Indiana Football: 3 things to be thankful for this season

1. Young Star Power

Not too often is it where the majority of your team returns from a program altering season, but that’s exactly what Indiana has in store for next year.

Offensively, seven of the 11 starters have eligibility remaining after this year, and eight if you include both Penix and Ramsey under center. That doesn’t even include the 10 other players that see significant time in the rotation.

Some of those names have even started to show great promise over the course of the past few weeks. David Ellis (15 rec, 170 yards) and Miles Marshall (10 rec, 120 yards) are two of the skill players who look to have promising futures, especially with the departures of Donavan Hale and Nick Westbrook. In addition to them, four-star freshman running back Sampson James has a huge ceiling and will look to take over the reins once Stevie Scott departs.

Who will be throwing some of these weapons the ball? Redshirt freshman Michael Penix. While injuries are still a question that he needs to answer, his talent is off of the charts and when healthy this season, he was one of the better QB’s in the Big Ten.

Defensively, nine of the 11 starters are going to be back next year for Indiana, assuming they all return, with an additional 12 rotational players still having eligibility remaining. Out of those 21 returning players, 17 are either sophomores or freshmen currently.

There has been a lot of talk about the depth of Indiana’s roster, and how Tom Allen has emphasized the importance of it in order to have a good program. With so many young players, while there is depth, they are learning how to compete at a Big Ten level, and with so much experience at a young age, it will only benefit them when they are upperclassmen.