Indiana rewards Curt Cignetti for dream season with massive contract extension

Give Indiana a ton of credit for being proactive in its ability to retain its increasingly sought-after head coach, Curt Cignetti. Through his first 10 games as the head coach at IU, the Hoosiers are 10-0 and very much alive to make the College Football Playoff. If they beat Ohio State next week, all signs point to them facing Oregon in Indianapolis for the Big 10 title and the No. 1 overall seed in the CFP field.

Cignetti is only in his first year at Indiana after a strong run previously at James Madison. He may not be anything close to a young man, but he was one of the hottest head coaches potentially on the market. Indiana is known for a lot of things, but winning routinely on the gridiron is not one of them, and plenty of teams figured to want the architect of one of the most remarkable turnarounds in the sport's history.

So, despite how much they're currently paying former coach Tom Allen to not be in Bloomington anymore, kudos to Indiana for paying up to keep Cignetti around. According to Brett McMurphy of the Action Network, Cignetti has agreed to an eight-year extension to stay at Indiana. His new contract would run through the end of the 2032 regular season, averaging $8 million annually with an addition annual retention bonus of $1 million. We are looking at what would now be at minimum a $64 million buyout to get Cignetti out of his contract, probably closer to $70 million.

Cignetti would be coaching into his very early 70s if he were to coach out his entire Indiana contract.

Indiana does its part to make sure Curt Cignetti retires leading Hoosiers

Admittedly, I was quite bullish on Indiana coming into the season. I saw the Hoosiers' very navigable schedule. With Cignetti coming in and his staff hitting the transfer portal so hard, I thought eight wins would have been a great ceiling for this team. What I did not envision was Indiana essentially being a College Football Playoff lock at this stage of the season. They have made college football so fun!

While there is a tinge of apprehension about paying Cignetti this much this soon, I totally understand where Indiana is coming from. If they don't pay him, somebody else will. That team would be getting a rockstar head coach, while Indiana would quickly devolve back into nothingness. It is the price of doing business when it comes to one of the best late bloomers in the college coaching profession.

This coaching carousel is going to be so fascinating. The biggest job is not going to come open, with Billy Napier being safe at Florida for at least another season. The best head-coaching candidate is no longer, with Cignetti being extended. At this juncture, only six Group of Five jobs have opened up. We cannot reasonably expect for the best job in this cycle to be Purdue, so let's keep our eyes peeled.

Indiana had no choice in the matter, but paying Cignetti a small fortune was absolutely the right call.