Indiana secures first 10-win season with win over Michigan

Indiana is now a football school. At least for this season, which is already the most successful season in program history. 

Thanks to the Hoosiers' 20-15 win over the Michigan Wolverines on Saturday, they improved to 10-0 on the season. It is not only the first 10-0 start in program history, it is the first 10-win season the program has ever had. 

Before this season, Indiana had only ever produced two nine-win seasons, with the most recent coming during the 1967 campaign.

Indiana is one of the biggest surprise stories in the country with first-year head coach Curt Cignetti orchestrating a stunning one-year turnaround. Not only did the Hoosiers win only three games during the 2023 season, they only won nine games over the previous three seasons combined. 

Now they are a top-10 team and looking like a serious contender to qualify for the 12-team playoff.

What made Saturday's win so impressive is that they were able to knock off Michigan despite not getting a great showing from their offense. The Hoosiers entered Saturday with one of the highest-scoring offenses in the country this season, averaging 46.6 points per game. That number was second only to Miami. But the Hoosiers were never able to get rolling on offense against Michigan, especially in the second half when they were limited to just a field goal.

Despite that, they were still able to find a way to grind out a win against the defending national champions. While Michigan might not be the same team that it was a year ago, there is no way anybody in Indiana would have anticipated a win in this game to improve to 10-0 when the season began.

The Hoosiers still have two games remaining that land on two very different sides of the competitive spectrum. In two weeks they get their biggest test of the season by playing a road game at Ohio State, one of the best teams in the country. They will then close out their regular season against a Purdue team that has just one win this season. 

An 11-win season seems well within reach. A perfect 12-0 regular season is at least still a possibility.