Indiana football: Hoosiers are no longer the underdog after stomping Alabama and Oregon. They’re not taking their foot off the gas just yet
Atlanta
—
They stood a few yards apart on the confetti-strewn field, one a redshirt senior offensive lineman who serves as the anchor of his team, the other a sophomore defensive lineman who has yet to log his first career start.
They were discussing the same big thing – the machine that is now the Indiana Hoosiers – but from entirely different perspectives. Yet both said the same word over and over again.
“We’re afraid to death of complacency,’’ said Pat Coogan, the lineman.
“We never want to be complacent,’’ said Daniel Ndukwe, the defensive lineman.
It sounds simple. It is not, of course. No one wants to settle at anything but the human spirit being what it is, invariably it happens. A slight ease off the gas pedal, a millisecond taking the eye off the prize, the need to catch one’s breath.
Except, apparently, among the Hoosiers who play football as if not playing football hard would be an unforgivable sin. It is the only way to explain what Indiana is doing right now because otherwise it is too absurd.
The reckoning in college football is not coming via financial windfall, as everyone thought that it might in the NIL era. It is coming via old-school values that tend to seep into the soil in the Midwest. Work hard. Take nothing for granted. Don’t settle. Never get complacent.
Indiana is not the “Hoosiers” of film fame. They are not, in fact, the plucky little upstarts going against the big city bad guys. Do not let Fernando Mendoza’s earnestness fool you. The Hoosiers are the bad guys, the bullies come to take your pride and your lunch money, albeit politely. As Carter Smith made his way to the celebratory post Peach Bowl stage he yelled, “Excuse me,’”over and over again as he zigged and zagged his way through the media.
With a 56-22 dismantling of Oregon, Indiana has romped through this College Football Playoff like nothing the sport has seen in years, if ever. In the last three games, the Hoosiers have held Ohio State to 10 points, Alabama to three and Oregon to 21, though that should come with an asterisk. The Ducks scored their last touchdown with 34 seconds left in the game.
That is, to underscore, Ohio State, Alabama and Oregon. The first two have won 25 national titles between them. Indiana has lost more than 700 games in its history and now is one game away from a national title.
Next up is none other than The U, yet another member of the college football hoi polloi, in a championship game that might require organ donation to get a ticket. The Miami Hurricanes are at home, while the entire state of Indiana – save for some in West Lafayette – is content to abandon their homes to enjoy this unexpectedly stupefying playoff march.
Lest anyone try to bill this as some sort of morality play, the good boys from Indiana versus the meanies from Miami, it is best to remember that Indiana is the top seed; it’s Miami that had to fight its way into the bracket.
“They’re complete,’’ Oregon coach Dan Lanning said. “There’s not a weakness in their game. They run the ball well. They stop the run well. They throw the ball well. They defend the pass well. They’re great on special teams. So you see a really complete, well-coached team. They obviously have a ton of belief and deservedly so.’’
That is the crux of it; Indiana is good at everything. It’s almost like a bait and switch. Worry about the offense and the defense gets you. Fret about finding ways to score and the offense punishes you. And then special teams piles on.
If the offensive line deserved the MVP trophy in the Rose Bowl, the spoils should have gone to the defense here. On the first play from scrimmage in the game, D’Angelo Ponds expected an RPO play from Oregon quarterback Dante Moore. Ponds read Moore’s eyes the whole way and when Moore threw the ball to the left side, Ponds jumped the route and sauntered 25 yards into the end zone.
If you want to know what it sounds like when an entire state erupts, listen to the replay. All of Indiana cheered.
The defense then proceeded to gift wrap 14 more points to the offense. It set up first-and-goal from the three after Mario Landino jumped on a Dante Moore fumble in the second quarter, and gave the Hoosiers the ball on the 21 when Ndukwe pancaked Moore to force another fumble. In the fourth quarter and the game well in hand, Ndukwe blocked James Ferguson-Reynolds’ punt, handing IU the ball on the seven.
The Hoosiers’ defensive stalwartness has not exactly been lost; they are ranked No. 2 in the country but the surgical precision and disarming charm that Mendoza brings to the offense does tend to suck up a lot of the spotlight.
It should not. Indiana’s defense is masterful, a plug-and-play roster that is annihilating opponents without its leading tackler. Stephen Daley suffered a freak injury celebrating the Big Ten championship and hasn’t played in the playoff.
No matter. The Hoosiers simply find other guys. Ndukwe had all of eight tackles in his first 14 games; he had three against Oregon, including two sacks, the forced fumble and then the blocked punt cherry on top.
“When you have good people and they buy in and they prepare the right way, we have a lot of those guys,’’ head coach Curt Cignetti said “They’re high character, smart guys.’’
Like Cignetti, defensive coordinator Bryant Haines came up the old-fashioned way, starting at schools most folks don’t know exist – Manchester, a Division 3 school in Fort Wayne; Adrian, another D-3 outpost in Michigan. He’s now one of the highest paid coordinators in college football, courtesy of a mad scientist approach to defense.
The 40-year-old cooks up ways to make quarterbacks miserable in his sleep, devising schemes that are meant to lure as much as they are intended to confuse. He says he’s toned things down as he’s gotten older, learned when to take risks and how to better mix up his coverages.
“That’s what I call him, a mad scientist,’’ said Ndukwe, who grew up in Lithonia, Georgia, and relished the home game. “I’m doing things that I’ve never done before and you can just see other teams, they get confused. You can feel how it affects them.”’
Moore looked at times overwhelmed, either dancing in the pocket anxiously trying to find an open receiver or swarmed as the pocket collapsed. He is in good company. Ohio State’s Justin Sayin threw a pick and was sacked five times, and Alabama’s Ty Simpson threw for only 67 yards before leaving with a cracked rib.
“They show you one thing,” Lanning said earlier this week, “and take something else away. They’re really good at post-snap movement, which makes it difficult for the quarterback. Their defensive line plays with relentless effort. They’re tough to block up front. And then the technique continues to show up.”
Everything at Indiana continues to show up again and again like a metronome of consistency, their mantra so ingrained even the university president sings the same tune.
While booster Mark Cuban barked “Hoo hoo Hoosiers!” outside the locker room with fans, Pamela Whitten unassumedly walked past the locker room before stopping to chat with a pair of reporters.
“This is great, isn’t it?” she said. “But we still have one more game.’’
No time for complacency.
