3 Takeaways from Indiana’s dominant 38-3 win over Alabama in the Rose Bowl

Indiana became the first team in the 12-team playoff era to survive the First Round Bye and advance to College Football Playoff Semifinals, doing so in dominant fashion against an Alabama team that was alleged to be more battle-tested than the Hoosiers.

Outside of some potential jitters and probable technical issues on the first and second offensive drives, respectively, everything went according to plan for Curt Cignetti and his staff. It did not matter that his group was facing the most storied program in the history of the sport, Cignetti’s team was there to execute.

With one quarterfinal remaining, Indiana now owns the widest margin of victory in the 2025 CFP, beating Alabama worse than the Power Four teams beat the two G5 teams that made the opening round. The Hoosiers are sure to be favorites in the rematch against Oregon in the Semifinals.

Here are 3 takeaways from today’s game.

Curt Cignetti

For somebody who studies and respects the game of football the way Cignetti does, his disregard for college football history borders on reckless.

Indiana is not supposed to win bowl games, let alone the Rose Bowl. It had been over 50 years since the Hoosiers made it to the Rose Bowl, and over 30 since Indiana won any bowl game.

Then there’s the history of the sport beyond Bloomington. Alabama is supposed to be the best team in the country, with more modern titles than any program in the country. Vegas favored Indiana, but the media talking heads opted for Bama, thinking that their postseason history would carry the Tide over the Hoosiers.

While we’ll never know for sure how Cignetti felt squaring off against the program where he made a name for himself as a Saban assistant, he appeared to treat this game the same as he did the Old Dominion game to open the season.

Through 27 games, Cignetti has demonstrated that he does not care who his team lines up against, what the stakes are, or how long it’s been since Indiana won a game of that caliber. He’s there to get his guys to execute on a play-to-play basis, an approach which has let him continually rewrite college football history in Indiana’s favor.

Fernando Mendoza

In case Diego Pavia and Julian Sayin losing their bowl games wasn’t enough proof, Fernando Mendoza went out and proved that he was the correct choice for the 2025 Heisman Trophy. Mendoza went 14-16 for 192 yards and three touchdowns through the air, while also scrambling for some big yards when plays broke down.

Mendoza has proven to embody all of the mental characteristics of his head coach, described above, keeping his composure after being sacked twice on the opening drive alone. Despite never having played in a game of this magnitude in his career, Mendoza went 6-6 on his next drive to set up Indiana’s field goal.

The scary thing for Oregon will be the emergence of Charlie Becker over the last couple of games, which only gives Mendoza more options. Mendoza found the three of them plus Riley Nowakowski for multiple receptions each, with Nowakowski being the only one not to score a touchdown on the day.

Kane Wommack tried to get Mendoza off his game with blitzes as Iowa and Oregon had earlier this season, but Mendoza was ready after that opening drive. For now, it’s not clear how opposing defenses can slow him down.

Defense

Both of Indiana’s coordinators deserve all of the credit in the world, but Bryant Haines is probably gonna win the Broyles Award. The 2025 Indiana Hoosiers – the best team in program history – has relied on Bryant Haines’ defense in each of their biggest wins this year.

In the first half alone, the defense forced a turnover on downs, then recovered a fumble from Ty Simpson, who left the game after taking a massive hit from D’Angelo Ponds on that play. Both of those turnovers led to points, helping Indiana’s offense move past an opening drive that sputtered out.

Today’s win marks the third time this season his unit has held a ranked opponent to 10 points or fewer. Oregon was the only ranked opponent to break 13 points against Indiana, doing so on a late pick-six that Haines was obviously powerless to stop.

Mendoza and the offense will be all over highlight reels tonight after the offensive explosion, but it was the defense that kept Alabama out of the game from the start. All of this despite losing Stephen Daley to injury following the Big Ten title.

Now that Haines has demonstrated he can generate pressure and stop the run without Daley, there aren’t too many question marks remaining about what this Indiana team can be.