Will Curt Cignetti and Indiana football make noise at Big Ten media days? What you need to know
The three-day event will run from July 22-24 at the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino with all 18 teams from the league in attendance. The Hoosiers will help kick off the event Tuesday along with Illinois, Rutgers, Maryland, Nebraska and Ohio State.
Indiana coaches and players will make the rounds for interviews with various television networks and reporters from across the country.
Here's everything you need to know about this year's event:
The Big Ten Network will air Cignetti's initial news conference live Tuesday. Cignetti and IU players will also sit down for interviews during the network's live special that day from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m., but times have yet to be announced. IndyStar, the Herald-Times and USA Today Network outlets will be on hand.
Each of the league's 18 teams will be represented by its head coach and three student-athletes. Cignetti chose linebacker Aiden Fisher, wide receiver Elijah Sarratt and defensive end Mikail Kamara to join him in Las Vegas.
They had success for Cignetti last year after following him from James Madison to Bloomington and will be three of the most veteran players on the roster in 2025 with 110 games (86 starts) of experience between them. Fisher and Kamara earned All-American honors last season, and all three of them made the All-Big Ten team.
There wasn't a dull moment at last year's Big Ten media days when Cignetti had a microphone in front of him.
He talked about getting rid of 'dead wood' in the portal, dissed the Rose Bowl as just an 'old stadium,' took some parting shots at JMU's wannabe rival Coastal Carolina and gave his TED talk on self-imposed limitations.
'Oh, if we got to a bowl it's a great year, bull----,' Cignetti said. 'That ain't the goal, the goal is to be the best.'
Cignetti used the moment to generate buzz back at home in Bloomington as part of his quest to get fans to buy into a program that hadn't done much to reward their enthusiasm in recent years. It was an extension of the infamous speech he gave at Assembly Hall on the day he was introduced as coach.
Indiana's College Football Playoff appearance solidified the increasing buzz surrounding the program and resulted in record ticket sales ahead of the 2025 season.
So what now?
Cignetti doesn't want IU to fade into the background while he eyes building a perennial contender. Big Ten media days will give him the platform to make sure fans across the country know the Hoosiers aren't going anywhere.
Mikail Kamara likes to say he spoke Indiana's success into existence last season.
He was an early believer in the group Cignetti assembled that included a large contingent of Kamara's teammates from James Madison. Kamara told reporters they were destined for big things before IU even wrapped up spring camp.
Kamara echoed that sentiment as the first Hoosiers player to start openly talking about making the College Football Playoff on the heels of a 41-24 win over Northwestern that left them as one of just nine unbeaten teams left in the country at 6-0.
'The only way for you to see that future is to manifest it,' Kamara said last season. 'That's kind of always been my thing.'
Kamara will be able to reveal what he's manifesting for the Hoosiers in 2025 on his business trip out to Las Vegas.
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