Indiana shouldn't be here. Then Cignetti showed up

To truly appreciate where you're going in life, you often have to look at where you've been.

In the case of Indiana football, revisiting the past should come with a parental advisory warning.

The Hoosiers haven't just been bad, they've been the worst ... literally. Indiana entered the 2025 season with the most losses ever at the FBS level and sported a laughable 1-72 record against AP top-5 teams.

While most programs reserve significant space, or even a room, for trophies and awards in their football facilities, Indiana needed only a single shelf. With just two Big Ten titles and three bowl wins in 127 seasons, the Hoosiers' trophy collection was hardly robust.

Only Northwestern and Maryland drew fewer fans per game than Indiana in 2023, the year before it hired Curt Cignetti. There's a reason the football season in Bloomington used to last just two months, often feeling like a brief prelude to the beloved Hoosiers' basketball campaign.

Cignetti became the 23rd head coach in program history two years ago. Not one of the previous 22 left the job with a winning record.

So how the hell are we just days away from the Hoosiers - the lowly Hoosiers - taking the field in Miami as the only undefeated team with a shot at the national title?

All roads lead back to Cignetti.

With a name and demeanor that suggest he's a police captain in a '90s procedural drama, Cignetti brought a boatload of players to Indiana from his previous stop at James Madison. The personnel provided an instant boost to the roster, but it may not have been the most important thing the coach arrived with.

Cignetti exudes an overwhelming confidence that dominates the room every time he speaks. That self-assurance is what made him comfortable enough on the day he was hired to walk onto the Indiana basketball court during a timeout and loudly proclaim over the microphone, "Purdue sucks, but so does Michigan and Ohio State."

Just 20 days later, at a National Signing Day press conference, Cignetti dropped his now-iconic 'I win, Google Me' line - a phrase we've been hearing on endless loop after a reporter asked him how he attracts recruits.

OK, Curt. First, you piqued our curiosity; now you have our attention.

The bombastic comments got people talking about Indiana football and proved that, despite being born in 1961, few people in the sport knew how to go viral better than Cignetti.

While those clips continue to follow Cignetti everywhere he goes, it's something he said during this year's narrow win at Penn State that truly reveals how he's been able to completely flip the narrative around Indiana from doormat to national powerhouse.

The Hoosiers were 0-13 all-time at Beaver Stadium, a stat FOX Sports' Jenny Taft asked Cignetti about before kickoff. The response was simple, brief, and incredibly telling.

"This team has never played here."

Using just six words, Cignetti made it clear that this isn't the same Indiana program burdened by a dismal 534-715-44 overall record. Under his leadership, these Hoosiers are the best team in college football, boasting a sparkling 26-2 mark.

There might be 125 years of losing on Indiana's resume, but that was in the B.C. era (Before Cignetti). Although the IU remains on the helmet, this ain't your father's, grandfather's, or great-grandfather's Hoosiers.

Cignetti seems hell-bent on using every snap to prove that Indiana belongs, making the program's previous century-plus of losing irrelevant. That's especially evident in how the Hoosiers finish blowout wins. There's no letup whatsoever, with Cignetti's trademark scowl on the sideline indicating he's offended by anything less than a 30-point win.

That's how you build up the largest point differential in the CFP era.

Clemson, Ohio State, Georgia, Alabama, LSU. That's the type of company Indiana now finds itself in.

Only Miami stands in the way of the first perfect season in the 12-team playoff era, a first national championship for Indiana, and perhaps the most unbelievable turnaround in the history of college sports.

If Cignetti and the Hoosiers seal the deal, Hollywood executives should be rushing to make the coach's comments after the Rose Bowl win a reality.

"It would be a helluva movie."