Curt Cignetti Lands New Deal With Indiana That Makes Him One of the Top-Paid Coaches in College Football

Winning a national championship comes with some perks—including a big raise.

Indiana coach Curt Cignetti watches during the College Football Playoff national championship. | Rich Janzaruk/Herald-Times / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

He might not smile often, but it feels like there’s a good chance that Indiana coach Curt Cignetti has a grin on his face today.

On Friday, ESPN’s Pete Thamel reported that Cignetti had gotten a raise and extension with Indiana. The new deal will pay him $13.2 million per year and goes through 2033. With his new salary, Cignetti immediately becomes one of the highest-paid coaches in all of college football.

Given the results Cignetti has produced, it feels like Indiana still might be getting Cignetti at a bargain. In two years with the Hoosiers, Cignetti has a record of 27–2, including last year’s 16-0 run to a national championship. That run of success would be worth a hefty raise at the most established college football powerhouses in the sport. Pulling it off at Indiana—which had claimed just three wins the season before Cignetti’s arrival and hadn’t reached nine wins since 1967 before he won 11 in his first campaign—feels like an outright miracle.

While the Hoosiers continue to enjoy the glow of their first national championship, Cignetti is already back to work. Indiana has plenty of work to do to make sure next year’s team is capable of reaching similar heights, especially with the departure of Heisman winner Fernando Mendoza to the NFL.

Whatever challenges Indiana may go up against in the coming years, Cignetti will have the resources to face them.

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