As of this morning, there are exactly five unbeaten teams remaining in BCS college football’s Top 25. You would have likely not gotten long odds on the current number one, Oregon, and you might not have been laughed at if you had suggested the number four Miami Hurricanes. And if you really knew your stuff and you had a good idea of how their conferences were shaking out, you might have also been justified in nominating the Big 12’s BYU or the AAC’s brave old Army team.
But, honestly, would you have predicted what’s gone down in Bloomington, Indiana so far this fall? As WDRB.com’s Philip Steinmetz shared late yesterday, if you did, it might have been merely part of what began as an inside joke.
In 2019, Homefield Apparel began selling a #9WINDIANA T-shirt after Indiana University football fans created the hashtag with the hopes of the program achieving nine wins that season.
But that didn’t happen as IU lost 23-22 to Tennessee in the TaxSlayer Gator Bowl to finish with eight wins. Then from 2021-2023 IU compiled a 9-27 record.
On Saturday, under first-year coach Curt Cignetti, #9WINDIANA finally became real for fans as the Hoosiers moved to 9-0 after defeating Michigan State 47-10, in East Lansing, Michigan.
The last time Indiana won nine games in a season was 1967 and the program had never achieved a perfect 9-0 start.
That’s right, the only Indiana coach to ever reach 9-0 previously was named Bobby Knight.
Even the hometown boosters had difficultuy embracing that possibility, as the INDIANAPOLIS STAR’s Matthew Glenesk confessed in his writeup:
In August, we asked IndyStar’s IU Insider Zach Osterman to make his Indiana football season predictions. With a first-year coach and a remade roster, Zach went a bit bold with his prediction, declaring the Hoosiers would finally reach #9WINDIANA.
And you all laughed at him. Who’s laughing now?
Heck, even the coach himself is at a bit of a loss for words.
“They continue to play consistently,” Cignetti said. “It’s never perfect. And they’re never satisfied. Never satisfied.”
(Quarterback) Kurtis Rourke finished 19-29 with 263 yards and four touchdowns in his first game back since having surgery on his right thumb.
And yet–in the overloaded Big Ten, with the strong legacy programs of Ohio State and Penn State having gone head-to-head yesterday with the Buckeyes escaping with a win, the Hoosiers are merely the fourth highest-ranked Big Ten team.
But none to worry. They will have a chance to truly show the remaining skeptics what they are capable of in three weeks when they visit Ohio State (assuming, of course, they’re unable to knock off a Michigan team at home this coming Saturday; the same Wolverine squad that succumbed at home to the Ducks yesterday).
And even a competitive loss would likely keep the Hoosiers in contention for the CFB playoff–and its first actual chance at a football championship.
“For some reason,” junior defensive end Mikail Kamara said, “people still don’t believe in us, so we’ve just go keep going.”
Well, you’ve got at least one contributor to this site believing. As for the other, you will soon have your shot. Good luck!!
Courage…