It was commented on in a thread yesterday regarding the average age of the Indiana team being 23 years old. They noted on this in the game yesterday. It's not an accident. Cignetti prioritizes production over potential (his line). Of course, older players have a longer track record to show production. LOOOOONG gone are the days when teams are built for development. Even if a coach wanted to bring in a high school recruit player with with an eye of having him there 3-5 years, there are absolutely zero guarantees. A full 1/3 of all FBS players entered the portal this season. On top of having to worry about depth by losing backups who want more playing time, coaches have to equally worry about losing productive starters who will go shopping for a higher paycheck.
The way teams are constructed already bears no semblance to how they were constructed even 5 years ago. The paradigm has totally shifted. Even the top teams have to endure transfers and heavy roster turnover. Portal use is only accelerating as well. Even just a couple years ago, the prevalent thinking (for most people not named Deion or Lane) was that the portal would mostly supplement high school recruiting. It would be used to plug holes for the most part, with obvious exceptions. Now, I'd say the portal is every bit as important as high school recruiting. Most of your roster might still come from high school recruiting, but I'd wager that production-wise, the portal is every bit as important.
Given that, it seems Cignetti developed a cheat code by using his strategy of looking at production over potential. You can't argue with the results. IU was the worst P4 school in history. This year they have one of the better teams in recent memory. Obviously, Cignetti is just a fantastic coach, but a big part of his success is the kind of player he targets, particularly in the portal. It's no mistake their average roster age is 23 years old.
It's a copycat world. If Cignetti can do what he's done at the least likely program in all of P4, I think you'll see other coaches start to emulate the approach.
The way teams are constructed already bears no semblance to how they were constructed even 5 years ago. The paradigm has totally shifted. Even the top teams have to endure transfers and heavy roster turnover. Portal use is only accelerating as well. Even just a couple years ago, the prevalent thinking (for most people not named Deion or Lane) was that the portal would mostly supplement high school recruiting. It would be used to plug holes for the most part, with obvious exceptions. Now, I'd say the portal is every bit as important as high school recruiting. Most of your roster might still come from high school recruiting, but I'd wager that production-wise, the portal is every bit as important.
Given that, it seems Cignetti developed a cheat code by using his strategy of looking at production over potential. You can't argue with the results. IU was the worst P4 school in history. This year they have one of the better teams in recent memory. Obviously, Cignetti is just a fantastic coach, but a big part of his success is the kind of player he targets, particularly in the portal. It's no mistake their average roster age is 23 years old.
It's a copycat world. If Cignetti can do what he's done at the least likely program in all of P4, I think you'll see other coaches start to emulate the approach.
