Not Too High or Low; Doing Little Things Fuel IU Success
By Pete DiPrimio | IUHoosiers.com
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- Noise is out there when it comes to Saturday’s Indiana-Ohio State football showdown and Carter Smith wants no part of it.
The fifth-year left tackle wants no distractions heading into a game of this magnitude. Priorities center on avoiding social media and limiting phone calls and texts, especially from those interested in getting tickets given his hometown is Powell, Ohio, which is less than 20 miles from Ohio State’s campus.
“I've been off social media,” he says. “As far as calls, I haven’t had anything right now.”
Smith and fifth-year linebacker Isaiah Jones are former Ohio high school standouts who have helped turn the No. 5/4 Hoosiers (6-0 overall, 3-0 Big Ten) into a national power.
Smith played at Olentangy Liberty High School, where he was athletic enough to have lettered in volleyball besides starring in football. Although a four-star prospect living close to Ohio State, the Buckeyes never recruited him.
Their loss, the Hoosiers’ gain. Smith was a consensus All-American last year while winning the Big Ten’s Rimmington-Pace Offensive Lineman of the Year Award.
IU is 1-3 against No. 4/5 Ohio State (5-1, 3-0) with Smith on the team, the victory coming in last December’s Big Ten title game.
“It always means a little something more to me when I get to play the hometown team,” he says. “This is my fifth year in a row getting to play against them. Right now, I have a losing record against them. I'm looking to add another positive to that.”
Jones was a standout player at London High School. That’s about 30 miles from Ohio State. His father, Darrell, played tight end for the Buckeyes in the early 1990s.
Once a Buckeye fan, the elder Jones now bleeds Cream & Crimson, his son says.
“My dad is my biggest supporter. He's all IU. He's all in on my success. He had his time there, but now he’s all in on Indiana, all in on me. He wants nothing but the best for the Hoosiers.”
IU beat the top-ranked and defending national champion Buckeyes 13-10 at Indianapolis’s Lucas Oil Stadium in last season’s Big Ten Championship Game. The highly anticipated rematch could produce another cliffhanger. Under head coach Curt Cignetti, these Hoosiers are built to win them.
Cignetti-coached teams thrive by not beating themselves. It’s a concept every coach in America strives for, few produce.
The Hoosiers are 7-0 in one-score games under Cignetti in two and a half seasons. Part of the reason, Jones says, is that Cignetti keeps everyone “level-headed” no matter the situation.
“He's not going to be too high, or too low,” Jones says. “He's not going to celebrate your highs and then freak out on your lows.
“Whether you're up by a lot or you're down, it's the same. It's one play at a time. If you’re down, if you just do your job, eventually you're going to start chipping back. If you’re ahead, you're going to keep getting a bigger lead.”
Smith says Cignetti becomes more “hands on” for some games, especially on offense, which is his specialty. Cignetti was a college quarterback at the West Virginia University, and coached quarterbacks, receivers and tight ends for 25 years before becoming a head coach with a spectacular 33-2 record in Bloomington.
“In those tight scenarios toward the end of the game,” Smith says, “he likes to draw up his schemes and do what he does best. I think he just gets a little more hands-on as the game gets a little tighter."
Regardless of the score, Cignetti never wants to see his players back off.
“That’s been indoctrinated from the last three years,” Jones says. “If we're up by 45 points, that doesn't matter. You’d better go out there and play like you're down 15. That’s been bred into the culture.
“It doesn't matter what the score is. We're playing to the highest level.”
That’s especially true, Jones adds, in close games.
“Just because we're down doesn't mean we have to play different. You still go out there and complete your 1/11th, complete your job, and eventually, things start clicking. The offense gets clicking. They start getting their points. The defense starts clicking and we get (the opposing team) off the field on third down. You do that and you’ll like the result.”
Another factor in close-game success is limiting penalties. IU and Rutgers have committed the fewest penalties in the Big Ten, with 20, but the Hoosiers have played six games to the Scarlet Knights’ five.
Ohio State, by comparison, has 40 penalties. Nebraska, which lost an 11-point lead in the final 12 minutes in last Saturday’s defeat to Indiana, has the most with 50.
That limit-the-penalties success, Smith says, starts with the coaching staff passing out grade sheets.
“Coach Cig is going to say, ‘Hey, fix this. This is going to be called on Saturday.’ They put special attention into that when they break down the practice film. That's something we know as players we need to clean up, too.
“On the offensive line, it’s staying still before the snap, holding your water, keeping your hands inside so you don't get a jersey tug and a flag thrown. It's all in the little things.”