Newly hired Indiana football coach Curt Cignetti hasn't wasted time getting Hoosiers fans fired up. Less than a day after declaring that his team will be in the 2024 Big Ten Championship game, Cignetti took the mic during an Indiana men's basketball game to bash the school's conference rivals. Check out the video below.

“Hey, look, I'm super fired up about this opportunity,” the new Indiana football coach said Cignetti to the raucous crowd, “I've never taken a backseat to anybody and don't plan on starting now. Purdue sucks — and so does Michigan and Ohio State! Go I.U.!”

Indiana hired 62-year-old Cignetti on November 30th after five successful seasons as the head coach at James Madison, where he compiled a 31-4 record and five consecutive first-place finishes.

“This was a hard decision for me because you've got to be uncomfortable to grow,” Cignetti said at his introductory press conference last week,  “And I'm too young to stop growing. So this is an exciting opportunity at a prestigious university in the top football conference in the country — and there is no reason we can't be successful.”

While Cignetti's enthusiasm is admirable, he and the Indiana football program have a tough hill to climb. The school has had just two winning seasons (2019-2020) since 2007 and just three since 1994. They haven't finished in first place in the Big Ten since 1967.

Victories over Indiana State, Akron, and Wisconsin were the only highlights of a dismal season in Bloomington. That said, the school's final defeats of the 2023 season at Illinois, at home versus Michigan State, and at Purdue were all within less than four points.