Presented by Home Field Apparel. Welcome back to Crimson Cast,
GAIL and Clavio here. The week of IU Football podcast
content rolls on. It's Wednesday night, October
23rd, college game day coming here in a couple of days, but we
got plenty to talk about in between now and then.
Special guest joining us on the show.
We will bring him on in just a second.
First, just a quick reminder folks, we are brought to you
here on Crimson cast by Home Field Apparel, your place to go
for the finest in college fashions, the softest fabrics,
the coolest designs, and they're going to be all over Bloomington
over the course of this next couple of days.
If you missed the announcement and I'm glad I can finally talk
about it, I was sworn to secrecy prior to this, but Home Field
partnering with a bunch of your favorite places here in town
over the course of the next few days.
They're going to be at Upland Brewing Company from 5:00 to
9:00 on Friday. If you want that iconic 9 Windy
Anna shirt, and I know many of you missed it the first couple
of times around, it's going to be available for 999 at the pop
up store that they'll have at Upland.
So be sure to head over there. Plus, if you wear home field or
buy some there, you get free Upland beer.
And there's also supposed to be a surprise gift giveaway as
well. Along with, according to the
flyer, complimentary snacks. You can't beat complimentary
snacks. They will also be on Saturday
morning. They will be presenting Game Day
Breakfast Club at the upstairs pub starting at 7:00 AM and
running until noon. If you arrive early, the 1st 200
fans through the door get a free surprise IU shirt.
I haven't seen it, but I know what it is and it's awesome.
You'll want to get over there lots of great things going on
there free collectible breakfast plate complimentary breakfast
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you're going to breakfast club. All of this being brought to you
by home field and also Crimson Castle will be at upstairs in
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got some special guests joining me, so I hope you'll be able to
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Again, home field apparel your place to go for college sports
fashion. All right, we're gonna bring on
We've got on our special guest. If you're watching this on
YouTube, the man who may have graduated with the highest
quarterback rating in the history of the program with a
with a 236 in a senior year. You, you know him from Twitter,
you know him from podcasting. Former IU odd receiver Mitchell
Page joining us here on the show.
Mitchell. We met randomly after the
Nebraska game in person and now here we are.
Miracles can't happen. This is why you go out after
games, folks. But how you doing?
Great to have you on the show. Yeah, absolutely.
I was just listening. You know what the biggest
travesty I think in my life right now is?
I don't own a single article of home field apparel.
Wow. Isn't that terrible, I'm
thinking. Connor, I know you're listening.
That is horrible it. I don't deserve it at this
point. Some of the unbelievable stuff
that they, and this is, I'm not being paid by them.
They just have unbelievable logos, designs, just bringing
back classic looks. I'm completely missing out.
So I was just listening to you go through that.
I may be at the upstairs on Saturday morning.
If I if I wasn't having to be in my tailgate spot at 5-6 AM
basically on on Saturday morning, I might just park, fire
up the generator and walk down to upstairs and see if I could
get in at that point. I think it might be the move.
If it's anything like it was last week, you'll probably be
late. Late getting in late getting
out. Yeah, it was pretty jammed.
And folks, if you haven't been to upstairs is not not an
official sponsor of the show, but you know, they are our
adopted bar here on on Crimson cast.
If you haven't been to the new side of of the upstairs pub,
it's like a spaceship landed on the building with the the
coolest sports bar set up that you could possibly think of on
Kirkwood. It doesn't stink.
That was my first time seeing it.
For whatever reason, when I was there, never really went
upstairs. I, I think Brothers was our big
spot is whenever I was on the team.
So I spent plenty of time in that place.
But upstairs, maybe my spot, I ran into you.
You never know what might happen.
See, I mean, great things happen at upstairs.
I, you'll find me there at least every once in a great while and
you'll see me there on Friday even better.
So. But I wanted to bring you on,
you know, 'cause this is IU. Football's having what we would
call a moment. I think you could say feels like
it maybe the moment and and this is, you know, for for someone
like yourself who is, you know, worn the uniform and has gone
out there and you know, was there for two of the most
successful seasons in IU history.
If you take the totality of the whole 220 some years.
I I guess first and foremost, like what has been your reaction
to this season so far? Yeah, it's definitely changed
from the beginning. I think you watch them play the
first game and they look pretty Dang good, but we've looked good
before and then it just keeps happening.
And you almost expect, I mean, I played for the team and I wasn't
on the sideline expecting something to happen.
But you could just feel moments in the game where it's like, oh
gosh, here we we're going to snap it over the guy's head or
something crazy like that. And the only reason I know that
it would happen is I saw it over and I was a part of it.
I still have nightmares of double overtime Michigan, me
dropping the Dang ball on the goal line.
I still have nightmares about it.
And this team just doesn't do that.
They are an inevitable force. Like if you're on the tracks,
get out of the way. And I think the most impressive
thing that, and now it's finally being talked about in the
national media, but they don't do anything that's crazy flashy.
They're just extremely clinical and the coaches put guys in
places to be successful. They take what you're really
good at and put you there. Whatever you're really bad at,
they keep you away from as much as possible and it seems like
they've done that at a really high level.
Obviously you've got the quarterback, Curtis Rourke's
been unbelievable. We're talking Heisman with him,
but all the way through the roster, you've got an offensive
line that felt like they were invisible at times in the last
couple years and now they're standing up to what people said
was a top 10 defensive line. Kind of hit him in the mouth so.
Part part in the Red Sea, right? It just, they, they feel like
that you just need to get out of the way.
And honestly, the the environment, it feels magical.
I will be at every game from here on out.
I even if I was still living in Charleston where I was last
year, I'd be at every game. It, it just feels like if you
haven't been can be a little harder to go now 'cause every
game's sold out, but you better find a way to at least be in the
city on game day, because it's, it's, I've never seen anything
like it. I truly haven't.
I, I got so many directions I want to go with you on this, but
let me, let me start with something you were kind of
alluding to there, which is like, you know, how clinical and
how like it's not flashiness. It's not like, you know, we,
we've talked about this on the podcast before where it always
felt like when Indiana was good, they had a few like really
awesome players and then they had a bunch of guys that were
like a couple of levels below and they, you rose and fell
based upon how well or how poorly those players were
playing. And this team, I mean, I've, I,
I, I looked at the roster and I'm like, where are the obvious
NFL players? Like where, where are the guys
who are head and shoulders? It's like everybody's a solid B
plus or a minus, which doesn't sound impressive until you think
about, well, gosh, if everybody's AB plus or an A
minus, you don't have a lot of drop off.
That makes a tremendous difference in, you know, what
plays you're calling, how you're scheming, you know, asking guys
to step up and do things and, and not asking them to do things
they can't do. As I think you alluded to there,
it's rare you get a group of of players together that can do
that, and it's even rarer for a coaching staff to be able to
harness that kind of effort and intensity.
Yeah, I I think what, as we get farther along into the transfer
portal, you start to see guys make jumps from what they call
the group of five or sometimes even below or into the Big 4,
right? Whatever that means.
I think a couple things are really going to start to stand
out. The first one being how close
the really good players on all of those teams at every level
are to each other. It also exaggerates how
important depth is. And I think the only thing I can
really compare it to is the teams that I played on, right?
We had unbelievable talent at the top end.
And I'm not I'm not including myself in this at all.
I I was just kind of a guy. But you look at like a Cody
Latimer or Shane Nguyen or Tevin Coleman, Jordan hat, like those
guys start at every school in the conference in a lot of
schools in the country. Maybe you start getting to
Georgia or whatever, but like we had talent.
But if you really watch those games, especially the games
against Ohio State, for whatever reason, we always matched up
really well with them for a really long time.
And then as you're just hitting, hitting, hitting, hitting, you
start to see where that depth starts to matter, especially
along the offensive and defensive lines.
When you just been banging into each other for three hours, you
just start to wear down and that next man up being able to do it,
that's where the really good team separate themselves.
And Indiana in a year has built a bunch of depth with a lot of
starters that we were just talking about are all right next
to each other pretty Dang good. And they've all bought into
whatever signet he's talking about in the team room.
I would pay a lot of money to be in one of those meetings.
But when you have something like that, I, I keep using the word
magic because that's the only thing that I can really describe
it as. But really it's just good roster
construction in a team that believes that's all that really
has happened. You didn't bring in a bunch of
five star players. I would guess there's 05 star
players on the roster and this is the results you get.
I, I don't think I've watched a lot of ball this year, Not a lot
of teams that are doing what Indiana's doing.
I don't care if you're talking in Oregon, Georgia, sometimes
Texas. Yeah.
I, I, I think just the fact that we're talking about Indiana in
that vein, it's like it's a fake world, isn't it?
I mean, I, I've been joking with a lot of people all this, it's
like every time I talk about how good Indiana is or how, you
know, they're, they're, they have a better than 50% shot of
making the playoffs, I feel like I'm gonna get struck by
lightning because that's this is, this is the universe and the
way it normally operates for us. Like you're not supposed to say
those things. And yet and yet, you know, I
think what lingering doubts I had about the team really, you
know, they disintegrated early. I know that UCLA game.
I've been to every single game so far and home and away.
And it's, you know, I remember standing in the in the, you
know, the, the stands there and if third quarter and, you know,
UCLA gets the ball if they scored on their first possession
of the third quarter. And I'm like, OK, is this when
it unravels? And not only did it not unravel
it, it reraveled or whatever, whatever you want to say, like
they want the. Exact they did.
The same thing against Maryland, they did the same thing against
Northwestern in a game that was pretty tight there in the third
quarter and then they just blew it open.
And then you know, the Nebraska game, I'm like, well, Nebraska's
gonna clearly give them an effort.
I picked Indiana to start 6 and O and then lose the 7th and 8th
game. So I was like, well, you know,
Nebraska probably a bridge too far, Washington Bridge too far.
And to come out and hang A50 six to seven victory on a team that
was a, a fringe top 25 team to to beat them so severely that
that chart, like, did we lose that bad chart that's on
Twitter? Like you need a.
Separate chart to get Indiana, Nebraska on there.
I, I mean, my God, it's, it's, it's just one of those things
where it doesn't compute. And I've had people ask me like,
how is Indiana doing this? And other than the very
technical and accurate description you just gave, it's
like, well, they've got a bunch of guys who are doing their jobs
really well and they make really good play calls and they seem to
really stay disciplined. I cannot explain it, and I've
given up trying. It's like if I try to peer too
deeply into this, I'm afraid I'm going to undo the magic or
something. So I'm just kind of like living
in the moment, as messed as I possibly can.
Just smile and wave. It's unbelievable.
I think the real turning point of the season in terms of my
belief and I think the belief of a lot of people that are true
live and die. IU football fans and I, I'm
going to pause that thought because I do want to say even
before this now, it feels like there's a whole bandwagon and
come on, all of you are invited there.
There's no shame that you're just now joining us.
Come on we're excited you're here.
But even in the down years, the IU football fan is a unique,
powerful individual. Like to the ability to just
every year bang your head against that wall is a special,
special trait. And there's so many of them out
there. I've interacted with a lot of
people that are just die hard, die hard football fans.
And when I do come across them, it makes my week, month.
It just how cool and passionate those real lifers are.
So now I'm going to pivot as that fan.
You start to talk about like the when the belief changes.
I was in the stadium for Maryland.
You throw 2 picks in a set. It felt like you threw 2 picks
before the game started. That's a game that in the past,
similar to Rutgers a couple years ago, you lose 50 to
nothing. Things have derailed.
You start getting mad at each other.
You start throwing the ball down the field trying to make it all
up in one play. And when I watch these guys just
methodically, continually beat teams into the ground, that's
when you start to think, OK, these guys got a little
something different to the point where now I'm not afraid to
appear behind the curtain. I want to see the magic because
it's it's real. It's it's not a team that in the
past we've had some teams that create a bunch of havoc on
defense and cause some turnovers and get some 5050 balls to fall
our way. That's just as fun.
Or it is fun. Maybe not just as fun.
This is it's truly a just good team.
There's nothing flashy. They don't do anything fancy.
You just better bring it if you're going to play them.
Yeah, it feels more sustainable than than the big play approach.
You know, it's funny you mentioned like the game that you
throw 2 picks early and then lose by 50.
Nothing. It's essentially what happened
in Nebraska. You know, they, they, they, they
had that, that game. Think about that.
They were down 50 to nothing. It felt like, yeah, at the
kickoff, yeah. And, and that it's just so weird
for Indiana football to be the one doling that out as opposed
to being on their losing end of it.
I was talking with somebody who's not a huge football fan.
It was the day after the Nebraska game.
And I was like explaining how the whole day had gone.
And they they, they asked me something that I just thought
that was hilarious. They were like, well, why hasn't
IU just hired somebody like Signetti before?
And I'm like, I don't think you understood.
I don't think Indiana understood necessarily what they were
hiring when they got Signeti. I think they had an inkling like
this guy could be special. This guy is different.
But it is so unusual, not just at Indiana but in college
football to hire a coach who comes in and completely flips
the culture. You know, especially, you know,
I mean, we've never really had the transfer portal era prior to
the last couple of years. But that obviously allows you to
flip the culture a little bit faster.
But even with that, we, you know, normally takes 3-4 years
to really get your system and get your program in.
How surprised are you about how quick this is gone?
And what do you think is the reason why they've been able to
get it going so quickly? Yeah, it's obviously
unprecedented times with the transfer portal, so it does
happen faster. But the ability to just come in
with completely new guys. And he brought some from JMU and
there's some that play, so some were familiar.
But it's still 85 guys that have never seen you before.
They got recruit. Half the team got recruited by
you, the other half just had two or three of the most miserable
years of their lives. And now you'll come in.
Maybe you're a breath of fresh air, but to buy in implement a
system that is as diverse and I keep using the word clinical,
but that's what it is and disciplined that quickly at a
place that had experienced the last couple of years.
It's I don't have any words for what that is.
It's much more likely that a team like Alabama, and I don't
mean this because Kayla Nabor was at Indiana, he has probably
the hardest job takeover in the history of college football.
That's so this is no slight to him, but I'm just using that as
a reference because you go into a place like Alabama that has
the standards, has a bunch of guys that have followed these
standards. Saban leaves.
You lose a couple guys, but it's not the whole roster.
It's still a very big chunk of those initial dudes that played
for Nick Saban and they average 20 penalties a game.
It's the same guys that happens much more often than coming in
and taking over a team that couldn't block a soul, couldn't
throw it 5 yards down the field, couldn't tackle anybody, and
we're destined to lose every game before they even flip the
coin. To have the aura isn't the right
word, but it kind of is. Like when you come in, you talk
crazy. First of all, some of the stuff
he said. When you look back at it, if you
don't think this man was a psycho when he first got here
without seeing this, you're a liar.
If you tell me that, you're like, yeah, I believed him.
No, you didn't. To start like that and get a
team that actually believes what the heck you're saying before
anybody else does. When a lot of people on campus,
you go to class. I've been in those classes after
we lose a game that we should have won, and the professor
doesn't even know that I'm in the class and starts making
jokes about the football team. I've been in that class.
That's happening to those guys, especially when I win.
Google me. And so does Purdue and Ohio
State, especially when that happens.
So now you get on campus. These people think we got a
lunatic coach on the football team.
They're going to be talking like that, you know what's happening
at practice. But it's so easy to kind of let
those voices get in your head and get distracted.
And they haven't done that. And I, I think that that is
maybe why I have a little more hope that they're not going to
let the national media get in their head now that people think
they're good and they're just going to keep on doing what
they're doing. So that was a really long way to
answer a question, but it's there's so many factors that
make it unbelievable that it becomes simple.
Like the real simple is they believe in them, they believe
they're going to win and they're really freaking good.
That's it. I want to go back to what you
said there about not letting it stuff get in their heads.
You know, so as a football player, you know, obviously game
day didn't come when you were here or it came the next year
sort of for that Thursday game. But you know, how are you
dealing with the week when this kind of noise is happening
around you? And you know, I mean, it's it,
it's not just the game day thing, but it's all of the
national media. And this, this was what I
worried about last week because it felt like Signeti or Curtis
Rourke were on every single podcast and show known to man.
And I, I just was thinking the whole week I was like, God, I
hope that this doesn't cause them to come out and just be
flat. And I had the opposite effect.
I'm like, maybe they need to be on more shows this week.
I'm scrolling Twitter and I see Signeti on Pat Mcafee's show.
I'm thinking, oh gosh, here we go again.
We've got big time. This is over with and now I
think he should be the president.
I wish it was on the presidential debates.
I'm. Fine, I'm fine with right in a
minute at this point, it might be best for everybody, but I
mean, are you able to shut the noise that like, how does it
penetrate and and what can a coaching staff do like you
because you don't want to overdo it, because then you can almost
create a self fulfilling prophecy to some degree, to
borrow something that somebody told me a couple of days ago.
But it it does feel like it's a tightrope to walk, especially
for a group of players, at least the non JMU guys and and their
success was at a lower level. But this is not a group that's
collectively had a lot of taste of success up to this point.
Yeah, it's really hard and I can promise you that they do hear
it. Now.
I think as a coach, you have to acknowledge that you hear it.
People think you're really good. And in some people, I've
definitely been in scenarios where they say people think
you're good but you're not. And here's why.
Here's why. Here's why.
This is why we got to bring you down to make you think you're
not. I'm more in the camp of people
think you're really good. Now you got to go prove it
because you haven't shown him anything yet.
We're not even close to how good we can be.
And that kind of feels how Signetti handles it now.
Yeah, he is hard on you when you're winning because that's
what you need to do, especially on Saturdays.
But during the week, my guess is they're coaching much more
positively. Even when there's a negative
play that happens at practice or in the game, you talk about it
more along the lines of people think you're really good.
If you start playing like this, they're going to stop thinking
you're really good. You need to go show the world
why we are different and why they're still not talking about
us enough. And I think that's how you build
the little chip on the shoulder. But I do have a funny story
about letting the letting the noise get in.
I was still a walk on. I was not playing, but I
definitely heard it and I was all bought in.
I think it was my second year. We got through the 7th game of
the season. We were like four and three or
something. It wasn't.
We were not blowing teams away and somehow it shook out that
there was no conference divisions yet.
I don't think maybe there was. I think it was the old that was
the leaders and legends, that's what.
It that's what it was because Wisconsin was on our side.
I know, I know. I remember this.
I was at this game. Somehow it worked out that if we
beat Ohio State. Ohio State had been put on
probation, I think because of the tattoo scandal.
A. 100% So now we control our destiny, we get to the Big 10
Championship and we are geeked. All we can practice.
We broke down on Big 10 champs. We got beat by 60.
One of the many games that I've sadly wandered out of the
stadium at halftime be like, well, that that didn't go very
well. For whatever reason we just
never the Wisconsin teams of old and I don't think really anyone
matched up with them but the Monty Ball Melvin Gordon teams.
My dad. This is my favorite story about
any game that I played. I didn't even play again this
one either. This was at Wisconsin.
It was like 5° and my dad was there way early like he always
was. Went to the concession stand and
he's behind these five humans and they're ordering whatever
they're ordering and they turn around and it was all ladies.
We are in trouble. That looks like our offense
line. This is a power.
Towering over him and like we are not getting off a block.
All day. It's it's wow, lot of last, last
question for you. So you were at the Nebraska
game, you were out afterwards, but especially in the stadium.
I know you've never heard or seen Memorial Stadium quite like
that before. What was that like to experience
for you as someone who's been in that stadium a bunch, has been
on the field a bunch? Like what?
What was that vibe like for you seeing the stadium not just
full, but full of people that were like absolutely psyched to
watch IU play football. Yeah, definitely nothing I'd
ever seen. We got there at 6:45 in the
morning and I started getting emotional just driving past the
tailgate fields, past upstairs in Kilroy's with 1000 kids
waiting to get in there. Not just because they wanted to
drink, because they needed to be there early so they could get to
the game. And then my wife could tell you,
I don't think I spoke for the first quarter.
Just soak it in. Just bask.
It's so loud in there. I've never known that stadiums
are designed like if you go to Michigan and maybe it's because
they're playing Indiana, it's but it's so flat so it doesn't.
All the noise doesn't get on you.
Ohio State is built in the way that the noise is in your
helmet. Memorial Stadium is kind of like
that. When?
We were in on the field or shooting fireworks.
I couldn't imagine being on Nebraska's sideline.
That's a little different beast. And I know it's not 100,000, but
there's a, it's a different kind of place and it's just so
special, man. And how fun is it?
All listeners, all of you listeners, how fun is it to be
in the stadium and make a difference?
Because it's, I don't think Indiana fans have really known
how big of a difference they can make in the outcome of a game.
They're a huge There's a reason that it's so hard to go into
Death Valley at LSU and win. Indiana has the ability to do
that, whether we like it or not. If you don't think that creamy
Crimson ran out of the stand or ran out of the locker room,
looked and saw a full stadium and weren't ready to win 50 to
nothing, you're crazy. How could you not want to go out
there and execute every single job that you have to the best of
your ability in front of a crowd like that?
Well, and what's exciting about it is the the remainder of the
home season is sold out, which is just wild to think about.
I mean, the four sellouts in a season is almost unprecedented.
Last time it happened was 1970 for IU.
And yeah, just nice. Yeah.
That was in our lifetimes, right?
But no, you're right. I mean, the ability to for IU
fans to go in, make a difference, be loud and have it
matter. I've been saying this for years.
You know, people would try the fans for not showing up or not
sticking around. And I'm like, I get, I get the
complaints, but you got to build it first.
Like, you really have to show people success.
And I mean, even the first couple of home games this
season, people were leaving at halftime.
Signetti talked about it. You know, that Maryland game was
really kind of the first time where it felt like we were
almost there. And that was up to that point.
As I've said on the show before, up to that point, that was my
favorite Memorial Stadium experience, that Maryland game.
Damn, it was still electric. Yeah, and, and the Nebraska game
blew it out of the water. Like everything about it was
just so perfect. It was like living in a movie
for three hours. So I, I'm, it was, it was
interesting to hear your perspective on it 'cause you
know, I've, I've been in there a bunch of times when it's been
nowhere close that I know you have as well.
And I also have gotten emotional.
I've talked with a lot of people who are in my boat where you,
you're the Maryland game. I teared up a little bit at the
end 'cause I was like, I can't believe that they pulled this
off to this degree. And to be this much further down
the road already is, is really special.
And. It is right now.
Just thinking about it, I saw Indiana put out like just a 5
second highlight on Instagram and it wasn't even the plays, it
was just the scans of the stands.
Gives me chills. It it's gonna, I can't imagine
what this weekend's gonna be like.
I gotta, I'll have to meet up with you again, man.
We'll have to have some fun. I'll be there bright and early.
I'm gonna I'm gonna be getting in line at 5:30 to park in the
tailgate lot. So I will I will look for you or
I will send you my info. Come on over.
We'll, we'll, we'll crack open a Hoosier game day logger and get
ready for the noon kick here. We'll Mitchell, we'll have you
on again soon. This was awesome.
I appreciate you joining us and appreciate everything you did in
uniform as well, so thank you and look forward to chat with
you again about IU football in the future.
Absolutely. Let's keep it going, baby.
Absolutely well thanks to all you folks for joining us as well
on our week of content here for football on Crimson cast.
We got more tomorrow. Taylor Layman and I breaking
down the whole thing, Taylor from bite sized Bison with all
the numbers. Thanks to our sponsors at home
Field Apparel and thanks to all you folks once again, be sure to
be out there and loud. Get into the stands, help
Indiana beat Washington. Coming up this weekend, I'm
Galen Clavier. We'll catch you folks.
On the flip side, bring back the bison.
Stay never daunted. So long, everybody.
Send off I. That's what I do.