This would be a good year for Indiana to have its offensive line firing on all cylinders.
Because behind that group up front, IU appears to have a lot of promise at the skill positions. And specifically, IU’s passing game has a chance to be special. Especially when considering the track record of the new coaching staff.
Out of his five years with James Madison, Curt Cignetti coached four starting quarterbacks, all of which ended up winning conference player of the year on offense.
Ohio transfer Kurtis Rourke has already achieved that distinction in the MAC. And according to PFF, among players returning to college football in 2024, he’s the fifth-highest graded quarterback in the Big Ten as he gets set to suit up for the Hoosiers in 2024.
And in every conference game IU plays this season, Rourke will be the highest-graded returning quarterback.
Rourke’s MAC Player of the Year season was 2022. He ended that campaign with a major knee injury, and that disrupted his mobility and overall production in 2023. He’s a guy who has had legitimate NFL aspirations for a while.
“You’re looking at a guy who’s thrown almost 1,000 passes, has completed 67 percent, has 55 career touchdown passes, about 13 interceptions, about 8,000 yards,” Cignetti said when Rourke signed.
“Won ten games and nine games the last two years. He’s 6’5”, 231 pounds, and his brother (Nathan) was a quarterback before him, and he’s in the league with the Jags. It really came down to him declaring for the NFL draft or coming here (to Indiana).”
Rourke has never had a group of receivers to throw to like he’ll have this fall.
Top-to-bottom, Indiana might have the most talented receiver room in the Big Ten. They’ve certainly got one of the most productive.
The Hoosiers have three receivers with at least 105 career catches, four with more than 1,100 career yards, and six who are over both 60 career receptions and 700 career yards.
PFF says three from Indiana — Elijah Sarratt, Donaven McCulley and Ke’Shawn Williams — are part of the 10 highest graded Big Ten wide receivers who are returning to college football this season. No other team can claim more than one on this list:
Not mentioned by PFF is the IU receiver with the most career receptions (161), yards (1,751) and touchdowns (10).
Texas Tech transfer receiver Myles Price knows this year’s Indiana wide receiver room will be the embodiment of Cignetti’s oft-used phrase “everything is earned not given.”
“Everybody wants to be in, everybody wants to make plays, everybody wants to be the guy that makes that play to end practice or something like that. So I think that’s just a blessing to have, honestly. Because when you have to compete, when it becomes game time, it’s almost like second nature, like it’s nothing to me,” Price said in April.
“So I think just having that competitive edge, everybody wanting to be the guy, that’s a blessing to have in the room, because not everybody around the country has that.”
Here are the career numbers for IU’s eight receivers returning to college football this season:
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