New Indiana football coach trolls Ohio State Football

The Indiana football team made news this past week when they fired Tom Allen on Sunday before hiring Curt Cignetti only five days later. The Ohio State football team always took care of IU. Cignetti has most recently coached the James Madison football team to an 11-1 record in only their second season in Division I Football Bowl Subdivision as a member of the Sun Belt Conference. In five seasons as the Duke’s head coach, Cignetti has a record of 52-9.

Cignetti, who played as a quarterback for West Virginia in the early 1980s, has been slowly climbing up the coaching ranks since 1983. Every stop along the way, Cignetti has been a winner. Now the 62-year-old veteran will face his greatest challenge yet; making a winner out of Indiana.

"“I am excited to lead this program forward and change the culture, mindset, and expectation level of Hoosier football,” Cignetti said in a statement at his introductory press conference. “I want to thank director of athletics Scott Dolson and President Pam Whitten, and I look forward to working with both in building something special at IU. Both share my vision and belief that big things are ahead for the IU program.”"

Cignetti inherits a program that is coming off a third consecutive losing season going 9-26 during that stretch, which was the second worst among Power-Five schools during that time. The price tag for Indiana to make this move wasn’t cheap.

The Indiana Athletic Department and Allen were able to come to terms on his buyout, which was reportedly at $20 million, but was agreed to be reduced to $15.5 million which will be paid out in two $7.75 million installments over the next two seasons according to CBS Sports.

Now that Indiana has their shiny new coach, Cignetti didn’t take long to make some noise. On an interview on the Big Ten Network, which was being aired from inside Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis, Indiana, the site of the Big Ten Championship game, Cignetti cheekily stated, “I figured that I should make this trip up here since we’ll be playing in this game next year.”

Not to outdo himself, but at the Indiana versus Maryland basketball game on Friday evening, Cignetti was introduced to the home crowd at Assembly Hall and stated, “Hey look. I’m super fired up about this opportunity. I’ve never taken a backseat to anybody and I don’t plan on starting now. Purdue sucks. But so does Michigan and Ohio State.”

I get the Purdue reference. That’s Indiana’s in-state rival. But calling out Michigan and the Ohio State football program? That seems like a man who has zero self-awareness and misguided self-confidence. Does this guy have a death wish? Winning at Indiana University of Pennsylvania and James Madison is one thing, doing it at Indiana University is a completely different story.

The Ohio State football team currently has a 28-game win streak over the Hoosiers in football, which is the longest in Big Ten football history. The Buckeyes are scheduled to host Indiana on November 23, the week before the Michigan game, next season.