Myles Price knew last January that Indiana football would have a postseason date this winter.
The Hoosiers’ fifth-year senior receiver, then only a few weeks into his commitment after transferring from Texas Tech University last December, didn’t know many of his teammates, and he hadn’t done more than winter workouts and team meetings in Bloomington.
It didn’t matter.
“When I broke it down to my family, every year, there’s multiple teams in college football who had a losing record the year before, and then the next year, they go on and do things like this,” Price said Dec. 10. “So, this is how I had it mapped out in my head, and it just happened to work out like that.”
Price wasn’t alone in his confidence, but such belief wasn’t necessarily all-encompassing within Indiana’s locker room. The Hoosiers’ spring practices brought optimism, but with a bevy of newcomers trying to learn the playbook and develop chemistry, the pieces hadn’t quite come together.
Many of the Hoosiers’ 30 transfers were optimistic in turning the tide of a program that went 3-9 in 2023 and won only nine games the past three seasons combined, but full buy-in may not have fully arrived until fall camp.
And perhaps contradictory in a season where almost everything, at least from the outside, has been smooth sailing, Indiana adapted faith in a time of struggle.
After the Hoosiers’ second scrimmage of fall camp, the players entered the Don Croftcheck Team Room inside Memorial Stadium and, as is normal protocol, split into offense and defense. Indiana’s offense didn’t play well in the scrimmage, and a group of leaders — including sixth-year senior quarterback Kurtis Rourke and fifth-year senior running back Justice Ellison — called a players-only meetings.
Ellison already knew Indiana had talent. In that moment, he found it had the toughness and resolve to battle through adversity and capitalize on the potential its talent could reach.
“We let everybody know, ‘Hey, I believe in you, you believe in me, and we can do it together. We don't need the media and everyone else to believe in us, but we believe in each other,’” Ellison said Tuesday. “We had a heart to heart, and we went around the room, explained to each other what do we want to get out of this season? Why are we here? Why come to Indiana?”
The Hoosiers carry that meeting with them in the back of their minds each time they step on the field, Ellison said, and they’ll carry it into Friday night’s College Football Playoff opener against Notre Dame (11-1) inside Notre Dame Stadium in South Bend, Indiana.
It’s the next step in a dream season for Indiana, which has the third-best average scoring margin in Division I at plus-24.5 points per game en route to a program-record 11 wins.
But it’s also an opportunity to right the internally perceived wrongs about the validity of the Hoosiers’ season. In Indiana’s most-watched game this season, it lost 38-15 to then-No. 2 Ohio State, which is the only currently ranked team the Hoosiers have faced this season.
In the aftermath of the Hoosiers’ lone defeat, junior linebacker Aiden Fisher cited “uncharacteristic” mistakes. Senior tight end Zach Horton said when he reviewed the film, he barely recognized his own team.
That, Horton said, is motivation to write a different story Friday night in a standalone game on ESPN and ABC.
“We can play in these situations, and we can play in these type of games,” Horton said. “Watching the Ohio State game, that wasn't us. We felt like we have a lot to prove. We’re ready for these big-time games and we can play no matter where we are at, and we can really stay confident.”
Indiana won’t need anything extra to be mentally engaged in South Bend. Sixth-year senior defensive tackle James Carpenter said if someone can’t get locked in for this game, something is wrong with them.
But the Hoosiers have also been open about the significance of making a statement on a national stage.
Ellison, who finished top 10 in the Big Ten in rushing touchdowns, yards per carry and rushing yards per game, said after Indiana’s 56-7 win over Nebraska on Oct. 19 that he wants to elevate Indiana’s brand.
And as Ellison stood in front of a black College Football Playoff backdrop during his press conference Tuesday, he said he feels Indiana has accomplished that mission — but it wants more.
“People kind of say, like, ‘Oh, don't you get warm fuzzies a little bit that you've done a little bit? But we are staying focused in the moment,” Ellison said. “I have plenty of time down the road to look back on what we've done. But right now, it's time to lock in and stay focused.”
Indiana head coach Curt Cignetti, who’s won a barrage of national coach of the year awards, has often praised his team’s maturity throughout this season. The Hoosiers have an old roster comprised heavily of upperclassmen, which has allowed them to brush off outside noise each team it’s grown louder.
Yet while Indiana doesn’t listen to what Cignetti dubs “rat poison,” the Hoosiers still hold receipts. Despite Cignetti’s best efforts to forewarn others of what lay ahead, Indiana was picked to finish 17th — second to last — in the Big Ten’s preseason poll.
The Hoosiers noticed. They haven’t forgotten.
“We know we're supposed to be here. We know we belong,” junior receiver Elijah Sarratt said Tuesday. “But we're always going to have that chip. We remember what everyone was saying during the season and remember what everyone is saying now. We're all we need. We (are) going to go down there, just focus on us and try to handle business.”
Indiana’s age figures to prove beneficial in handling the noise and pressure within Notre Dame Stadium. It also may add desperation.
Of the Hoosiers’ 22 projected starters on offense and defense, 14 are in their last year of eligibility. A loss ends their college career — and the greatest season in program history.
Rourke, who finished ninth in the Heisman Trophy voting, acknowledged the do-or-die nature of the situation. He’s embracing it.
“I'm taking it as a positive and motivating, that it's one more chance to have a great opportunity to play with the guys and this team that's been so successful,” Rourke said. “Just really using it to motivate me even more than I already have to go out there, have fun, enjoy it.”
But he doesn’t plan on having the ride end Friday.
“We'll talk about my last college game in four games,” Rourke said.
That, of course, means a trip to the College Football Playoff National Championship game. It’s a lofty thought, but the Hoosiers have been dreaming big all year. Why stop now?
“It’s just realizing what kind of opportunity we have,” Carpenter said. “This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, once-in-a-lifetime experience. We get to go play for a national championship, and this is where it starts. It’s what we came here to do — win a national championship.”
At each stop this season, the Hoosiers have said they wanted more.
After getting to 6-0 and becoming bowl eligible for the first time since 2020 with a win over Northwestern on Oct. 5, redshirt junior defensive end Mikail Kamara said the goal wasn’t that moment — it was to win a national title.
Following a 47-10 victory over Michigan State on Nov. 2 that gave the Hoosiers their first 9-0 start in program history, Fisher said all it meant was the team had a chance to get to 10-0 the week after. And when Indiana did that, fifth-year senior receiver Ke’Shawn Williams and redshirt sophomore wideout Omar Cooper Jr. each said they were happy but unsatisfied.
At 10-0, Williams said Indiana reached another milestone on its way to where it ultimately wants to be. The same can be said for Friday night’s game in South Bend, which the Hoosiers enter as 7.5-point underdogs.
Indiana University’s winter commencement ceremony is Friday morning. It’s the end of one chapter and start of another for those walking across the stage. The Hoosiers’ football team plans on doing the same when it walks through the tunnel in Notre Dame Stadium.
In a season built on breaking barriers, Indiana’s next obstacle to knock down comes at 8 p.m. Friday. At stake? The opportunity to keep dreaming.
“History has been made already,” Ellison said, “but we have much more to do.”
Follow reporters Daniel Flick (@ByDanielFlick) and Dalton James (@DaltonMJames) and columnist Jhett Garrett (@jhettgarrett) for updates throughout the Indiana football season.
