‘Relentless’ – Leadership Fuels Indiana’s Winning Quest
Pete DiPrimio | IUHoosiers.com
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. - Mikail Kamara is back, and offenses beware. Hold him, double team him, scheme to beat him, it doesn’t matter. Indiana’s superstar defensive lineman wreaks havoc and now that he’s back for a sixth and final season, well, imagine the possibilities for a potentially powerhouse defense.
“It’s my preparation and watching film,” he says. “On the field, being hungry -- hungrier to make plays.”
Every player wants to make plays, but it’s the best ones, the great ones, who go beyond the norm to ensure it happens. The 6-foot-1, 265-pound Kamara, with All-America honors on his resume and 10 sacks among last season’s stats, pushes for greatness.
“It’s not just the clean wins (at the line of scrimmage),” he says, “but those ones where I am sprinting for 15 or 20 yards (going after a scrambling quarterback), or seeing the tight end catch a pass and sprinting down field to force a fumble. It's making those more relentless plays that will lead to winning more games.”
Winning is the ultimate goal and leadership fuels it. Kamara is among the Hoosier leaders on offense and defense driven to use last season’s 11-2 ground-breaking success as a foundation for even more this year. Some, like Kamara, linebacker Aiden Fisher, cornerback D’Angelo Ponds and receiver Elijah Sarratt, came with head coach Curt Cignetti from James Madison.
Others, such as offensive lineman Carter Smith and receiver Omar Cooper Jr., are Indiana veterans. Still others are transfers such as center Pat Coogan from Notre Dame or running back Roman Hemby from Maryland. All have bought into Cignetti’s winning approach.
It starts with Wednesday’s fall camp start in preparation for the Aug. 30 season opener against Old Dominion.
“It's a top-down approach,” Cignetti says. “Everything starts with me, trickles down to the assistants. They're in charge of their rooms or their areas.
“You can never have enough good leaders on your football team in the locker room. There is a small contingent of JMU guys still on this team that have played really good football for a long time, that have the right stuff, and that lead in a positive way. Those guys are invaluable. But we have other guys on our team that are good leaders. Coogan coming in from Notre Dame. Carter Smith, our left tackle. I could name 10 or 12 guys that have the potential to be really good leaders.”
Much has been made of IU’s offensive system directed by offensive coordinator Mike Shanahan and its defensive system run by defensive coordinator Bryant Haines that have thrived for years. It goes beyond them, Cignetti says.
“You win with people because the season is not a sprint, it's a marathon. You’ve got to be able to handle success. You've got to be able to handle failure. You've got to do the right things off the field. You have to stay away from the land mines. You have to pick other guys up when they're down. You have to have consistency and performance game in, game out, week in, week out.”
It sounds easy. It’s not. Winning is hard and when it comes, it brings glory and distractions. The best teams, the best players, stay focused on the effort and commitment winning demands.
“When you're successful,” Cignetti says, “you can't have the warm fuzzies, can’t become complacent, can’t begin to hate the things that got you to where you are.
“That stuff is not hard. Those are things that aren't talked about very much, but to go the distance, those are the things that you've got to thrive and be good at.”