They’ve been glossed over all season, legitimate concerns ignored because they're Indiana and they've proven it.
But have they?
Have the Hoosiers, the unthinkable college football success story of the past two years, proven anything this season?
They self-imploded at home in the biggest game of the season against Ohio State, a comedy of turnovers and missed opportunity and unforced errors unlike anything we’ve seen in two seasons of near perfection under coach Curt Cignetti.
They needed a 14-point fourth quarter at Nebraska, in a game the Huskers did all they could to give Indiana the game — then did.
They needed overtime to beat one-dimensional Michigan, which couldn’t throw
the ball downfield while playing a freshman backup quarterback making his first start.
They needed overtime to beat Minnesota at home, and only after a 60-yard field goal at the end of regulation covered Cignetti’s colossally bad time management decisions.
And now they’ve been given a gift from the College Football Playoff selection committee, a No. 4 ranking in the first poll of the process. Without a win over a current Top 25 team.
After the ugly win last week against Minnesota, Cignetti spoke about another gritty, improbable comeback, declaring the Hoosiers, “found a way to overcome.”
They’ve overcome injured and ineffective quarterback Josh Hoover, who wasn’t playing all that well when he was healthy, and certainly wasn’t earning his fat NIL deal. Overcome a run game that in 2025 was the unheralded key to everything, and is now the straggler of an offense that can’t consistently win at the point of attack.
In the past four games against Nebraska, Ohio State, Michigan and Minnesota, Indiana has averaged 103 yards rushing per game, and a measly 3.5 yards per carry.
Now, the dagger: outside of the joke nonconference schedule of Moe, Larry and Curly, five of Indiana’s six games have been one-possession games. Two were won on the last play of the game, one was lost on the last play, and two others were secured with less than a minute to play.
Nothing about that resume screams No. 4 team in the country. It does, however, show deferential treatment from the CFP selection committee.
If you didn’t think Indiana had officially made it, there should be no question now. The obvious wink-wink, nod-nod is typically reserved for Alabama and an occasional SEC team.
Now here we are, and Indiana is the team that refuses to lose unless it absolutely, positively can’t get out of its own way. The Hoosiers are far and away the safest bet in a battered and beaten Big Ten.
Ohio State and Oregon lost star quarterbacks, and the road to the CFP looks sketchy for both. Oregon needs to win the Big Ten (it’s a convoluted road), and Ohio State may be able to endure another loss before win or walk arrives.
Michigan can’t score points, while Northwestern and Minnesota both lost critical games last week that could’ve been resume rockets. Now they’re puttering along again, destined for a meaningless bowl game.
Then there’s unbeaten UCLA and Iowa, neither having won a game of significance but both potentially headed for the CFP if they can simply finish off fortunate schedules.
At the top of the heap is Indiana, whose final three games are against two-faced USC, at Washington with a backup quarterback (or the starter, who knows at this point) and Purdue. Maybe the CFP had it right all along.
The Hoosiers are going to finish in the top 4 and earn a first round bye, anyway. May as well make it happen now.
Whether or not they’ve proven anything.
Matt Hayes is the senior national college football writer for USA TODAY Sports Network. Follow him on X at @MattHayesCFB. Listen to him daily, from 12-2 p.m., on 1010XL-Jacksonville.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Indiana football is living off last year. CFP committee just made it official
