Like mentor, like student: Curt Cignetti’s success perfectly reflects lessons learned from Nick Saban.

After an undefeated 13-0 season and playoff berth, Cignetti looks unstoppable before the Rose Bowl, as they prepare to take down Alabama. And in this moment, Cignetti draws inspiration from his old coach.

“The guy down in Tuscaloosa used to say normal equals average,” Indiana’s head coach said on Next Up with Adam Breneman. “All of us face adversity every single day. Part of being successful is overcoming obstacles, learning from failure, not being affected by success, staying humble and hungry every single day. And high achievers and strivers understand that, and that’s why they get to that point.”

Cignetti and Saban’s ties go way back in time. He joined Saban’s first Alabama staff in 2007. From 2007 to 2010, he served as wide receivers coach and recruiting coordinator, developing All-Pro Julio Jones, and helped Alabama win the 2009 BCS national championship before taking head coaching jobs at IUP, Elon, and James Madison. All the learnings help Cignetti big time now.

Ahead of their game against Notre Dame, Curt Cignetti went to College GameDay in December 2024, where he explained how Saban’s influence is still defining his program. However, Nick Saban’s blunt one-liner responding to that, with Cignetti’s past blunders, drew immense laughter across the set.

“One thing you didn’t learn from me is talking all the sh*t you talk,” Saban said, referencing Cignetti’s earlier comment: “We don’t just beat Top 25 teams, we beat the shit out of them.”

That’s part of their fun banter, but Saban’s played a big role in Curt Cignetti’s success. He himself credits Saban for pushing him this far.

“I wouldn’t be where I am today without my time under Nick,” Cignetti said. “We had great years there. We took over a team (that was 6-7), and we went 7-6 and 12-0 the next year in the regular season.”

There were ups and downs, as they lost against Tim Tebow and Urban Meyer’s Florida in 2008 in an SEC game with a 31-20 score, but the next year in the rematch, they beat them, showing their dominance. That success slate helped him make way to other teams, ultimately leading him to Indiana. Even after all these years, Cignetti credits his beliefs and methods for success to Saban, saying that 95% of his philosophies are derived from him.

That’s exactly why he led 15 straight winning seasons across multiple programs. In two seasons, the Hoosiers won a Big Ten title, produced a Heisman Trophy winner, and earned the No. 1 seed in the CFP.

Now, with that learning and title-winning mindset, Curt Cignetti is also addressing portal chaos.

Curt Cignetti gets real on transfer portal chaos

Curt Cignetti and his team enter the playoffs with stress on their backs, and Indiana’s head coach isn’t thinking twice before pointing it out. With the playoffs colliding straight with the opening of the NCAA transfer portal, the pressure sits squarely on teams chasing a national title. With the quarterfinals scheduled for December 31 and January 1, the portal opens on January 2.

And Curt Cignetti expressed his frustration clearly before Indiana’s Rose Bowl game.

“I definitely think the calendar could be improved,” Cignetti said. “And that would be unanimous amongst the coaches. Whether you get to move the start of the regular season up a week and start playing in the playoffs when the season ends, so there’s a little bit better time to devote to high school recruiting and portal recruiting, we’re all looking, I think, for that solution.”

Regardless of who wins, both teams will be facing a lot of scrutiny. With one team preparing for the national semifinal, the other will go through the major turmoil and heartbreak of missing it. In between all this, focusing on the portal will become a major issue for teams. So, pushing the portal timeline makes sense for coaches on the hunt for the title.

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And this lack of decision-making is coming because of the absence of a centralized leadership in college football. And the 64-year-old didn’t hesitate to point it out.

“What you’re doing within college football is just that you don’t have one guy in charge,” Cignetti said. “If you had one person calling the shots, I think it would be a lot cleaner. So, hopefully we’ll make some progress in that regard.”

Now, let’s wait and see how Curt Cignetti manages playoff games with the transfer portal.