IU’s commitment to Indiana football is something Curt Cignetti ‘appreciates’. But, it’s back to work he goes with ‘some great opportunities ahead of us’

Indiana football is the talk of the country for many reasons heading into the second-to-last week of the regular season. But, Monday was business as usual for Indiana head coach Curt Cignetti — as it always is.

Cignetti spoke to the local media for the first time since the news broke on Saturday that Indiana had locked Cignetti up with a new contract — adding years and providing a much-needed financial aspect to the National Coach of the Year frontrunner.

As Indiana sits at 10-0 and coming off of a bye week, it’s easy to get caught up in all of the ‘outside noise’. But for Cignetti, he continues to be focused on the task at hand

“I’d like to keep it to the game, but a brief comment on that,” Cignetti said of the new contract. “The university has made a very significant financial commitment to football in a lot of areas, and I’m appreciative of the opportunity and to lead the program and continue to develop the program moving forward. I’m excited about our future.

“We’ve done a lot of good things. We’ve got a lot of people behind us. This is where I wanted to be. I played the what-if game with my wife and my agent three weeks ago, four weeks ago, and it all pointed to where I’m at right now. I’m glad we have that behind us and now we can focus on what we should be focused on this time of year.”

Indiana is not only undefeated, it has already set a program record for wins in both a season and in Big Ten play.

Trending: Scott Dolson wants to make sure that the success of Indiana football ‘isn’t a one hit wonder’

The Hoosiers are also sitting at 5th overall in the College Football Playoff rankings — and as of this weekend, projected to host a first round game next month.

But first comes No. 2 Ohio State on Saturday — IU’s toughest test by far this season, and only ranked opponent that the Hoosiers will face this year. So, for that reason alone, Cignetti has other things to focus on.

“Excited about this week’s opportunity against Ohio State,” Cignetti said. “Obviously an excellent football team. One of the favorites to win the National Championship. A lot of great players, extremely well-coached. Their tradition speaks for itself, so it’s a big game for us because it’s this game coming up.

“We treat them all alike. If there was a better way to prepare for a certain team, we’d do that for every team.”

While this is just ‘another’ game for Cignetti and Indiana football, there is no doubt a deeper level of intrigue to this matchup. The winner likely advances to the Big Ten Championship, barring a final week miscue. Also, that team undoubtedly solidifies itself as a host for the first round of the playoffs.

So while this incredible journey for Indiana football continues — and a lot of the outside noise continues to point to Indiana’s monumental turnaround, there is no surprise or shock in Cignetti’s eyes. Not when he took the Indiana job, and certainly not now as he has his team squarely in National Championship conversations.

“I think any P4 school with the proper commitment is capable of being successful and being ultimately successful because really the difference between victory and defeat in most of these games is very slight, slim. It’s all attainable,” Cignetti said. “We’ve put ourselves in a position right now to be talked about quite a bit. That’s nice. It doesn’t help us prepare, doesn’t help us play any better. But we’ve got some great opportunities ahead of us.

“This is a team that’s capable, and the only limitations on this football team would be those we put on ourselves, between our ears. But this is a group of guys that do not think that way. We’re going to go into this next game confident, believing, and we’re going to go out there and we’re going to play well.”

SEE ALSO: Why did Curt Cignetti want to stay with Indiana football? — ‘We’re the emerging superpower of college football’

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