Curt Cignetti and Kirk Ferentz have known one another for more than 40 years. It’s a relationship that stretches back to the mid-1980s, when Cignetti was a graduate assistant at Pittsburgh and Ferentz, who had been in Cignetti’s role just a few years earlier, would occasionally come by the Panther s’offices to say hello.
Four decades later, both are veteran head coaches and their respect for one another was on display this week as Cignetti’s Indiana gets set to take on Ferentz’s Iowa on Saturday at Kinnick Stadium in Iowa City.
Cignetti got the mutual admiration fest rolling Monday when he said explicitly that facing Iowa (3-1, 1-0 Big Ten) on the road would be a more difficult test than the one his team handled with so much ease against then-No. 9 Illinois last Saturday at Memorial Stadium.
“The thing about Iowa in general, they will not beat themselves,” said Cignetti, whose team laid waste to the Illini in a record-breaking 63-10 triumph. “You will have to beat them. They’re not going to beat themselves and they play really well at home.”
Not to be outdone by his coaching colleague, Ferentz sang Indiana’s praises in his press conference the same day.
“Where do you want to start?” the 27th-year Iowa coach said. “It’s hard to find a weakness, it really is. They did it last year and they’re doing it right now, too, with a lot of new players again. That’s really impressive. That’s good coaching. They clearly have a vision of what they want to be, and it looks like it’s working really well for them.”
Of Indiana quarterback Fernando Mendoza, who is coming off back-to-back games with five touchdown passes, Ferentz, the all-time wins leader in Big Ten history, was even more effusive:
“I don’t have a Heisman vote,” he said, “but I’d vote for him based on what I have seen.”
There’s ample reason to believe both coaches are correct in their lofty appraisals of the other’s program. Indiana (4-0, 1-0) comes into the game ranked No. 11, flying high following its beatdown of the Illini and the darling of many of the computer rankings, which consistently slot the Hoosiers among the top 5-7 teams in the country.
Iowa, meanwhile, is coming off a solid road win at Rutgers and has been tripped up only once, a 16-13 defeat on a late field goal against rival Iowa State, which is undefeated.
Saturday’s matchup is not quite a College Football Playoff elimination game, but the loser will likely have to upset a conference heavyweight – Oregon and Penn State are on both teams’ schedules – to have any hope of making the field.
Both teams, too, have some history that does not appear favorable. Iowa has lost 10 games in a row against ranked opponents since its last win in October 2021. The Hoosiers have lost four in a row in Iowa City, with their last win there coming in 2007.
IU’s most recent meeting against the Hawkeyes, in the 2021 season-opener, came under similar circumstances: The Hoosiers were ranked for a game in Iowa City and there was significant excitement around the program. Iowa led 14-0 less than three minutes into that game and won 34-6. IU finished 2-10.
“We know the challenge they present,” Hoosiers linebacker Aiden Fisher said of the Hawkeyes, who have won at least eight games in nine non-COVID seasons in a row. “Really well coached football team, always physical, always in the right place, really disciplined, and we’re the same way. So it’s going to be who can break the other team’s will first. It’s making sure we’re playing to the character of football that we know.”
A win would give the Hoosiers an inside track on a second CFP spot in as many years and set up a titanic road clash with undefeated, No. 6 Oregon on Oct. 11.
Job No. 1 for the Hoosiers will be handling their surroundings in their first road game of the season. It is not an ideal opening test – 96-year-old Kinnick is widely considered one of the most difficult road environments in the country, featuring close to 70,000 black-and-gold-clad fans at close proximity.
IU struggled with tough road crowds at Ohio State and Notre Dame in its only two losses last season and has pumped in crowd noise to practice all week to try to simulate the suffocating atmosphere the Hawkeyes can bring to bear.
“It’s loud and obnoxious and it rings your ears,” Hoosiers center Pat Coogan said of the artificial noise. “There’s not any breaks or anything because there’s not going to be any breaks Saturday.”
That irritation during the week is the armor the Hoosiers will take into battle with them Saturday, the lineman says.
“You can’t just turn it on Friday and expect to be good,” he said. “You gotta prepare for (the noise). You gotta make sure everyone’s tuned into the cadences and all the little things.”