Indiana keeps forcing its way into the college football conversation, and not everybody is enjoying the ride.
The Hoosiers have spent the last two seasons rewriting what their program can be under Curt Cignetti. After taking over before the 2024 season, Cignetti guided Indiana to an 11-2 finish, its first double-digit-win season, and a trip to the College Football Playoff. Then came an even bigger leap: Indiana went 16-0 and won the first national championship in program history.
That kind of rise was always going to draw attention, and it has. But it has also drawn eye rolls. ESPN’s Paul Finebaum said on “The Paul Finebaum Show” that the chatter around Indiana has become too much for him after joking about being around Indiana graduates while doing “First Take.”
“The Indiana conversation is fairly nauseating,” Finebaum said.
The skepticism is easy to understand when a program with Indiana’s history suddenly turns into an undefeated national champion in such a short span. Still, the Hoosiers keep answering with results. They opened this season ranked No. 6 and handled a revamped North Texas team in emphatic fashion, rolling to a 52-16 win.
Josh Hoover settled in immediately in his first game for Indiana, completing 13-of-16 passes for 231 yards and four touchdowns without an interception. The Hoosiers also piled up 134 rushing yards and added three scores on the ground.
For Indiana, the challenge now is bigger than proving the opener was real. The Hoosiers have already done that work with a national title and another convincing win.
What comes next is whether they can keep stacking performances against tougher competition, including a home game against No. 1 Ohio State in October.
For now, the conversation has shifted from whether Cignetti’s breakthrough season was a one-off. Indiana has already answered that. The bigger question is how long the Hoosiers can stay in the sport’s top tier before even the loudest doubters have to back off.
Indiana plays Howard on Saturday at noon ET on the Big Ten Network.
In Other News...
Indiana Still Faces An Eligibility Fight With Two Key Players
A court hearing that could affect several athletes, including two Indiana University football players, has been pushed back to Monday, leaving the Hoosiers in a familiar holding pattern as the season gets underway. For now, a temporary restraining order remains in place, giving those players an extra year of eligibility and clearing them to take the field this weekend while the legal fight plays out.
The case centers on a challenge to an NCAA eligibility rule tied to athletes in the high school class of 2022, and it has become one of those off-field issues programs would rather not have hanging over the roster. For Indiana, the immediate concern is simple enough: the players are available today, but their longer-term status is still tied to a hearing that has yet to happen. [Read more 🡒]
Former Hoosiers Are Suddenly Everywhere For NFL Week 1
Indiana footballs reach into the NFL got an early-season reminder in Week 1, when former Hoosiers showed up on active rosters across the league in a way the program has never quite seen before. Indiana already had plenty to celebrate after setting a school record with eight players taken in the 2026 NFL Draft, a group led by No. 1 overall pick Fernando Mendoza, but the next step has been even more striking: the pipeline didnt stop on draft weekend.
A total of 18 former Hoosiers made NFL 53-man rosters for Week 1, with five more landing on practice squads, giving Indiana an unusually visible footprint once the games started. The article goes on to track those ex-Hoosiers appearing in action around the league, a sign that the programs recent surge is translating beyond Bloomington and into the kind of pro-level presence that keeps a college fan base checking Sunday boxes with a little more interest than usual. [Read more 🡒]
Indiana Is Gaining Early Momentum With A Tackle Recruit To Watch
Indianas season opener against North Texas did more than give fans an early look at Curt Cignettis program. It also put the Hoosiers in front of one of the more intriguing young linemen to watch in the 2028 class, as Jacob Van der Kooy of Oconomowoc High School made the trip to Bloomington and came away impressed by what he saw on and off the field.
Van der Kooy singled out Cignetti, Bob Bostad and Zack Leeds for the way they carried themselves, and he also noted the gameday atmosphere and the academic offerings at Indiana. He does not yet have an offer from the Hoosiers, but he sounds open to the possibility if his development keeps trending the right way, which gives Indiana at least an early foothold with a prospect worth tracking. [Read more 🡒]