football power back then that's when they did the first round of upgrades to memorial stadium and started upgrading their practice facilities. During that time IU always had good offenses, food QB play just could never figure out the defense until Tom Allen showed up. Then Wilson got fired and Allen was elevated to head coach and he had a couple decent years including the Covid year with Daboer at OC. Then Penix got hurt, then followed Daboer to Washington and the bottom fell out.
IU hires Cignatti I thought it was a great hire at the time but never in a million years thought all of this would happen, but even in that first year without Cuban they increased the NIL fund and the assistant coaching salary pool went from 4-5 million under Allen to 10.5 million. In its simplist form Cignatti knew what he needed, IU gave it to him and Cignatti delivered and ROI has been huge. Cignatti may be to IU what Howard Schnellenberger was to Miami, it'll be interesting to see how it continues to go. IU invested in the program but they also hired the right guy and as we can see at a places like Nebraska, LSU, Auburn, Florida, A&M under Jimbo and others, investing isn't always enough if you don't have the right guy in charge.
 

GophEnEspaña said:
It helps when Cignetti knows that the school/donors will pay whatever he needs for NIL and coaching staff salaries.

PJ sees the writing on the wall. He knows there aren't big donors coming out of the woodwork to magically bolster our NIL. He knows the administration will not pay competitive salaries to attract and keep talented assistants.

Two different worlds.
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Nope. Money isn't the answer.
He has operated without money in his previous stops, and he didn't get the Cuban money until year 2.
Even with the Cuban money they're not just buying players. The 2026 Indiana recruiting class is similar to Minnesota's. Even rated a couple spots lower on 247. He brought 13 players with him from JMU, and he didn't get he highest rated transfers in either year so far. Hell he brought 13 players in from JMU. That's not money. That's talent evaluation and coaching.

Writing this off as "just money" is shallow reasoning at best. Likely more jealousy than reasoning.

The guy can evaluate, and coach.
 



USAF said:
Nope. Money isn't the answer.
He has operated without money in his previous stops, and he didn't get the Cuban money until year 2.
Even with the Cuban money they're not just buying players. The 2026 Indiana recruiting class is similar to Minnesota's. Even rated a couple spots lower on 247. He brought 13 players with him from JMU, and he didn't get he highest rated transfers in either year so far. Hell he brought 13 players in from JMU. That's not money. That's talent evaluation and coaching.

Writing this off as "just money" is shallow reasoning at best. Likely more jealousy than reasoning.

The guy can evaluate, and coach.
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Money is a massive part of it. He wouldn’t even be at Indiana this year if not for the financial commitment.
 

btowngopher said:
Money is a massive part of it. He wouldn’t even be at Indiana this year if not for the financial commitment.
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Money may have played a big role in keeping him at Indiana.
It has little to do with him winning. And being able to command that salary.
 

USAF said:
Money may have played a big role in keeping him at Indiana.
It has little to do with him winning. And being able to command that salary.
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As far as money goes, if you look at the recruiting rankings up until now, it has brought Indiana to Minnesota level. It will be interesting to see if the level of play is sustained, but right now, it is impressive.
 

saintpaulguy said:
Sustainable or not, I'd take it right now. I was born the year Indiana last won a Big Ten tittle.
They tied the Gophers and Purdue.
Purdue won in 2000. . Indiana this year. Minnesota has not won since.
We are sustainably not even close to winning one.
I love Gopher football, but you'd think there would be a breakout year once since 1967.
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The odds of a breakout year for MN football have now fallen to pretty much zero with the current structure of NIL.
 




Cignetti gets $11.6 million per year, MN isn’t even in the same universe to pay that salary. Much less the salary pool for the assistants. It’s 2 different leagues a universe apart.
 


btowngopher said:
But it’s not like he runs some weird unique schemes that have never been seen before. He doesn’t do the play calling as far as I know. Does he do something special in game? To me it seems like his biggest strength has been talent identification and acquisition from coaches, to the high school players, to the portal.
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I think another trait exceptional coaches have is using the talent they are able to acquire in a way that maximizes the strengths and doesn't ask them to do things they don't excel, or at least be solid doing.
 


Mendoza was reportedly paid around $3mil. That's money. Supposedly he turned down +$7mil from Tennessee and chose Indiana instead. That's coaching/salesmanship. It takes both to get where they're at.
 

mplarson7 said:
Let me just say that I'm an IU grad, and even we don't fully understand what is happening.
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My brother is an IU grad and I grew up following IU and what I can say is the money was always there, they just didn't have a coach with a blueprint. I always wondered what it would have been if Kalen DeBoer had been promoted instead of Tom Allen.
 

Some Day...Maybe said:
Cignetti gets $11.6 million per year, MN isn’t even in the same universe to pay that salary. Much less the salary pool for the assistants. It’s 2 different leagues a universe apart.
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People complain why we arent better, this is one reason of many why. The U doesn't care about sports, champagne on a Red, White, Blue beer budget. The people here are in love with the underwhelming team at US Bank stadium, the Gophers and the U are an afterthought. Still amazes me that the school cant fill a 50K stadium with being the only D1/BCS team in the state or whatever they are calling themselves these days.
 
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Some Day...Maybe said:
Cignetti gets $11.6 million per year, MN isn’t even in the same universe to pay that salary. Much less the salary pool for the assistants. It’s 2 different leagues a universe apart.
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In Cignetti's 1st year his assistant pool was smaller than Fleck's. Look it up.

Most of his assistants are long time staff. He got them paid when he had the power.

People writing this off as only money are just blind to reality.
 





Gilthorp57 said:
My brother is an IU grad and I grew up following IU and what I can say is the money was always there, they just didn't have a coach with a blueprint. I always wondered what it would have been if Kalen DeBoer had been promoted instead of Tom Allen.
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Danny B and Sinkyn went to IU. This is so exciting!
 



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