Are you paying close attention? There are only a handful of teams who can realistically win the College Football Playoff next season. You better believe the defending national champion Indiana Hoosiers are certainly among them. While repeating in the 12-team playoff era is so incredibly hard, do not tell that to Curt Cignetti. However, his Indiana team might have this Achilles' heel next season...
ESPN's Adam Rittenberg outlined how cornerback depth could be problematic for Indiana during its national title defense. Losing D'Angelo Ponds to the 2026 NFL Draft was inevitable. Even though he is undersized, his knack for picking the football off did play a massive role in Indiana's first national championship to date. Jamari Sharpe may return, but there is a huge void to be filled in the back-end.
The good news for Indiana is the Hoosiers appear to have the best defensive coordinator in college football in one Bryant Haines. He won the Broyles Award last season for a reason. Indiana was able to make plays all over the gridiron on defense, especially in the secondary. Given that Cignetti favors the other side of the ball, Indiana has to find ways to be opportunistic on defense, without being reckless.
Ponds is off to the NFL, but Indiana should have enough built-in equity to overcome his big departure.
Indiana could be exposed in the secondary next college football season
Of the 12 teams that made the College Football Playoff last season, expect for Indiana to be on the shortlist of teams to be back again in 2026-27. After all, the Hoosiers were one of four teams to make it into back-to-back tournaments in the 12-team format era. That being said, nothing is going to come as easily for Indiana next year as it did in this past one. There will be some degree of adversity.
For as much hype as Josh Hoover brought with him coming over from TCU, he is not Fernando Mendoza. No one is... Add in the fact that Indiana is undoubtedly not going to sneak up on anyone this year, they will be getting everyone's best shot. Even though Cignetti has emerged as a transfer portal maven in this new era of college football, what happens when the disease of me comes for Indiana?
Every year, there is only one champion. Last year it was Indiana, but this year is now. While Haines, Cignetti and the rest of the Indiana staff will try to find new ways to get the ball back into the hands of its high-octane offense, Ponds may have been more special of a player than we ever gave him credit for. In the end, Sharpe and others have to be sharp to ensure Indiana does not backslide defensively.
Indiana may be a team with few weaknesses, but this team could get beat over the top next season...
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