Indiana head coach Kurt Cignetti is ready for the national championship game.
In their final press conference before Monday’s championship game, both Cignetti and Miami head coach Mario Cristobal were asked about how their teams felt during their final practice of the season. Signetti made no secret of how he wants his team to be ready.
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“I think leading up to this game, there was a lot of hype in favor of Indiana and a lot of rat poison,” Signetti said. “I happened to see something on social media this morning about our guys hugging each other at the end of practice. This is a close-knit team. I’ve seen a fair amount of sentimentality this week from some of our seniors who have been with us a long time.
“I think it’s time to sharpen the saw and throw those warm fuzzy things out the door, that sentimentalism. It’s time to go play a game against a great opponent. We’ve got to have a sharp edge in this game. You can’t go into a war with warm milk and cookies.”
If you weren’t aware of the sacred rose Cignetti was referring to, photographers sprinkle holy water in the Indiana end zone before every playoff game for the Hoosiers, which the team has outscored 94-25 so far.
If you’re a long-time college football fan, you might also recognize Nick Saban’s term “rat poison.” That’s one of Saban’s favorite ways to describe how a team can get caught up in its own positive media coverage. Cignetti is a former assistant coach under Saban and worked for the longtime coach at Alabama.
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So does Cristobal. He also served as an assistant coach at the University of Alabama before becoming the head coach at Oregon State in 2017. He also referenced Saban in his response to a question when talking about the process leading up to Monday night’s game.
“Brilliantly, [Saturday] It’s a typical Thursday practice and I think the process itself is no different than any other Thursday, but every team is unique,” Cristobal said. “Every team is uniquely special and different and brings something different to the lives of everyone around them.
“But I don’t think we fell into any nostalgia moments or anything like that. I just really felt like our team was very focused and they were really committed to executing the rest of the day’s process and knowing that we had a huge opportunity. That’s how we ended the night and that’s how we prepared to continue our process this morning.”
