MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. -- As No. 1 Indiana entered Hard Rock Stadium on Monday night to compete for the school’s first national title on No. 10 Miami’s home turf, the Hoosiers carried with them the confidence of their head coach, Curt Cignetti -- and the baggage of the program’s heavy history as one of the worst in college football.

To understand just how improbable Indiana’s 16-0 season was, punctuated by its gritty 27-21 win against Miami in front of a crowd of 67,227 -- the majority clad in cream and crimson -- a history lesson is required. Indiana football had lost 715 games -- the second most in FBS history, just one behind Northwestern.

But with one thrilling win in the College Football Playoff National Championship -- a seesaw game that went down to the wire -- the Hoosiers left Miami as the best team in the country, completing one of the most remarkable twoyear turnarounds in history. Though there are sure to be debates about where this Indiana team ranks among college football’s greatest teams -- including the 2001 Miami Hurricanes -- the simple fact is nothing like this has been done before with a roster filled with unheralded recruits.

“Are there eight firstround draft choices on this team? Probably not, no, there aren’t,” Cignetti said after the win. “But this team, the whole was greater than the sum of its parts.”

That includes the Hoosiers’ Heisman Trophy winner, Fernando Mendoza, who willed himself 12 yards into the end zone on fourth-and-4 with 9:18 left to give the Hoosiers a 24-14 lead.

“At that point I took the drop,” said Mendoza, who completed 16 of 27 attempts for 186 yards but no passing touchdowns. “It wasn’t the perfect coverage for it, but I trust my linemen, and everybody in that entire offense, that entire team had a gritty performance today. And we were all putting our bodies on the line, so it was the least I could do for my brothers.”

The last player to win the Heisman Trophy and national championship in the same season was Alabama receiver DeVonta Smith in 2020. And yet Indiana’s 12-play, 75-yard drive ended with a jaw-dropping, fourthdown touchdown run by a Hoosier from Miami who was never recruited by the Canes.

Mendoza was hardly alone. Indiana’s national championship roster included eight 4- or 5-star players, while Miami boasted 45 who earned 4- or 5-star rankings out of high school. For four quarters, they went toe-totoe on the sport’s greatest stage, a showdown of two teams that were long shots to get here -- let alone win it all.

Cignetti now has an FBS-best 27-2 record over the past two seasons after Indiana went 9-27 in its final three seasons before he was hired. He has led the Hoosiers to their first two 10-win seasons in program history. Indiana joined the 1894 Yale team as the only ones in major college football history to finish 16-0 a feat Cignetti said “a lot of people thought was never possible.”

“It probably is one of the greatest sports stories of all time,” he said, “but it’s all because of these guys and the staff.”

With 5:04 left in the third quarter, Indiana defensive lineman Mikail Kamara blocked a punt with his left hand and linebacker Isaiah Jones recovered the ball in the end zone for a touchdown, giving the Hoosiers a 17-7 lead. It was the first blocked punt to result in a touchdown in the CFP era, and Beck reacted by putting both of his hands on his helmet in disbelief and frustration.

“Just to be able to do something this crazy, like this is something you write a book about, you write a movie about,” Kamara said. “To do this in real life and do it with these guys that I love, it’s just amazing.”

Indiana led wire to wire -- but not in dominant fashion as it had all season. The Hoosiers entered Monday night having outscored opponents by 473 points this season, which tied with 2019 Clemson for the most entering the national championship game in CFP history.

With 6:37 left, Miami closed the gap to 24-21 with an eight-play, 91-yard drive that ended with a 22-yard touchdown pass from Beck to Malachi Toney. The Canes were constantly within reach but could never take the lead -- or stop enough of the Hoosiers’ explosive, timely plays.

A 57-yard touchdown run for Fletcher with 11:06 left in the third quarter closed the gap to 10-7. The Canes, who survived six lead changes in the Fiesta Bowl win against Ole Miss, needed only two plays and 47 seconds to score, and the Hoosiers came up empty on the following possession.

Miami (13-3), which was playing for its sixth national title and the program’s first since 2001, was the visiting team in its home stadium because the Hoosiers earned the higher seed. And just as they had done through the entire playoff, Indiana fans packed the stadium, filling what appeared to be about 60% of the seats.

For Miami, penalties have been an issue all season. The Hurricanes entered Monday night averaging seven penalties accepted against them per game, which is 104th in the FBS.

With 6:13 left in the first half, Indiana had the ball at Miami’s 1-yard line. Mendoza handed the ball to Riley Nowakowski, an unheralded tight end who embodied everything about Indiana’s roster. Nowakowski, a former walk-on at Wisconsin with the background of a fullback, powered through for the touchdown and a 10-0 lead.

Including that touchdown, the Hoosiers scored 198 points in the second quarter, the most of any FBS team in any quarter this season. For all of the attention on Mendoza, though, the defense was equally as impressive in the first half, holding Miami to 69 yards, the fewest by a team in the first half of a CFP championship game.

Meanwhile, Miami’s offense at times struggled to move the ball a yard. The Canes’ offensive line, which had an advantage of about 53 pounds per player, was being outplayed, and Beck became visibly frustrated until Miami converted on a fourth-and-1. The Canes’ most productive drive of the first half ended with a missed 50-yard field goal attempt that clanked off the right upright.

Indiana’s win was also a victory for the Big Ten, as it was the first time since 1940-42 (Minnesota in ‘40, ‘41, and Ohio State in ‘42) that the Big Ten won three straight national titles (AP and Coaches Poll titles only).