Curt Cignetti Wins Home Depot National Coach Of The Year Award

Curt Cignetti becomes the fourth Indiana football coach to win a national Coach of the Year award of any kind.

Indiana Hoosiers head coach Curt Cignetti reacts after the game against the UCLA Bruins at Rose Bowl. / Kirby Lee-Imagn Images

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. – Indiana has had a historic football season – the greatest in Indiana’s history at 11-1 with a College Football Playoff bid to go with it.

National observers did not let the architect of Indiana success go unrewarded.

On Thursday night, Cignetti was named the Home Depot National Coach of the Year. His award was presented as part of the College Football Awards Show broadcast on ESPN.

The 11 wins that Indiana has had in 2024 is a program record and it represents an eight-game improvement from the Hoosiers’ 3-8 season in 2023 under Tom Allen.

Indiana’s eight Big Ten wins are also a program record. The Hoosiers finished a game behind Oregon for the Big Ten regular season championship.

Cignetti is the first Division I head coach to start 8-0 or better in consecutive seasons at different institutions. He led James Madison to a 10-0 mark to start the 2023 season and pushed Indiana to an identical mark to begin the 2024 slate.

Cignetti is the only Indiana coach to start his first season at 4-0 and is the only non-Ohio State or non-Michigan Big Ten coach to begin his career with a 10-0 record since 1936. Ryan Day (Ohio State, 2018-19), Urban Meyer (Ohio State, 2012), Earle Bruce (Ohio State, 1979), Bennie Oosterbaan (Michigan, 1948-49) and Carroll Widdoes (Ohio State 1944-45) are the others.

The Home Depot Coach of the Year award has been given since 1994 by ESPN.

The Home Depot Coach Of The Year award is one of many that cites a national coach of the year. Among other honors still to be given is the AFCA Coach of the Year, Associated Press Coach of the Year Award, George Munger Award, Paul “Bear Bryant Award and the Sporting News College Football Coach of the Year Award and Walter Camp Coach of the Year Award.

Cignetti became the fourth Indiana coach to earn national coach of the year award honors. Bo McMillin (1945, AFCA), John Pont (1967, AFCA, FWAA, Sporting News, Walter Camp) and Tom Allen (2020, AFCA) were also so honored.

The national honors come a little more than a week after Cignetti was named the Big Ten Coach of the Year by both his peers and by the Big Ten media.

All of the above honors can be added to a resume that includes coach of the year awards at each of his previous stops. He was the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference Coach of the Year in 2012 at Indiana of Pennsylvania, the Colonial Athletic Association Coach of the Year in 2017 at Elon and Sun Belt Coach of the Year in 2023 at James Madison.

The final chapter in Indiana’s football season has not yet been written. The Hoosiers travel to Notre Dame to play in the first round of the College Football Playoff at 8 p.m. ET on Dec. 20. The winner advances to play Georgia in the Sugar Bowl on Jan. 1.

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• CIGNETTI WINS BIG TEN COACH OF THE YEAR: Curt Cignetti was named Big Ten Coach of the Year by both his peers and by the media. CLICK HERE.