Big talk, little walk from Curt Cignetti in Hoosiers' CFP loss to Notre Dame

SOUTH BEND, Ind. — It was nearly midnight when the door to the visiting media room flew open and in walked Indiana head coach Curt Cignetti, the ripsnorting rabble-rouser whose trophy cabinet is bursting with national honors after guiding the Indiana Hoosiers to their best season in school history, a turnaround that will never be forgotten. Hours earlier, before the snow in Notre Dame Stadium had fully melted, Cignetti appeared on the set of "College Gameday" and ignited social media with his latest batch of cocksure comments. Sandwiched between the legendary Nick Saban and former NFL punter Pat McAfee, now a prominent personality at ESPN, Cignetti declared that programs he’s coached "don’t just beat top-25 teams, we beat the s--- out of them." At which point he sat back and crossed his arms while everyone on the dais hollered with delight.

But that wasn’t the same Cignetti who sauntered into a postgame news conference with his metaphorical tail tucked between his legs, a string of puzzlingly conservative decisions in his wake. The scoreboard at Notre Dame Stadium might have showed a modest 27-17 win for Notre Dame, which had entered the weekend as a sizable betting favorite, but nothing about the game itself was close. Cignetti’s team trailed by 24 points with fewer than five minutes remaining after Fighting Irish quarterback Riley Leonard plunged into the end zone for a 1-yard score. Were it not for two touchdowns in the final 90 seconds — long after most Indiana fans had already departed — the optics would have been even worse for a team whose résumé was loudly questioned over the final two months of the regular season.

"The hardest thing on a night like this is saying ‘goodbye’ to your kids," Cignetti quipped as he positioned himself behind a microphone. "They’re hurting because their old man got his a-- kicked."

And it really was an a-- kicking. An Indiana offense that entered the postseason ranked second in the nation in scoring at 43.3 points per game was held to a single field goal for the first 58 minutes and change. Three of the Hoosiers’ first seven meaningful drives gained 2 yards or fewer, including two that went backward. Another ended with a backbreaking interception from quarterback Kurtis Rourke, whose three worst outings of the season in terms of completion percentage came against the three best teams Indiana faced: Michigan (60.7%), Ohio State (44.4%) and Notre Dame (60.6%). The defense, which played with remarkable effort, was undone by scores of missed tackles and one gap issue that sprung tailback Jeremiyah Love for a 98-yard touchdown run to open the scoring. Punter Evan James shanked his first two kicks and got an earful from Cignetti each time he returned to the sideline.

The second and third quarters produced a fascinating display of histrionics from Cignetti, who paced the length of Indiana’s bench time and time again, isolating himself 30 or 40 yards from the remainder of his coaching staff. How tightly could one man cross his arms in frustration after each of his team’s eight failures on third down? "Our offense was doing nothing," Cignetti said. How powerfully could one man slam fists into his own hips whenever one of Notre Dame’s skill players wriggled free from a defender’s grasp? "We played good people that moved faster," Cignetti said. How sarcastically could one man grin when his last-second timeout before an unusual fake field goal attempt by the Fighting Irish wiped away what would have been a fourth-down stop? "You never get everything you want in life," Cignetti said.

The lopsidedness of the game itself dulled what had been an otherwise magical day for college football, which ushered in its ballyhooed 12-team playoff. There was minimal traffic on the ride into South Bend on Friday afternoon, but not for any absence of enthusiasm among Hoosier and Fighting Irish faithful. Instead, fans had flooded into this small city beginning in the wee hours of the morning, before 7 a.m., with videos of cars lined up for parking amid ongoing snow squalls quickly making the rounds on social media; such was the excitement surrounding the first-ever College Football Playoff game played on a campus site. It was a half hour later when the official X account for Notre Dame’s athletic department shared a photo of the snow-swept stadium with three snowballs stacked in the foreground like a miniature version of Frosty.

But come mid-afternoon, by which point the precipitation had faded and the temperature climbed into the 30s, every corner of Notre Dame’s campus reverberated with beverage-clutching fans from all corners of the state and beyond. There were two violinists holding an impromptu concert on the doorstep of O’Rourke’s Public House, a bustling bar at the corner of E. Angela Boulevard and N. Eddy Street, just beyond the entrance to the school’s manicured grounds. Swarms of fans migrated past the Raclin Murphy Museum of Art toward the parking lots alongside the stadium, where Irish flags speckled the skyline and canopy tents stretched to the horizon. Indiana fans donning the school’s famous candy stripe pants were mingling with Notre Dame fans dressed like leprechauns or Santa Claus or Buddy Hobbs, the protagonist in "Elf." One man poked his head from the yellow-tipped butt of a life-sized cigarette costume to further the play on words with Cignetti’s last name. A cart outside the Ara Parseghian Gate, named for the famous Fighting Irish coach who won national championships in 1966 and 1973, peddled hot chocolate for $5.49 per cup to fans whose tailgating efforts needed a shot of warmth. Streams of private planes descending into the local airport hummed overhead.

"Hoo-, hoo-, hoo-, hoo-siers!" a handful of Hoosier faithful shouted on their walk between the stadium and the Joyce Center, home of Notre Dame’s basketball teams. "Loo-, loo-, loo-, loo-sers!" a snarky band of Fighting Irish supporters fired back, mimicking the rhythm and cadence of the chant. Both sides shared a laugh.

There was so much for everyone to be excited about in this reawakening of what some were dubbing the Indiana State Championship, with the two campuses separated by fewer than 200 miles. Not since 1991 had the Fighting Irish and Hoosiers faced each other on a football field to renew a rivalry that dates to the 19th century. Since then, the former had grown accustomed to competing for national championships. But the latter has lost more games than any other FBS program and reached 11 wins for the first time in school history.

Which is why there was still a twinge of pride in Cignetti’s voice as he answered questions about how this year’s Indiana team should be remembered. Sure, the Hoosiers had been clobbered by Notre Dame in a game they had little chance of winning. But they’d also set a new standard under Cignetti in an unforgettable Year 1.

"Had a historic season, right?" Cignetti said. "Set the foundation for hopefully what’s to come."

Michael Cohen covers college football and basketball for FOX Sports with an emphasis on the Big Ten. Follow him at @Michael_Cohen13.

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