January 19, 2026, will forever belong to the Indiana Hoosiers. Curt Cignetti authored one of college football’s most remarkable turnaround tales, lifting Indiana to a national championship that rippled far beyond sports.

Curt Cignetti’s daughter steals the spotlight with viral text exchange after CFP title game originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.

Indiana coach Curt Cignetti has officially confirmed he's happy to have brought the first national championship in football program history to Bloomington.

An implicit “never too high, never too low” mantra governed Cignetti’s Hoosiers, and because of that they beat Miami 27–21 Monday to become the most unlikely national champion in college football history. It’s a mindset Cignetti has cultivated for years—dating back to his days at James Madison, as fans found out from his daughter Natalie Tuesday.

Not even rap stars in the wee hours of a Hoosiers celebration could deter Curt Cignetti whom, pausing that celebration, was already focused on work.

Curt Cignetti is proving to be a nightmare for college football. Not for the sport, but for his peers who have long proclaimed that a national championship requires a blue-chip roster as its prerequisite.