Here are 5 numbers to ponder as Indiana tries to win its first national title

For Indiana, a basketball blue blood suddenly on the precipice of ultimate pigskin glory, there is but one number that truly matters at this very moment, and that’s the number 1. 

As in, 1 more victory and Indiana football enters a new realm for all eternity. One more win against a Miami Hurricanes team that’s a heavy underdog in its own stadium and basketball-crazed Bloomington will go ballistic for football, for once. 

Led by a transfer quarterback of Cuban descent who became Indiana’s first-ever Heisman Trophy winner last month, the Hoosiers are heading down to Fernando Mendoza’s hometown determined to make history. They’ll have to win this 1 more game though on Monday night at Hard Rock Stadium, or that shiny Heisman on Mendoza’s mantle, that beautiful Big Ten title trophy they took down Ohio State to win and that 15-0 record they entered with will all sort of float away amid a flood of disappointment.

Everything IU has accomplished in Curt Cignetti‘s 2-season tour de force can be crystalized with that 1 more win. It’s really that simple, only there’s a lot more to Indiana’s special story and certainly more numbers that matter other than 1. Here are 5 of those numbers to ponder as these high-octane Hoosiers try to finally nail down that first national championship: 

1. 16

It’s hard enough to get to 15 wins, even with the expanded 12-team College Football Playoff format. But that’s exactly where these special Hoosiers are. They’re a perfect 15-0, with a dominant 12-0 regular season capped by that Big Ten title game triumph over Ohio State before blasting Alabama and Oregon in their first 2 Playoff games. 

It’s all so impressive, historic, you name it, but if there’s not a 16 next to IU’s win column come late Monday night in Miami, then a potential perfect season turns to dust in a flash. It sounds cruel and kind of unbelievable, because we’re talking about Indiana football here. But the Hoosiers need to close now if they want to be remembered among the all-time great college football teams, let alone a championship team, so 16 truly is the magic number here, as in 16 wins next to 0 defeats.

Crazy as it sounds now, considering how things turned out for Clemson in 2025, Dabo Swinney talked publicly way back in August about leading his Tigers to a 16-0 season, mindful that his 2018 national title team went 15-0. There has never been a 16-0 national championship team, and we know now that Clemson never got close after such high preseason expectations, but here comes brash Curt Cignetti and his stacked Hoosiers with a shot at that elusive 16-win threshold.

This particular 16 would be beyond sweet. It would mean college football history. It would mean that first national title trophy coming back to Bloomington. For a team and a program already gunning for history, 16 is the only endgame IU is interested in on Monday night.

2. 305

This number has nothing to do with passing yards, total yards or any yards for that matter. For people familiar with Miami, either through living in South Florida, vacationing down there or hearing it in a rap song, 305 is more a state of mind rather than a number. It’s the ever-popular area code that’s synonymous with Miami, and it’s the area code you would dial when calling, say, the high school in Miami that Fernando Mendoza attended.

That would be Christopher Columbus High School in Miami, an all-boys Catholic school that’s only about 5 miles from the University of Miami campus and roughly 25 miles from Hard Rock Stadium. Mendoza is naturally the headliner of a strong list of Columbus grads represented on both teams playing on Monday night. His brother, Alberto, also went there, representing the 305 like his Heisman-winning brother, and then as you’d expect there’s some strong Columbus representation on the Hurricanes, including head coach Mario Cristobal and associate head coach Alex Mirabal.

So, that unique 305 vibe will be virtually everywhere come Monday night, with the hometown team playing down the road a bit from Columbus, in their home stadium, against a Big Ten team that just happens to be led by a star quarterback from Miami. Is that enough 305 for everybody?

Classes have already been canceled at Columbus High on Tuesday, since no matter who wins there will be alums celebrating a national championship into the wee hours and beyond. Indiana just wants those Columbus alums celebrating to be the 2 Mendoza quarterbacks who went to high school in the shadows of the college program they are now facing for all the marbles. And they’ll be doing it in UM’s home stadium, all part of a script you would swear is made up because it just has too much of that 305 flavor. 

3. 12

The number 12 has everything to do with Indiana’s explosive offense and absolutely nothing to do with superstar quarterback Fernando Mendoza. How is that even possible? Well, the number 12 is all about the Hoosiers’ dominant rushing attack, which continually falls way below the radar because that Mendoza-led passing game has snatched nearly all of the headlines this season.

So, here’s a headliner of a fact about that sneaky good IU ground game. It’s actually kind of great, ranking — you guessed it — 12th in the nation in yards per game at 218.3. Navy is No. 1, in case you wondered, at 285.6 yards per contest, but the point here is that while Indiana’s passing game is super dynamic, its running game is just as explosive, featuring the relentless tandem of Roman Hemby and Kaelon Black. 

Hemby has 1,060 yards rushing with 1 more game to add to that total, he averages exactly 5 yards per carry and he’s scored 7 touchdowns. Right there with him is Black, who’s piled up 961 yards this season, averaging 5.7 yards per carry, with 10 TDs. So, while Mendoza has dissected defenses this season, that ground game has steamrolled them, churning out 3,275 yards as a team, with a 5.3-yard average and 33 rushing scores. 

Throw freshman Khobie Martin into the mix with his 505 yards and 6 touchdowns and you have a 3-headed monster that defenses can’t cheat against because of that Heisman Trophy winner behind center. The Hoosiers just need to make this pick-your-poison proposition work for one more game.

4. 71.4

Now, why would this inexact number reflect anything important about the Hoosiers? The answer is the number is actually a percentage, a very strong percentage that shows off just how deadly Indiana has been on 3rd down during its dominant Playoff run. 

In the 38-3 quarterfinal rout of Alabama, the Hoosiers were 9 of 14 on 3rd down, continually killing the Crimson Tide’s spirit by keeping drives alive. It also helped IU dominate the time of possession, as the Hoosiers held the ball for nearly 35 minutes. 

It was a similar theme during Indiana’s 56-22 semifinal bludgeoning of Oregon, with the Hoosiers converting a ridiculous 11 of 14 on their 3rd-down conversions. Combine the 2 games and you’ve got a 20-for-28 clip on 3rd down, which calculates to that wildly impressive 71.4%.

This Indiana team is already really, really good at torturing defenses without converting an absurd amount of its 3rd downs. For an offense, confidence like this on 3rd down can become a pattern, so we’ll see on Monday night if this Playoff pattern continues and can demoralize the Miami defense like it did to Bama and Oregon. 

Stopping Indiana is hard enough on 1st and 2nd down. But not being able to do it on 3rd down is the worst kind of agony for opposing teams who are trying in vain to keep up with IU on the scoreboard.

5. 0

The emptiest number out there, 0, has been tied to Indiana football since the beginning of time. It signifies the number of national championships the Hoosiers have won on the gridiron, a drought that’s followed the program forever but a drought that can end, at long last, on Monday night.

Indiana can’t shy away from its checkered-at-best football past. What’s in the history books can’t be changed. But what this special Hoosiers team can change comes in a few nights, when it’ll take the field at Hard Rock Stadium against the program that plays its home games there and try to turn that 0 into a joyous number 1.

We’ll throw in a bonus reason why 0 is relevant for these Hoosiers, and this time it’s a positive. Because not only did IU blow out Alabama and Oregon to get to Miami in Miami, the Hoosiers did it while committing 0 turnovers in both games. So, not only was Indiana absurdly dominant in the quarterfinals and semifinals, the Hoosiers were ultra efficient, too, refusing to beat themselves.

No opposing team has found a way to beat Indiana over the past 5 months, either. If that continues for just one more evening, there will be a slew of special numbers to attach to the 2025 Hoosiers.