Postgame Quotes: at Iowa

Postgame Quotes
Indiana at Iowa
September 27, 2025

Curt Cignetti | Indiana Head Coach
Opening Statement:
CC: "That was a really hard-fought ball game. I give Iowa a lot of credit, they're a good football team. They laid it on the line. I give our players and coaches a ton of credit. We made the play when we needed to. It was a back-and-forth game. A lot of good, bad, and ugly. More bad and ugly, except defense kept them out of the endzone, got a couple of turnovers when we needed to. Partially deflected the punt. Our field goal kicker was awesome under pressure and when we needed to make a play we did. We really struggled on 3rd and short. They came after us with the blitz. But, when we needed to make a play we did on 3rd down against the house blitz again. It's a great road win. So, very proud of the team and players."

On decisions made on third and fourth downs…
CC: Fernando didn't do any audibling today, with the noise, that wasn't the plan. You know, they came after us. On the last play to Saratt, they had house blitz the play before. Meaning one more than you can block. So, we went to our seven-man protection, and we called that. We called that 3 or 4 times, maybe 5 or 6 today. We did it against Indiana State as well who house blitzed us. Sarratt ran a slant, he won inside, broke a tackle. Ball was where it needed to be, and he scored. Somebody asked me after the game, I think it was a TV reporter, what I'll remember from this game. I'll remember Sarratt running toward the endzone that's what I'll remember. I give our players a lot of credit, it was a great team win."

On the importance of winning a close game on the road…
CC: "Well, I think, you know, all wins are great. You know, we get a week off. Coaches have a day off tomorrow, we are 5-0. We would much rather win decisively than put this on tape. Let me tell you, we left a lot of plays out there in the pass game and there's some bad stuff on that tape, but the defense and the special teams. I give Iowa a lot of credit. But to go into a hostile environment, this is a hard place to play. They got a great home crowd. They were juiced up for this game and to come out with a win when maybe you didn't' play your best and a lot of it is because of [Iowa]."

On if there was anything he would have done different in the pass game in the first half…
CC: Well, the first pass we threw the right guard got beat and got smoked. Four-man rush, sack, third down and two and a half. That kind of spooked everybody, I think. Guys got to trust their technique. We came in at halftime and looked at the stats, we've only thrown 8 passes, holy cow, and they've thrown 17. That last drive, at the end of the half, 17 seconds or 27 seconds, and we found a way to get three points out of that and that was huge. Then after that, you know, I thought things stated well the first drive of the 3rd quarter, I thought okay, here we go, but then nope. And you know, it became what it was."

On the mentality of his team…
CC: At this point, you're kind of like, when Mendoza got hit on the sideline, they didn't call roughing the quarterback. That really kind of pulled our guys in it right there. We've got a lot of new guys; we've got a lot of good guys. A lot of the right stuff on this team. We were tested really hard, and we found a way to push through it.

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