BLOOMINGTON, Ind. — Indiana football’s defense had a throwback performance in Saturday’s season-opener against North Texas.
But not the type many would’ve expected.
IU’s defense, with as loaded a front seven as anyone in the country, looked more like the units in years preceding head coach Curt Cignetti’s arrival in late November 2023. The Hoosiers displayed poor tackling throughout the game and suffered blown coverages at inopportune moments. The Hoosiers minimized those miscues’ impact, buckling down when necessary in a 52-16 win.
But the team knows there will be work to do.
“I didn’t think we played real well on defense,” Cignetti said after the game. “They had us off-balance. Whether it was poor tackling out on the perimeter … when you play a first game, especially a new staff, and you’re not exactly sure what you’re gonna see offensively, you see some looks that you haven’t practiced, you gotta make some adjustments. That was the case.”
It’s true that North Texas (0-1) was a very unknown commodity entering this game. The Mean Green have a new coaching staff and among the lowest amount of returning production as anyone in FBS. Perhaps that accounts for a few of the errors.
But it went beyond that. North Texas gained 367 yards against IU’s defense. The Hoosiers allowed more yardage in only one of their 16 games in 2025, against Oregon in the Peach Bowl. Michigan State matched the 367 mark last October in Bloomington. The 2024 team gave up more yardage just twice in 13 games, against Maryland and Notre Dame.
This defense rarely gives up that type of yardage to opponents.
“The defense left the field unsatisfied in how we played,” linebacker Isaiah Jones said. “We beat ourselves on some plays and we got to get off the field quicker.”
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IU’s defensive performance notably lacked a lot of the big plays the group has regularly produced over the last two years. The Hoosiers recorded only one sack against their former teammate, Tayven Jackson, by defensive tackle Tyrique Tucker in the first quarter. They had an additional two QB hurries, split by Mario Landino and Jeff Utzinger, and Rolijah Hardy and Josh Burnham. And while they recorded seven tackles for loss, two of them came in the game’s final two minutes, when both teams were content to run out the clock.
The Hoosiers did get one takeaway, an interception by Quan Sanks. But that, too, came in garbage time.
Indiana’s defense just wasn’t as disruptive as it’s typically been under Haines and Cignetti.
“You just want to see better tackling. You want to see more explosive plays, more explosive defense, TFLs, sacks. If they get the ball at the perimeter, it’s a TFL, it’s a gain of one,” Jones said. “Violent, vice tackles, that’s what we preach, hustling for the ball, and we have to correct that.”
Of course, this was just the first game of the season. Cignetti’s teams at Indiana have always had some lumps starting out the year — nobody left IU’s win over Old Dominion to open 2025 saying “this team will win the national title.” Both the 2024 squad and the 2025 champions needed a few weeks to fully round into form.
Jones is confident the defense will be able to get right moving forward, because he knows how this coaching staff approaches these sorts of situations.
“When you have a coach like coach Haines, coach Cignetti, and all those defensive coaches on the staff, they’re not going to let that go lightly when we get to practice on Monday and meetings,” Jones said. “And when you have guys that have played on defense before and are leaders, those leaders are going to step up and we’re going to make sure that we’re flying to the ball and we’re going to vice (tackle) and hit ball carriers.”
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