Indiana football transfer class has ‘flown under the radar’ this offseason

When Curt Cignetti took the Indiana football job, he had a huge mountain to climb. Not only to get Indiana back to competing in the Big Ten, but simply to field a roster. Nearly half of the IU roster was in the transfer portal when he took over the program.

Indiana would go on to bring in 31 players from the transfer portal and that includes numerous players who had a lot of production at their previous stops. That has and will always be critical for Cignetti when evaluating talent. It’s never about stars or potential. It’s about who fits best with what he wants to do in his system.

“I’ve never really looked at stars ever, honestly. It’s kind of like I get so focused in on certain things, like in this particular case, evaluation,” Cignetti said. ” … I’m more into production than potential. I’m a little old fashioned.”

Indiana’s current transfer class ranks 27th overall, with two four-star prospects. But, On3.com national writer Jesse Simonton believes that Indiana’s transfer class is ‘flying under the radar’ nationally.

“Outside of Louisville and Colorado, no program has tried a more aggressive about-face than Indiana this offseason — and new head coach Curt Cignetti made sure his team’s facelift best positions the Hoosiers to avoid the basement of the Big Ten for the second-straight year,” Simonton wrote. “IU saw 38 players exit the team and 31 transfer newcomers (many with experience and production) join the roster. When you account for high school signees as well, nearly 50% of the team’s roster will be brand new in 2024.

” … With as many as 20 of the 31 transfers projected to start next season, Cignetti has expressed supreme confidence that the Hoosiers have solidified the roster to be competitive immediately in Year 1. In the Big Ten, that’s a tall task, but maybe?”

Read: ‘Something’s got to give and it wasn’t going to be me’: Curt Cignetti has won at every stop. He doesn’t expect that to change with Indiana football

Among IU’s additions were 13 players from James Madison, including freshman All-American defensive back D’Angelo Ponds and standout wide receiver Elijah Sarratt.

Indiana has won just nine games in the last three seasons and a large reason behind the struggles have been because of quarterback inconsistency. One of the reasons Cignetti was brought in was because of his track record at developing QBs.

There’s hope that Ohio transfer Kurtis Rourke will be added to the list of successful signal callers under Cignetti.

Overall, IU’s incoming transfer class ranked better than its outgoing class.

“Now you end up with two kinda guys here (at Indiana) — one with a chip on your shoulder and want to prove to people that they can get it done,” Cignetti said earlier this spring. “You want to keep those guys. The guys who have sort of succumbed to defeat, failure, negativity, blame, finger pointing, given up along the way. You’re glad they’re in the portal. The portal makes it easy to change the roster, but you better thrive in it to stay in the business and be successful.”

SEE ALSO: Indiana football sees net-positive rating swing on massive transfer portal haul

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