Pagoda

For sure. I’m just commenting on the rumor, which is an interesting one. Not trying to be critical of your post at all.

This is an odd rumor. Adidas makes uniforms and shoes and sells crappy merch. I highly doubt they have any involvement in major athletic dept decisions. It’s not like PSU FB losing some games has any impact on Adidas’ bottom line.

Lmao.

I think you're right. He's built something here basically from scratch exactly how he wants it such that we can beat a #2/3 ranked team at Autzen and have the fifth best odds to win it all at the moment. It's wild to say, but his ceiling here is surprisingly very high in this modern era of CFB. I find it hard to see his redoing everything he's done the past two years, especially at 65. He could build up another program I'm sure and do very well, but it's a lot of redundant effort and there is some risk too. And how much better is PSU as a platform to do something like win national titles? It's better, yes, but I'm not sure it is by a whole lot. They have two natties from the 1980s and haven't been competitive for titles in the modern era. They're not a program that sets up coaches to win it all like an OSU or LSU, nor are they one of the richest programs like Texas or Oregon. It's a Tier II program in a tiny town in the literal middle of nowhere PA (2.5 hours Pittsburgh) with a big stadium. We can pay Cig and staff as much as they can -- that money comes from the athletic dept and we have enough. We likely can't match PSU NIL, but we can probably close the gap such that it's less of an issue. What we do have is the current high performing program Cig has built with strong support from Scott, Pam, and other key figures at IU. I think there is a lot of value in that. These are just some ramblings from a homer IU fan. I'm not well connected to IU, but I know a few people around the program and they're not too worried. If they get worried, I'll get worried, but until then, I feel pretty good he keeps building here. Maybe I'm wrong, I don't know Cig and I can only guess. We'll see. And lastly, I've got a sneaking suspicion Cig likes beating the traditional powers at a non-traditional school. I say this in the most positive way -- he's kind of a maniac and it makes the wins even sweeter.

Yea. Kinda funny that as a WVU and Pitt guy… word is he doesn’t like PSU much, which would make sense. Though of course that doesn’t stop someone from taking a job. I feel pretty good he stays and keeps doing what he is doing here — it’s good pretty well!

Interestingly, IU turned out to be a platform where he can make the CFP and beat teams like Oregon on the road. We may not have the most NIL, but our NIL is going up. And he probably has the ideal alignment and relationship with the President, AD, and other key folks, which does matter quite a bit and is part of the reason why this whole thing is working so well. When the fit is great and things are going very well, and hopefully it continues to, it doesn’t make a ton of sense to leave it and restart.

A few observations: Our odds to make the playoff went from -115 (53% chance) before Oregon to -2000 (95%) after. I didn’t track this until now, but we are now +200 (33%) to win the B1G Championship game. OSU is -155 (61%). Wild stuff. Of course we have a lot of football left to play and nothing is a given, but these are just what the old betting markets are saying.

Knowles makes about $3.1M. If we wanted to, we have enough athletic dept revenue to bump Haines up from $2.1M to $3M. No guarantees we would, but I think if it kept him we probably would. But in general I agree head coach jobs are going to be offering more money per year. He could easily get HC offers that exceed $3M/yr, with probably longer duration and more guaranteed money too. Plus it’s a big step up in his career. If he takes a HC gig it’s very understandable and I’ll cheer for him.

True, I think we would pay Haines whatever he wanted, but if he wants the head coaching gig there is nothing we can do. If he wants to go the head coach route, hopefully he is picky about the job he takes and stays here a little longer as he waits for the right one.

I thought we were paying the staff enough after all the big raises last year. Somehow they are justifying even more. Another round of revised contracts/raises makes sense and we’ve got to pump every cent of NIL we can find into this program.

#3 ranking incoming. :-)

Oregon had about 50 yards in the second half before some of the garbage time stuff. What a performance.

Yep. We just won at the #2/3 ranked team. I’m not seeing a reason to move.

Hearing our lockeroom celebrations in the background is amazing!

Yes!!!

BUMP THIS THREAD !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This will take days for me to process. Unbelievable!!!!!!!!!

CFB world:

Cmon Illinois put up a fight.

I can’t think of a more butthurt program/fanbase than WVU. Good grief will they ever move on? It’s been six months.

Another enjoyable read. Maybe others knew this, but Cuban is a bit more involved than I thought, which is great. https://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/indiana-football-mark-cuban-curt-cignetti-success-nil-revenue-sharing/

For me, without seeing the terms of the deal, I just don’t have much of an opinion. My gut is the B1G isn’t dumb and the terms will be okay or even favorable to the conference. If this deal sucked OSU and Michigan would likely have squashed it. I’m also pretty sure the B1G will not lose control of anything per Petitti’s comments. My guess is we’ll see around $100M come into each school and future rights distributions to the schools will be a little lower as some of that goes now goes to investors. Frankly what may matter most is how well IU spends the money we are about to get. College sports is already big business so in my opinion this doesn’t change the nature of anything.

I am curious what the theft and fraud was related to this time around. He did the image rehab thing after he got out of jail and he was working at some logistics company. Sad to see him implode again.

David Williams? lol