Curt Cignetti has completely changed the narrative surrounding the Indiana football program in just 10 short months as the Hoosiers' head coach.
The Hoosiers' first-year head coach has taken a perennial bottom feeder and turned them into the first bowl eligible team in the FBS this season.
Following Indiana's 41-24 victory over Northwestern on Saturday, Cignetti had plenty of reason to celebrate. His team had just improved to 6-0 for the first time since 1967, and they'd become bowl eligible for the first time since 2020.
Instead of resting on their laurels, Cignetti and the Hoosiers are choosing a different approach. For them, there's no reason to celebrate. For these Hoosiers, a group unlike any Indiana team ever seen before, the job is far from finished.
"I'm proud of the team up to this point," Cignetti said postgame, "which I'm not supposed to say. But we can certainly improve a lot more and we're only halfway through the regular season."
While Indiana's historic start to the season has shifted the perception surrounding the program, Cignetti and his Hoosiers won't let the team's early season success distract them from their ultimate goals.
One of the biggest reasons for Indiana's undefeated start to the season is that each and every player amongst Cignett's bunch has bought in and embraced the mindset that's been instilled in them ever since the 63-year-old head coach took over the job back in late November.
"Right now, this is not the goal," redshirt junior defensive end Mikail Kamara said. "Being 6-0 is not necessarily the goal. The goal is to go and try to win a Natty. This is fantastic, but this is not the end."
The Hoosiers' laser focus on continues improvement and avoiding complacency has become commonplace for the 2024 Hoosiers.
On Saturday, Cignetti became just the second head coach in the history of the program to become bowl eligible in his first season at the helm of the Hoosiers. For Cignetti, the process of instilling that confident and business-like mentality is all part of the process, which for him started on day one and hasn't stopped since.
“When you take over a program, the number one thing you gotta do is change the way people think,” Cignetti said. “Change the way people think. The way you play the game, the expectation level, your standards, how you do things, the fan base, what to expect. You gotta change the way people think."
"So we have a blueprint," Cignetti carried on. "We have a way we play. We’ve got character. We’ve got some talent, right, and they’re playing like all of our other teams have played in those situations.”
Indiana's seemingly overnight success has surprised many on the outside of the program. For those within it, the Hoosiers' 6-0 start to the season isn't only not surprising, but it's expected.
With that being said, college football -- and college sports in general -- is a volatile world. One of the many veterans on this experience-laden Indiana roster, fifth-year senior wide receiver Ke'Shawn Williams, knows all too well how quickly things can change.
He understands the importance and the necessity of avoiding complacency, as the Hoosiers move forward. If they don't, everything Cigneti and this team has built through the first six weeks of the season could be all for naught.
"You got to understand that preseason, they didn't have us doing anything special," Williams said. "If we go out there in two weeks and lose, they're going to say, 'The old Indiana is back.' So we can't get caught up in opinions from outside what's going on in-house."
Over the last two weeks, Indiana has found itself in unfamiliar situations. The Hoosiers dominated each opponent in front of them throughout the first quarter of the year, but the last two weeks have been a different story.
In the win over Maryland, and even more so in this past weekend's victory of Northwestern, Indiana was thrust into tight, adverse scenarios for the first time this season. Each time it looked like the Hoosiers might falter, Cignetti's bunch remained undaunted.
After Northwestern narrowed Indiana's second half lead to just three points in the fourth quarter, the Hosiers scored back-to-back touchdowns to secure the win. In those late game moments, where it seems like the outcome of the game was hanging in the balance, it pays to have experienced players at so many key positions around the field.
One of those players with a plethora of college football experience is sixth-year senior quarterback Kurtis Rourke, who threw for 380 yards and three touchdowns on Saturday. As he continued his hot start to the season, instead of basking in all the success, Rourke emphasized the importance of staying grounded and focused throughout the back half of the schedule.
"Coach Cignetti talked about keeping that chip on our shoulder, that's very important," Rourke said. "We've had a great first half of the season, but we have a big second half as well. We have to keep that chip on [our shoulder] and know that there's going to be doubters no matter what and not get complacent."
The idea of remaining focused has been hammered into these Hoosiers ever since Cignetti's introductory press conference in early November when the new Hoosier head coach laid out his plan to wage a consistent war on complacency.
That approach isn't just a broad, team-wide attitude either. Rourke, who through six weeks has thrown for nearly 2,000 yards, 14 touchdowns and just two interceptions, has adopted that sort of mindset when reflecting on his own individual play as well.
"One of the biggest emphases moving forward for myself especially is to start faster and start better," Rourke said, claiming he still has plenty of room to grow this year. "It was a great statistical game, but it helps build my confidence knowing that there's so much more out there as well."
All the success the Hoosiers have enjoyed to begin the season ins't a fluke; it's the result of deliberate preparation and a relentless focus on the process. Indiana's first-year head coach has preached consistency, as he attempts to ensure his team remains steady through both the highs and the lows of a long season.
"We have an older team," Cignetti said. "I'm not really concerned about them reading their accolades on social media because they've been around the block a little bit."
As the Hoosiers enter their first bye week of the season, they currently sit undefeated and nationally ranked. Nonetheless, Indiana has its sights set higher.
"We can celebrate this one right now in the moment, but we know that this isn't the ultimate goal, to be 6-0," Williams said. "The goal is just to keep winning and being a great team and continuing to have success as a unit."
The Hoosiers' journey under Cignetti is only now just beginning. Their transformation from afterthoughts to contenders has been shocking for everyone but themselves.
Even still, after one of the best starts to a season in program history, the mission remains unfinished for Cignetti and his team.
Junior wide receiver Elijah Sarratt put it best: "It's an every day process with us, we're never satisfied."
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