It's fair to say that Curt Cignetti is well-compensated. And with his latest raise, he is now better compensated than all but one coach in college football.
On the heels of Indiana's first national championship, Cignetti, who signed a long-term extension during the season, is set to make more than $13 million in 2026, according to The Daily Hoosier. The $13.025 million salary figure is a massive bump from the reported $8.3 million he made in 2025, and it is also unofficially the second-highest in the country, behind only Georgia's Kirby Smart.
According to USA Today's coach salaries database, Smart made $13.28 million in 2025, which was over $700,000 more than the second-highest-paid coach, Ohio State's Ryan Day, who was coming off his first national title.
While it should be noted that the salaries of college football coaches change every year and could certainly still fluctuate considerably between now and August, the fact that Cignetti, who was coaching Division II Indiana University of Pennsylvania a decade ago, is among the highest-paid coaches in America is a remarkable turn of events. And it really can't be argued that he hasn't earned it.
At age 62, Cignetti made the leap from the always-competitive James Madison to Indiana, which had been one of the worst power-conference football programs in the country for a long, long time. Bringing over many JMU players and filling out the rest of his roster with many other transfers, Cignetti transformed the Hoosiers from a Big Ten laughingstock to a conference title contender in Year 1.
A season after Indiana went 3-9 and needed four overtimes to beat Akron at home for one of its two wins against FBS teams, Cignetti led Indiana to a 10-0 record to start 2024. While a road loss to eventual national champion Ohio State prevented them from going undefeated, the Hoosiers rebounded to smack around rival Purdue 66-0 to finish the regular season 11-1 and, more importantly, clinch their first-ever College Football Playoff (CFP) berth.
After losing to Notre Dame in the first round of the CFP in 2024, Indiana was determined to make sure Year 1 of Cignetti's tenure was anything but a fluke — and boy, did they.
Bringing in another crop of productive transfers, including Cal quarterback Fernando Mendoza, the Hoosiers began the 2025 season with a rocky showing against Old Dominion, only to crush their next three opponents, including ninth-ranked Illinois 63-10. Three weeks later, IU went to Eugene and beat reigning Big Ten champion Oregon, which had not lost a game since joining the conference.
In a rematch of the first loss of the Cignetti era, Indiana defeated No. 1 Ohio State 13-10 in the Big Ten Championship Game, earning itself the first seed in the CFP. The Hoosiers cruised to the national title game from there, walloping Alabama, Cignetti's employer, 38-3 before doing the same against Oregon in the semifinals 56-22. Then, in the national championship game, IU survived one of its toughest tests of the year and effectively cemented Cignetti's legendary status with a 27-21 victory against Miami, finishing a historic season of firsts with another title and a perfect, 16-0 record.
Cignetti and Indiana will begin their defense of the national championship on Sept. 5, when the Hoosiers host North Texas.
