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Adam Rittenberg
ATLANTA — Sometimes, Curt Cignetti doesn’t even have to say a word. A signal will suffice.
Pat Kuntz and the other Indiana assistant coaches know what each one means. For example, Cignetti, the second-year Hoosiers coach overseeing the most stunning rise in recent college football history, might place his hands next to each other, and then separate them into a V.
«Duck feet,» Kuntz, Indiana’s defensive tackles coach, told ESPN. «He picks up on those things. You wouldn’t see it at first, and then he looks at you and gives you the signal, and then you recheck it.»
When Cignetti spots a defect in an otherwise appealing prospect, scratch him off the list. On to the next.
Cignetti’s player evaluation process is meticulous, multifaceted and time-tested, and he is in the middle of every phase. Unlike most Power 4 programs, Indiana doesn’t have a massive personnel department. At Big Ten media days in July, Cignetti declared, «I’m the GM and head coach.» He makes the final call on players, as he has ever since leaving Nick Saban’s side at Alabama to lead his first college program at Division II Indiana University of Pennsylvania.
Oregon (7:30 p.m. ET on ESPN). Although Indiana’s players weren’t the highest-rated recruits or transfers, and the team’s overall talent level is often used as a qualifier in discussions about how high it can rise, the Hoosiers have reached the semifinals as the favorite to win their first national title.
How did Cignetti put together the team that has shattered historical barriers at Indiana and redefined what is possible in an ever-changing sport?
«I get that question all the time: Everyone wants to know what’s the secret sauce to having the success we’ve had,» defensive ends coach Buddha Williams said. «It’s not just one thing.»
WILLIAMS IS RIGHT. Cignetti’s evaluation process has layers, and he doesn’t base final decisions on a singular element.
He starts by assessing what a prospect has done, even while projecting what he could become.
«The first question is the stats: What were his junior-year stats? What were his senior-year stats? Why did he miss games? Why did he play in only eight games versus 12?» Williams said. «Those are the biggest questions he asks.»
Cignetti’s desire for on-field evidence, Williams added, is even more pronounced with transfers. Although Cignetti and the assistants who joined him from James Madison knew what the JMU players they brought over to Indiana could do, their evaluation for non-JMU transfers emphasized consistent production and durability.
Consequently, Indiana’s current depth chart is filled with fourth- and fifth-year players, especially on offense. The Hoosiers have several true sophomores starting on defense, including linebacker Rolijah Hardy, a second-team All-Big Ten selection who leads the team in tackles (92) and sacks (8). But they’re surrounded by veterans.
Elijah Sarratt, a wide receiver from FCS St. Francis. Sarratt had no rating from the recruiting services coming out of high school in Baltimore, but had 700 receiving yards and 13 touchdowns, tying a team record, as a freshman All-America selection with St. Francis.
He then came to James Madison, earned first-team All-Sun Belt honors and then followed the coaches to Indiana, where he’s a two-time All-Big Ten selection with 108 receptions and 21 touchdowns.
«He was super productive, and that was probably the No. 1 trait that we saw in him coming out of St. Francis,» Indiana offensive coordinator Mike Shanahan said. «His ability to have quick reactions, his ability to have quick movements, and just his ability to obviously make plays, stood out over, ‘what’s his 40 time?’ We don’t know, but he’s a guy we want to take a shot on.»
Sarratt is part of the JMU contingent that has fueled Indiana’s rise. Linebacker Aiden Fisher and cornerback D’Angelo Ponds are both two-time first-team All-Big Ten selections. Defensive end Mikail Kamara had 10 sacks in his first year with IU, and continues to produce, while defensive tackle Tyrique Tucker was a first-team all-league selection this fall.
«You don’t see that often at all,» Sarratt said. «[The coaches] don’t always focus on the big-time recruit, the top guy in the portal. They do a great job of getting people who fit what they want to teach, and develop them every single day.»
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Each position has traits that matter more than others, and different developmental timelines. Cignetti’s background as an offensive coach who coached wide receivers and quarterbacks shows up, but he knows what to seek at each position. Although Kuntz played defensive line and has coached linemen throughout his career, there are times when Cignetti spots something position-specific that Kuntz missed the first time through.
Cignetti is also big on ankle, knee and hip flexibility, which Saban stressed to him when Cignetti served as recruiting coordinator on Saban’s first few Alabama coaching staffs.
«It’s a start-stop game,» Cignetti explained. «You’ve got to have those for change of direction, but you also need those to create explosive power. It’s a game of speed, quickness and explosive power.»
According to Williams, coaches «all get enamored about traits,» from height to mass to length to first step. Cignetti considers those things, too, but he puts as much or more on how players fit Indiana’s schemes, and how they conduct themselves. Indiana hasn’t had any major off-field problems involving players since Cignetti’s arrival.
«He’s old-school, so one of the biggest things, when you meet him as a recruit, little things matter: Shake his hand, firm grip, be able to communicate, be confident,» Kuntz said. «Have that right presentation.»
CIGNETTI’S PERSONNEL STRATEGIES have been molded during a lifetime in football. His father, Frank, is a College Football Hall of Fame coach who led West Virginia and then IU-Pennsylvania, where the playing field is named after him.
«His father would be probably willing to take a chance on a guy, maybe, because he saw something that maybe nobody else saw, but other than that, they were very similar in what they were looking for,» said IUP coach Paul Tortorella, who worked with both Curt and Frank Cignetti over the years. «If I had a dollar for every time his dad and Curt talked about production, I could get out of coaching, honestly.»
Tortorella served as IUP’s defensive coordinator from 1995 to 2016, spanning Frank Cignetti’s final 11 seasons as coach and Curt Cignetti’s six-year tenure, before he followed Curt Cignetti as head coach. When Curt arrived, he had been an assistant at three FBS power conference programs.
Pitt, from 1993 to ’96, Cignetti had worked for Johnny Majors, in his second stint at the school after coaching the Panthers to a national title in 1976.
«We probably took too many chances on potential,» Cignetti recalled. «But we were in a position where we didn’t have much either. We didn’t have resources. We didn’t have facilities. Those things mattered. Back then, we didn’t have a lot to sell. Those were the kind of guys we got. And a lot of them didn’t pan out.»
Cignetti then entered a better situation at NC State, coaching Philip Rivers and other standouts, and serving as recruiting coordinator for a frequent bowl team under Chuck Amato. After seven years, he joined Saban at Alabama, helping the Tide rise from underachiever to national champion. Under Saban, Cignetti learned position-specific criteria for assessing players, and how to spot the «fatal flaws.»
But it wasn’t until Cignetti came to IUP that he refined his approach toward selecting players.
«I watched every guy,» he said. «I kind of did the board. … I’m in there watching all the guys, ranking them. Repetition is the mother of learning, and you get better and better at it.»
Cignetti became IUP’s coach and general manager. He didn’t have much choice in Division II, where resources, including scholarships, are scarce.
«It’s like they do at Division I with NIL money — we do it with scholarship money,» Tortorella said. «He wasn’t used to that coming from Alabama, but he was on top of it right away.»
Cignetti learned how to spread funds around. There were priority positions, of course — quarterback, defensive end, cornerback, wide receiver — but having too much in one bucket left the team vulnerable elsewhere.
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He always took care of the offensive and defensive lines. Indiana’s success at the line of scrimmage doesn’t surprise Tortorella or others who have followed Cignetti’s career. Nor does Indiana’s mastery of the portal.
«I knew that would be a great advantage for him,» Tortorella said. «When you get to the point where it’s free agency, I knew he’d thrive.»
During a Peach Bowl coaches’ news conference over Zoom on Saturday, Cignetti lamented that he had spent four hours hosting 13 portal recruits, which cut into his Oregon prep. Ducks coach Dan Lanning jokingly said to Cignetti, «Keep focusing on those portal guys.»
The following day, Cignetti secured one of the nation’s best portal hauls, including quarterback Josh Hoover (TCU), wide receiver Nick Marsh (Michigan State) and several pass rushers, including Kansas State’s Tobi Osunsanmi.
«Every move that I made, after I left Alabama, prepared me for this moment and also prepared me for the changes that have taken place in college football since I was an assistant coach,» Cignetti said. «That’s where the recruiting coordinator experience came into play.»
WHEN INDIANA DEFENSIVE coordinator Bryant Haines sits down with Cignetti to study players, he expects to hear tag words, like hip flexibility and body control. Haines has worked on all four staffs Cignetti has led — Indiana, James Madison, Elon and IUP — and knows perhaps better than anyone how the evaluation process goes with him.
«It’s really good. It can be frustrating a little bit if I’m committed to, like, I love this player right here and Coach Cignetti’s like, ‘I don’t like this way he does this th ing right here,'» Haines said. «… But at the end of the day, I learn a lot.»
Haines usually finds himself agreeing with his boss about why certain players aren’t getting greenlit. At times, there are debates between Cignetti and his assistants.
«Sometimes, it may get heated,» said co-offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach Chandler Whitmer.
«He might not agree on somebody, but if we’re convicted, if me and multiple people on the defensive staff agree, you state your case and you keep working toward that,» Kuntz added.
How often will Cignetti actually change his mind?
Penn State, as well as the Denver Broncos. «But Cig really, really puts a lot of burden on himself. He wants to make sure that he feels comfortable with the guys that we take, and if it doesn’t work out, he feels comfortable that it falls back on him.
«His involvement, it’s just much higher than any [head] coach I’ve been around.»
The approach has led to historic results the past two years. Not only has Indiana hit big on the JMU transfers, but others like quarterback Ferando Mendoza from Cal, who won the Heisman Trophy this season, as well as Pat Coogan from Notre Dame, who became the first offensive lineman to be named Rose Bowl MVP since 1944. Each of Cignetti’s first two transfer classes at IU included defensive linemen from Kent State in C.J. West and Stephen Daley, who both thrived with the Hoosiers.
His in-house evaluations have also paid off, too, with players he inherited, including Hardy, wide receiver Omar Cooper Jr. and linebacker Isaiah Jones, who arrived in 2022 and developed into a key contributor with 14 tackles for loss and seven sacks this season. Even players who left Indiana and returned have thrived, including safety Louis Moore and offensive lineman Khalil Benson.
«Coach Cig’s player evaluation is special,» Jones said. «He doesn’t always go after the big, shiny guys. If you can make plays, he wants you. The second part of that is the human being behind the pads. He’s going to bring guys who mold well in the locker room. That’s what’s made this team so special.»
Indiana is two wins away from becoming one of the great teams in college football history, the first to go undefeated and win the 12-team CFP. If the Hoosiers complete the journey, Cignetti’s fingerprints will be all over the roster.
«That’s what makes him elite, his ability to evaluate talent,» Whitmer said. «That’s probably one of his greatest qualities.»
