There are some things I just don’t expect to see. If I get to the Eiffel Tower one day, it will be a shock to me. There are other examples I could line up. You get the idea. Watching a 12-0 Indiana Hoosier Football Team play a 12-0 Ohio State team for the Big Ten Championship seemed more unpractical than going to France until Saturday. That was when this actually happened for real. I was there. I was really there. Indiana played Ohio State for the Big Ten Championship Saturday night. And they won 13-10. This is something I am still trying to completely process. Indiana had not beaten Ohio State since I was 20. I was there for that one. I’m 57 now. I was there for that one too. I really was there. I have pictures.

Hoosier fans far and wide were taken aback on the first play of the game when Indiana QB Fernando Mendoza was knocked just south of Fort Wayne and landed face first on the field. He got the wind knocked out of him, I thought, I hoped. Have you ever had that happen to you? I have been there. I will be there again before I get to France. This feeling is AWFUL. Thankfully, it goes away. That’s when #15 ran back out on the field a play later. They got this, I thought.

They did have it. They do have “it”. You know what I’m talking about. Whatever “it” is, you know it when you see it. And when you feel it. That is what this Indiana Football season has been about. I have never seen a team so efficient. Hats off to Coach Curt Cignetti.

When the game was over Saturday night, Coach Cig was having a good time. He earned it. This two season Indiana Football turnaround he has engineered is akin to The Miracle on Ice. No one has more respect for that happening than I do. To even try to make a comparison was once unfathomable. Now I believe it. In the two seasons with Coach Cignetti at the stern, Indiana is 24-2. That is not a typo.

I have thrown out the impressive stats. They are mindboggling. But what a great bunch of guys to just root for. They are so easy to root for. Top to bottom. There is nothing not to like. On Saturday, you can expect to hear Fernando Mendoza’s name called out as the 2025 Heisman Trophy winner. Has he thrown out a Heisman Pose on the field this year? Not hardly. Fernando would rather talk about his offensive line. He is a smart man. All the old linemen reading this are shaking their heads in agreement. They know. They love Fernando too.

I know many of you know of my affinity for singing. Well, Saturday night, as the Ohio State placekicker’s 27-yard attempt sailed wide left outside the upright in this picture, a kick that would have tied the game and probably sent us to overtime, I quite know that I strained a vocal cord. There is still a soreness on the left side of my neck. And I can feel something that just doesn’t feel right in there. It will heal. I have no regret. Maybe I’ll be able to hit some of those Joe Cockeresque notes I have always wanted to find as they were intended.

Next up for the Indiana Hoosiers is the home of my heroes. The Rose Bowl. That is how perfect this season is to me. I’m good with playing either Alabama or Oklahoma. Preferably Bama. They got no business in the playoff and most of America knows that. But, yeah, this is perfect. To be playing this game on January 1, a tradition THAT MUST STAY for the sake of a great parade, great folks in Pasadena who get ready for it all year long, and for the love of mankind the memory of Keith Jackson deserves all of this! I took the picture above on a Thursday morning before a USC-UCLA game in 2018.

You know all the talking heads at the FOX pregame show desk picked Ohio State. This won’t stop any time soon. Indiana won’t get the respect they deserve, and the team and coaches all feed off of that for sure. Just more of the perfect symmetry of a season that gave Indiana University a Big Ten Champ at last. The Hoosiers still have some work to do.