Indiana came out on top and paid the price

SOUTH BEND, Ind. – Indiana coach Curt Cignetti is a wildly popular figure in part because of the brash manner in which he rose to the job…and his ability to get his team to support him on the ground.

Whether it’s hurling insults at Purdue, Michigan and Ohio State, telling the uninformed to “Google him” or using national forums to brag about his team or himself, Cignetti wins hearts and minds with his mouth.

His teams keep the fans in their corner with an aggressive, well-executed style of play on both sides of the ball.

What would a Cignetti team be without this advantage? The defense… as nasty as it gets. Putting licks on the quarterback. Making running backs pay a heavy price when trying to maintain a running game.

The offense with its RPO game, well-balanced run-pass attack and willingness to take a chance from time to time to keep the opposition off balance.

This is the reason for the Cignetti teams. But in the biggest moment of the season, Indiana abandoned its aggressiveness out of caution. The edge was missing, and it showed in a 27-17 loss to Notre Dame in the first round of the College Football Playoff.

Notre Dame did so many things right that maybe Indiana’s level of aggression wouldn’t have mattered, but there were so many moments – obvious while watching the game live or revealed after the game by the participants – who made you wonder where Indiana’s mojo went.

This is not a team that typically settles for field goals when faced with a fourth down deep in enemy territory. This is not a team that sits back and absorbs a scoring streak that was 9:03 behind. This is not a team that kicks from Notre Dame territory (this was the third punt in Notre Dame territory or from midfield) with 10:34 left when the deficit is by 17 points.

The latter was a real shock. Yes, Indiana’s offense had struggled up to this point in the game. Yes, a successful conversion was against all odds. Yes, Indiana’s defense should be reliable enough to get stops.

But what did Indiana have to lose? If you convert the fourth down, you put some much-needed wind in your sails. If you don’t, so what? This point in the game is the time to be aggressive, but the Hoosiers have fallen into a shell.

Even stranger, Cignetti said he wanted to be aggressive, but talked himself out of it.

“I didn’t want to punt, but I didn’t want to go (for that) fourth-and-10. It’s like you’re wishing and hoping,” Cignetti said. “You have nothing to rely on to be able to convert on fourth-and-10 at this point. And there’s still time to clear if you win the game. So that was the reason why. I didn’t want to do it. But I felt like it was the best decision.

The problem was that Indiana got the less desirable outcome anyway. Notre Dame scored after the punt to take its largest lead of 27-3. Cignetti should have trusted his original instincts.

The response also demonstrated a lack of confidence in the offense. Sure, that lack of confidence was probably justified, but since when has Cignetti not given his teams confidence in their ability to execute? The lack of confidence is off-script for Cignetti.

That punt decision was the most obvious regret Indiana should have. But there were other things, less obvious.

Defensive coordinator Bryant Haines was beside himself after the game for being too conservative.

“They get the ball on the 2-yard line. I made a simple sort of dropped call. I thought I would be even more aggressive. I was talking to Aiden Fisher; you want to go attack them, maybe we can get two points here? said Haines, who was explaining what sparked Jeremiah Love’s 98-yard touchdown run.

“No, let’s make a nice conservative appeal. You mess up a little bit and the thing rips you apart for 98 yards and six scores. That’s how small the margin for error is against elite teams. That’s how I felt against Ohio State. I felt that again tonight,” he added.

Haines regretted not calling the game as aggressively as he wanted.

“In my mind, I saw a chance to be aggressive. But, again, for me, a lot of it depends on the flow of the game. Whether it’s how the offense went? What is the position in the field? Haines said.

“I wanted to be aggressive against Ohio State. Maybe they get the ball on the 30-yard line. This changes things. There’s situational football in there,” he continued.

“Looking back on it, especially on the third try, I was planning to be a little more aggressive. But those 35 seconds go by quickly. You have to come up with a call, put everything together. And hindsight is 20/20.

I don’t know what stopped the coaches from being as aggressive as they wanted to be. As of this writing (a few hours after the match), Cignetti is already being criticized nationally for his timidity. Given how much he loves to talk, and his choice words spoken during College GameDay about beating top 25 fringe teams are just going to boomerang on him, Cignetti is going to be a magnet for this type of scrutiny if he doesn’t is not supported. results.

Linebacker Aiden Fisher got into the thick of things. He wasn’t talking about any of the comments made by Cignetti or Haines. But he noted that Indiana has strayed from some of its fundamentals — notably the level of aggression they inflicted on Nebraska, Washington and Michigan State.

“We got to this point by just being ourselves and playing the way we play, and in these big games you can’t turn away from that; you just have to play your game and be disciplined in the way you play, and just things like that, just the little things that ultimately led to big things,” Fisher said.

Hard to say that considering Indiana was down from Friday night. The quality of Notre-Dame has a lot to do with it.

Ultimately, the Hoosiers committed the cardinal sin of pulling punches at a time when they absolutely needed to be aggressive in an attempt to impose their will on a play or get back into the contest.

That Indiana went in the opposite direction and erred on the side of caution to its own detriment was a development that might have been the most surprising — and disappointing — of all.

Indiana is out, but when you go out without swinging, it stings even worse.