New Indiana coach Cignetti counts on father’s old-school values, new faces to spur quick turnaround

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — Curt Cignetti’s old-school style runs through his veins.

The new Hoosiers coach expects his players to arrive on time, be prepared to work and ready to win. And in his world, like his father’s, there are no acceptable excuses.

Yes, Cignetti learned those values on the football field in western Pennsylvania that now bears the name of his father, Frank Cignetti Sr., the late Hall of Fame coach. Only now, the 63-year-old son finds himself hoping to emulate his father’s success at college football’s other Indiana.

“Greatest man I’ve ever known,” Cignetti said when asked about his father. “Never coached for him. I played one year, my freshman year at West Virginia, for him. He was my biggest critic early on, and (I) did not tell him I was going to take the IUP (Indiana University of Pennsylvania) job because I knew what he was going to say. I called him the night before and said, ‘I’m going to be announced tomorrow.’ I was 50. I bet on myself.”

Like his dad, the younger Cignetti just kept winning.

Whether the family legacy attains new heights at the far more prominent Indiana remains to be seen. Cignetti makes his debut Saturday when the Hoosiers host Florida International.

But the blueprint really is a combination of his father’s yesteryear philosophy and today’s modern tools that help teams rebuild virtually overnight, such as relaxed transfer rules.

Curt Cignetti has succeeded both ways.

After taking his first head coaching job at the same school his father turned into a Division II powerhouse, Cignetti led IUP to the playoffs twice in six seasons. Then he went to Elon, a program with a 12-45 mark over the previous five seasons, and immediately led it to the playoffs. Cignetti left for James Madison in 2019 and won conference titles each of his first three seasons while making the Football Championship Subdivision final four all three seasons before presiding over one of the most successful transitions from the FCS to the Football Bowl Subdivision in history.

So as he begins his Hoosiers tenure by taking over a squad picked to finish 17th in an 18-team league, the plain-speaking Cignetti isn’t changing his expectations — just the names and faces on Indiana’s roster.

“We came in and changed the roster and then you have to change the way people think — the mindset, the culture, the identity of your football team,” he said after welcoming 54 new players, 30 of them transfers. “I think we’ve made progress. But you really can’t measure it until you play.”

Behind the scenes, he’s created a noticeably different vibe in the locker room.

Starting offensive lineman Mike Katic opted to stay in Bloomington partly because as a Pittsburgh native, he understood Cignetti’s approach and his family.

Running back Justice Ellison, a transfer from Wake Forest, initially rejected a scholarship offer from James Madison but chose Indiana because of “the look” in Cignetti’s eyes.

Linebacker Aiden Fisher, one of 13 Dukes players who followed Cignetti to Bloomington, decided he wanted to continue playing for a coach and staff who believe in him.

“You can tell he’s a real serious guy. His self-belief is the first thing you see from him,” Fisher said. “Why go to another program when you’re going to play for a head coach that is going to put in the hours no other coach will? If you look at his track record, it speaks for itself, he wins football games.”

That’s music to Hoosiers fans who have endured three straight losing seasons and have celebrated only five bowl bids since 1994.

It’s not just what Cignetti has done in 13 seasons as a head coach — no losing seasons. Before Cignetti took the IUP job in 2011, Nick Saban made him his first recruiting coordinator at Alabama in 2007, meaning Cignetti hasn’t been part of a losing team since 2006 when he was on NC State’s staff.

So, naturally, when Cignetti stood at the podium for his first Big Ten media day, he reminded everyone his teams were twice picked to finish second to last in conference play — and wound up in championship contention both times.

While some colleagues may have suggested Cignetti be more diplomatic on the big stage, that’s not how Frank Cignetti Sr. raised his son.

No, the man who won 17 games with the Mountaineers while fighting cancer and 182 more at IUP after beating it, who instilled his tenacity and football philosophy into his two coaching sons, also taught them to be brutally honest.

“He was a very direct man, very honest man, had a great work ethic, led by example, helped a lot of people and players in their lives, had a good heart,” Cignetti said of his father, who died in 2022. “I threw him off the field one year because he was being too critical, but he was very complimentary of the way we played at the end when I was at JMU.”

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