December 8, 2025 • 16 mins
The voice of the Indiana Hoosiers, Don Fischer, makes his weekly appearance on Query & Company to discuss IU defeating Ohio State on Saturday night in the Big Ten Championship game. Don comments on the endless time that Curt Cignetti spends on preparing his team, compares Curt Cignetti to Bob Knight, and summarizes what it was like inside Lucas Oil Stadium two nights ago.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
The Indiana Hoosiers are the undisputed, unblemished Big Ten Football
champions and the number one team in the land. And
the guy that has been there for every step of
the way throughout this journey from the depths as I
talked about with the Tale of Two Cities, right the
(00:22):
depths of darkness to the Season of light. Don Fisher,
the voice of the Indiana Hoosiers, joining us now on
the Java House Peel and poor guest line and Don,
I'm going to begin with this, I know, and I'll
give you all the credit in the world because you
are the one guy from the get go when it
comes to Kurt Signetti, there was never really a doubt
in your mind as to what the ceiling was going
(00:44):
to be for this team and how impressed you were.
But if you could for me, Don just summarize I
guess the emotion or not just for you, but just
for that building and for that fan base of seeing
it all collectively come together on what was literally an
unbelievably special night at Lucas Oil Stadium.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
Well, the culmination, of course, was the third down pass
that Fernando Mendoza through to Charlie Becker, who made a
terrific catch and the throw was perfect. At that point,
you knew this game was going to belong to Indiana.
And I have my twin brother in Salt Lake City
(01:28):
calls me up the next day and says, you guys
are a little bit too giddy there the last minute
and a half.
Speaker 3 (01:33):
Something could have happened.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
I said, no, it can't, because Signetti is our coach,
and at any rate, I can just tell you from
my perspective, of course, hugely emotional ballgame, great win for
Indiana Athletics, but more importantly, a tremendous win for the
Hoosier Nation.
Speaker 3 (01:54):
A group of people, and.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
I'm not talking about everybody that's jumped on board here
in the last you know, a couple of years now.
I'm talking about the people who bought season tickets for
year after year after year back in the sixties and
the seventies and the eighties and nineties, the two thousands
people who have been coming to Indiana football games forever,
and for me, those are the people that and I'm
(02:19):
not saying that the people who have jumped on board
shouldn't be there. They should be there, But my point
is the people that have gone through this for all
these years and the struggles that Indiana football has had.
That to me is the most important faction of folks
that I want to think and stay of hanging in
there and staying with us and going through all of
(02:41):
what we've gone through and still continue to buy tickets
and spend the money that it took to watch football
at Indiana and to support football at Indiana. And those
are the people that I feel the best for.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
Don you know, Bill Binner is going to join me
coming up in about an hour. I mean, he's a
guy that sat through countless numbers of sleet storms watching
Lorenzo White run for two hundred and sixty yards, and
you know, I mean on and on right, I mean,
and it's those folks, right, And I think also about
and I'd mentioned this on Friday, and you and I've
(03:15):
talked about this. You know, Terry Hepner was a guy
that took that Indiana job and had this belief of
kind of what Kurt Signetti has delivered. And I don't
mean that to say one is that, you know, I mean,
they're two separate men. I understand that. But Hepner had
this belief of, like, no, this is where this program
could go, and I think most of us probably thought
he was a little bit crazy back then, and then
(03:36):
unfortunately he got sick and he never got a chance
to see it to fruition and I'm watching that on
Saturday night, And that's what made me so happy for
Kurt Signetti was the fact that here's a guy that
came in with his own also his own vision and
his delivery of his own vision. But it was parallel
with that vision and belief that we had seen preview
(03:56):
of before and I never thought I'd see it, Don,
But that, to me is what made it so special
was the number of people there, and there were those
people that believed that was possible. And even still, I'm
not gonna lie to you, Don, when you said unbelievable,
I thought to myself, no, I still don't believe it, right,
I mean, it was that incredible.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
It was there's no question about it.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
And look all I can tell you, and you're right
about Terry Heppner. He knew he could get this program
turned around, and he never got that opportunity because of
the glioblostoma cancer that he suffered brain tumor and died
in June after his second season and to me, that's
(04:37):
heartbreaking because and I know his son Drew was at
the ballgame on Saturday, and my wife told me about
it yesterday and I started blubbering because I when I
think of Terry Hepner, all I can do is get emotional.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
Well, I know what he meant to you, don I
mean I don't. I wasn't there firsthand, but you hear it.
And I think that for those that don't know, anybody
that was around him would understand why you feel that way, right?
And I feel like yeah, And it's like Kurt Signetti
walks and exudes the energy and the confidence that Terry
(05:16):
Hepner tried to introduce to people.
Speaker 2 (05:18):
That's the best way I can say it. If that
makes sense, No, it makes sense. It makes perfect sense.
And that's the way to put it because hep was
a guy that believed in Indiana football and I know
he knows he could have turned it around, and he
would have done it had he lived, but he did not.
And Kurt Signetti has followed whatever his vision was, whatever
(05:40):
vision that Terry had, he spottled that up and you
put it perfectly. That's exactly the way I feel about it.
Speaker 1 (05:46):
Don when you look at you know, I thought it
was interesting after the game, Don Fisher, the voice of
the Hoosiers is our guest Joba House peeling, poor guest
line when when Kurt Signetti said, and he kind of
flippantly said it, which I enjoyed, but he said, you know,
now I got two weeks to get these guys to
turn around and refocus. And yeah, I had to laugh
because I thought to myself, I don't know that I
(06:06):
have seen a football team that has more in step
bought into everything his coach said to the point where, yeah,
I mean, are they going to go in and win
the Rose Bull? I don't know that. But what I
do know is this, I don't think they're going to
go in and shoot themselves in the foot and not
show up, because that's just been I mean, you'd be
an idiot at this point to think anything other than
(06:27):
Indiana is going to go put their best foot forward, right,
And you know, were you able to see anything after
the game and the celebration, et cetera that was any
different in terms of their standard operating procedure from the
way he's always done things.
Speaker 2 (06:43):
No, I mean, here's the thing he did allow his
team to stay out there in the field and celebrate it,
which you would expect that any coach would do that.
And so everything that I saw from Kurt Signetti post game,
he had all kinds of responsibilities with the me The
Fox interviewed him, of course, and of course the Big
(07:03):
ten network interviewed him, and he had to do all
these other things involved in that. But the other thing
about that is he took time at the very I mean,
we were on the air for about forty five minutes
after the game. We're usually about twenty minutes after a
ballgame in normal circumstances. It was at least forty five,
maybe fifty minutes that we were still on the air
after the ballgame was over with. And he finally got
(07:27):
to us, and I knew he would if he had
the time, if he had the opportunity, And he finally
got to us and got to talk to our people
on the air, and who's your nation, so to speak,
that listens on the radio. So I just think the
guy is first class in every way. He's the greatest
coach I've ever been around in a sense of what
he's accomplished. And without doubt, I think this is a
(07:48):
phenomenal run for Indiana football that we've never seen before.
It's historic in every way, and it's a renaissance for
the program. And without question, I can't wait for the
rest of this season to fill itself out because I
think I think fans are going to be just as
excited about what we're about to see in the college
football playoff as they were through this twelve win season.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
You know, it's funny, Don, when people say, you know,
is so and so the best player of the century,
and you think, oh, gosh, I forget, We're only a
quarter the way through this century, right. I mean when
I think century, I still think the nineteen hundreds, right.
What he's done is I don't care whether you're talking
nineteen hundreds or two thousands. It's the greatest college football
coaching job I've ever that. I think anybody walking the
(08:29):
planet right now has ever seen. We've never seen anything
like this. Now, having said all of that, do you
feel Don that there is still that there are still
wrinkles to this football team that can be presented or
new looks that they can come up with for the playoffs?
Or are they at the point now of this is
who we are? This is what we do, and we're
(08:51):
confident in the way we do it, and we don't
need to readjust game plans.
Speaker 2 (08:57):
Well, every game plan needs to be adjusted, there no
doubt about that because of who you're playing, so that
factors into it. But here's the thing. It's not going
to change philosophically and it's not going to change process
wise for this Indiana football team.
Speaker 3 (09:13):
That's just a fact. He's been like this since he's.
Speaker 2 (09:15):
Gotten here, and I trust everything that he does in
that sense. His game plans are ridiculously good. And I
say that because I'll tell you who I thought was
the best offensive coordinator Indiana's ever had, and that was
Kaylen de Boer. Now how long ago was that? Not
(09:36):
that long ago? Right, But here's the thing about Kaylen
de Boor. He did a tremendous job here at Indiana
in one season, the COVID season with Michael Pennix, and
what he produced in that year was astonishing to me
because I thought, this guy really knows what he's doing.
And I still think that Kayln de Boor is a
(09:57):
great football coach. And he's getting all kinds of up
at Alabama from the fan base because they've lost three times.
Speaker 3 (10:03):
That kind of.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
Thing, and the fact that they made the college football
Playoff is in a lot of people's minds is very
very I don't know what the right word would be,
but a lot of people would say they don't deserve
to be there. I don't know if they should or not,
but I will say this that Indiana is capable of
beating anybody they play in this college football playoff because
(10:28):
Kurt Signetti's that good.
Speaker 3 (10:30):
And if we played Kylen.
Speaker 2 (10:31):
De boor or if we play Kirby Smart or whoever
the coach is, I will not take anything away from
Kurt Signetti's ability to dominate that football game with his
thinking process and how he goes about things. The only
way Indiana is going to get beat in this college
football playoff, in my mind, is because the other team
has more talent, because Indiana's talent is not what it
(10:54):
is to some of these programs, but the coaching is
beyond it.
Speaker 1 (10:58):
Don I got a kick out of it. Got a
good buddy of mine went to James Madison, and you know,
James Madison obviously got into the college football Payoff as well,
and he sent me a text that said, it's great
to be a JAMU fan because we have two teams
in the Big in the college football playoff, you know,
after the Big Ten title game, because you know, obviously
some of the great players that say and that's to me,
that's such a tribute to Kurt Signetty because when you
(11:21):
look at players that started at James Madison and now
they're beating all you know, their key players in beating
Ohio State for crying out loud in the Big Ten
title game, and so much of that just comes down
to coaching belief, all the things we've talked about. I
wanted to ask you this. You had the ability and
you did both games, which was I mean, you are
the You're the lou garig right, You're the iron horse
of broadcasting. Because you did both games on Saturday, you
(11:44):
you should probably have some sort of a throat laws
and endorsement. But but I will for those that don't know,
Don and I got to give you that the ultimate
tip of the cap because people will say, well did
his voice hold out? That is mentally exhausting. I mean,
honestly doing broadcasting for that long and having to move
that quickly for those for games back to back is unbelievable.
(12:08):
Having said that, in doing basketball and football, you have
seen two legendary coaches India a lot of coaches, but
two legendary ones, and Bob Knight and kurtz Signetti. The
reason I bring it up, Bob Knight was a coach
that when you went into a game, you thought to yourself,
the other team might have players, but they're not going
to be more prepared than Indiana. From an x's and
o's standpoint, the personalities aside, do you ever see or
(12:31):
feel similarity in terms of listening to the coaches in
terms of their preparation talk between those two guys that
you've had to do so many pregame shows.
Speaker 3 (12:39):
With, Well, no, I don't see a difference.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
Coach Knight was demanding on players of basically anybody in
his program. Wasn't amending on those people to be what
they should be and what they can be. That kind
of thing you get the same thing from Kurt Signetti.
He hires the right people, number one, because he vets
them all. He knows who they are before they get there,
(13:04):
and he knows what he's going to get from those people,
and they produce for him. And that's the trust he
has and the people that he gets because he, like
I said, he vets everybody that's in the program. So
and Bob Knight did exactly the same thing. He wanted
guys that were going to buy into his philosophy, his thoughts,
how to play the game, those kinds of things. He
(13:25):
did it with players, he did it with coaches, He
did it with the people that he surrounded himself with. So, yeah,
they're so much alike in that vein. They are totally
different personalities. And I say totally different only from the
standpoint that Coach Knight, as everybody knows, was so controversial
and so many different ways, and Churtz Signetty, I don't
think is in that context. His personality is different in
(13:48):
that way. And then how he handles players is different
than what Bob did. That's not a negative on either guy.
It's just the way it was at the time that
they were coaching and has been. So those kinds of
things change over the years, too, but they never I
don't think they ever changed with coach Knight and with
coach Signetti after his twenty six I think it was
twenty six years he was an assistant and learned a
(14:11):
lot of things from a lot of different coaches, and
then got his own programs at Indiana, vergs to Pennsylvania
and then Elon and not of course James Madison and
now Indiana. He doesn't vary from it, and in his
philosophy and his thinking process and how he goes about
running the program is as good as I've ever seen.
And it's simply so, very again, very simply like a
(14:35):
lot of what Bob Knight did because he were in
the program the way he thought it should be run
and it was hugely successful.
Speaker 3 (14:41):
And vice versa with Kurt Signetti.
Speaker 1 (14:43):
Okay, lastly, Don, I wanted to ask you this. There
were a lot of people, understandably and rightly so, per
Signetti being one of them, it talked about how happy
they were for Don Fisher to see that moment on
Saturday Night. So I'd like Don Fisher to say, what
individual or individual? I realized the fan base in general
is all encompassing, but was there anybody specifically that you
(15:06):
thought of as that game was ending that you thought
to yourself, that's who I'm happy for.
Speaker 2 (15:12):
Well again, and there's no individual that I thought about
that for I thought about that.
Speaker 3 (15:18):
For the who's Your Nation. I really did.
Speaker 2 (15:21):
I wanted this program to take off at some point
football wise, and even when it got started early and
looked like it might change, it has not. In all
those years, and that there have been a humongous number
of people coaches that I've enjoyed immensely at Indiana, Guys
that I had the greatest amount of respect for, Obviously
(15:43):
Bill Mallory and Bill Lynch and Terry Hepner and those
type of people. I loved all those people. They were
just great folks and they were really good coaches. They
just didn't hit it at the right time, and unfortunately
for all of us, Who's your Nation suffered because of that,
And now it's changed completely. And that's why I'm really
(16:03):
happy for the entire Hoosier Nation, because these people have
gone through a lot over the years.
Speaker 1 (16:08):
Well, don for the Hoo's your Nation. You've been the
town crier for many years and that was more crying
probably than actual town bugle blowing. But so the time
is now and celebrate it and enjoy it. And January first,
at four o'clock, you will be calling a college football
playoff game in the Rose Bowl for the Indiana Hoosiers
and we certainly look forward to it. Always appreciate the time. Don,
(16:29):
and I certainly hope you were able to continue to
enjoy what took place on Saturday.
Speaker 3 (16:33):
Absolutely appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (16:34):
Thanks Ja, Don Fisher joining us the voice of the
Hoosiers
The Indiana Hoosiers are the undisputed, unblemished Big Ten Football
champions and the number one team in the land. And
the guy that has been there for every step of
the way throughout this journey from the depths as I
talked about with the Tale of Two Cities, right the
(00:22):
depths of darkness to the Season of light. Don Fisher,
the voice of the Indiana Hoosiers, joining us now on
the Java House Peel and poor guest line and Don,
I'm going to begin with this, I know, and I'll
give you all the credit in the world because you
are the one guy from the get go when it
comes to Kurt Signetti, there was never really a doubt
in your mind as to what the ceiling was going
(00:44):
to be for this team and how impressed you were.
But if you could for me, Don just summarize I
guess the emotion or not just for you, but just
for that building and for that fan base of seeing
it all collectively come together on what was literally an
unbelievably special night at Lucas Oil Stadium.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
Well, the culmination, of course, was the third down pass
that Fernando Mendoza through to Charlie Becker, who made a
terrific catch and the throw was perfect. At that point,
you knew this game was going to belong to Indiana.
And I have my twin brother in Salt Lake City
(01:28):
calls me up the next day and says, you guys
are a little bit too giddy there the last minute
and a half.
Speaker 3 (01:33):
Something could have happened.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
I said, no, it can't, because Signetti is our coach,
and at any rate, I can just tell you from
my perspective, of course, hugely emotional ballgame, great win for
Indiana Athletics, but more importantly, a tremendous win for the
Hoosier Nation.
Speaker 3 (01:54):
A group of people, and.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
I'm not talking about everybody that's jumped on board here
in the last you know, a couple of years now.
I'm talking about the people who bought season tickets for
year after year after year back in the sixties and
the seventies and the eighties and nineties, the two thousands
people who have been coming to Indiana football games forever,
and for me, those are the people that and I'm
(02:19):
not saying that the people who have jumped on board
shouldn't be there. They should be there, But my point
is the people that have gone through this for all
these years and the struggles that Indiana football has had.
That to me is the most important faction of folks
that I want to think and stay of hanging in
there and staying with us and going through all of
(02:41):
what we've gone through and still continue to buy tickets
and spend the money that it took to watch football
at Indiana and to support football at Indiana. And those
are the people that I feel the best for.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
Don you know, Bill Binner is going to join me
coming up in about an hour. I mean, he's a
guy that sat through countless numbers of sleet storms watching
Lorenzo White run for two hundred and sixty yards, and
you know, I mean on and on right, I mean,
and it's those folks, right, And I think also about
and I'd mentioned this on Friday, and you and I've
(03:15):
talked about this. You know, Terry Hepner was a guy
that took that Indiana job and had this belief of
kind of what Kurt Signetti has delivered. And I don't
mean that to say one is that, you know, I mean,
they're two separate men. I understand that. But Hepner had
this belief of, like, no, this is where this program
could go, and I think most of us probably thought
he was a little bit crazy back then, and then
(03:36):
unfortunately he got sick and he never got a chance
to see it to fruition and I'm watching that on
Saturday night, And that's what made me so happy for
Kurt Signetti was the fact that here's a guy that
came in with his own also his own vision and
his delivery of his own vision. But it was parallel
with that vision and belief that we had seen preview
(03:56):
of before and I never thought I'd see it, Don,
But that, to me is what made it so special
was the number of people there, and there were those
people that believed that was possible. And even still, I'm
not gonna lie to you, Don, when you said unbelievable,
I thought to myself, no, I still don't believe it, right,
I mean, it was that incredible.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
It was there's no question about it.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
And look all I can tell you, and you're right
about Terry Heppner. He knew he could get this program
turned around, and he never got that opportunity because of
the glioblostoma cancer that he suffered brain tumor and died
in June after his second season and to me, that's
(04:37):
heartbreaking because and I know his son Drew was at
the ballgame on Saturday, and my wife told me about
it yesterday and I started blubbering because I when I
think of Terry Hepner, all I can do is get emotional.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
Well, I know what he meant to you, don I
mean I don't. I wasn't there firsthand, but you hear it.
And I think that for those that don't know, anybody
that was around him would understand why you feel that way, right?
And I feel like yeah, And it's like Kurt Signetti
walks and exudes the energy and the confidence that Terry
(05:16):
Hepner tried to introduce to people.
Speaker 2 (05:18):
That's the best way I can say it. If that
makes sense, No, it makes sense. It makes perfect sense.
And that's the way to put it because hep was
a guy that believed in Indiana football and I know
he knows he could have turned it around, and he
would have done it had he lived, but he did not.
And Kurt Signetti has followed whatever his vision was, whatever
(05:40):
vision that Terry had, he spottled that up and you
put it perfectly. That's exactly the way I feel about it.
Speaker 1 (05:46):
Don when you look at you know, I thought it
was interesting after the game, Don Fisher, the voice of
the Hoosiers is our guest Joba House peeling, poor guest
line when when Kurt Signetti said, and he kind of
flippantly said it, which I enjoyed, but he said, you know,
now I got two weeks to get these guys to
turn around and refocus. And yeah, I had to laugh
because I thought to myself, I don't know that I
(06:06):
have seen a football team that has more in step
bought into everything his coach said to the point where, yeah,
I mean, are they going to go in and win
the Rose Bull? I don't know that. But what I
do know is this, I don't think they're going to
go in and shoot themselves in the foot and not
show up, because that's just been I mean, you'd be
an idiot at this point to think anything other than
(06:27):
Indiana is going to go put their best foot forward, right,
And you know, were you able to see anything after
the game and the celebration, et cetera that was any
different in terms of their standard operating procedure from the
way he's always done things.
Speaker 2 (06:43):
No, I mean, here's the thing he did allow his
team to stay out there in the field and celebrate it,
which you would expect that any coach would do that.
And so everything that I saw from Kurt Signetti post game,
he had all kinds of responsibilities with the me The
Fox interviewed him, of course, and of course the Big
(07:03):
ten network interviewed him, and he had to do all
these other things involved in that. But the other thing
about that is he took time at the very I mean,
we were on the air for about forty five minutes
after the game. We're usually about twenty minutes after a
ballgame in normal circumstances. It was at least forty five,
maybe fifty minutes that we were still on the air
after the ballgame was over with. And he finally got
(07:27):
to us, and I knew he would if he had
the time, if he had the opportunity, And he finally
got to us and got to talk to our people
on the air, and who's your nation, so to speak,
that listens on the radio. So I just think the
guy is first class in every way. He's the greatest
coach I've ever been around in a sense of what
he's accomplished. And without doubt, I think this is a
(07:48):
phenomenal run for Indiana football that we've never seen before.
It's historic in every way, and it's a renaissance for
the program. And without question, I can't wait for the
rest of this season to fill itself out because I
think I think fans are going to be just as
excited about what we're about to see in the college
football playoff as they were through this twelve win season.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
You know, it's funny, Don, when people say, you know,
is so and so the best player of the century,
and you think, oh, gosh, I forget, We're only a
quarter the way through this century, right. I mean when
I think century, I still think the nineteen hundreds, right.
What he's done is I don't care whether you're talking
nineteen hundreds or two thousands. It's the greatest college football
coaching job I've ever that. I think anybody walking the
(08:29):
planet right now has ever seen. We've never seen anything
like this. Now, having said all of that, do you
feel Don that there is still that there are still
wrinkles to this football team that can be presented or
new looks that they can come up with for the playoffs?
Or are they at the point now of this is
who we are? This is what we do, and we're
(08:51):
confident in the way we do it, and we don't
need to readjust game plans.
Speaker 2 (08:57):
Well, every game plan needs to be adjusted, there no
doubt about that because of who you're playing, so that
factors into it. But here's the thing. It's not going
to change philosophically and it's not going to change process
wise for this Indiana football team.
Speaker 3 (09:13):
That's just a fact. He's been like this since he's.
Speaker 2 (09:15):
Gotten here, and I trust everything that he does in
that sense. His game plans are ridiculously good. And I
say that because I'll tell you who I thought was
the best offensive coordinator Indiana's ever had, and that was
Kaylen de Boer. Now how long ago was that? Not
(09:36):
that long ago? Right, But here's the thing about Kaylen
de Boor. He did a tremendous job here at Indiana
in one season, the COVID season with Michael Pennix, and
what he produced in that year was astonishing to me
because I thought, this guy really knows what he's doing.
And I still think that Kayln de Boor is a
(09:57):
great football coach. And he's getting all kinds of up
at Alabama from the fan base because they've lost three times.
Speaker 3 (10:03):
That kind of.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
Thing, and the fact that they made the college football
Playoff is in a lot of people's minds is very
very I don't know what the right word would be,
but a lot of people would say they don't deserve
to be there. I don't know if they should or not,
but I will say this that Indiana is capable of
beating anybody they play in this college football playoff because
(10:28):
Kurt Signetti's that good.
Speaker 3 (10:30):
And if we played Kylen.
Speaker 2 (10:31):
De boor or if we play Kirby Smart or whoever
the coach is, I will not take anything away from
Kurt Signetti's ability to dominate that football game with his
thinking process and how he goes about things. The only
way Indiana is going to get beat in this college
football playoff, in my mind, is because the other team
has more talent, because Indiana's talent is not what it
(10:54):
is to some of these programs, but the coaching is
beyond it.
Speaker 1 (10:58):
Don I got a kick out of it. Got a
good buddy of mine went to James Madison, and you know,
James Madison obviously got into the college football Payoff as well,
and he sent me a text that said, it's great
to be a JAMU fan because we have two teams
in the Big in the college football playoff, you know,
after the Big Ten title game, because you know, obviously
some of the great players that say and that's to me,
that's such a tribute to Kurt Signetty because when you
(11:21):
look at players that started at James Madison and now
they're beating all you know, their key players in beating
Ohio State for crying out loud in the Big Ten
title game, and so much of that just comes down
to coaching belief, all the things we've talked about. I
wanted to ask you this. You had the ability and
you did both games, which was I mean, you are
the You're the lou garig right, You're the iron horse
of broadcasting. Because you did both games on Saturday, you
(11:44):
you should probably have some sort of a throat laws
and endorsement. But but I will for those that don't know,
Don and I got to give you that the ultimate
tip of the cap because people will say, well did
his voice hold out? That is mentally exhausting. I mean,
honestly doing broadcasting for that long and having to move
that quickly for those for games back to back is unbelievable.
(12:08):
Having said that, in doing basketball and football, you have
seen two legendary coaches India a lot of coaches, but
two legendary ones, and Bob Knight and kurtz Signetti. The
reason I bring it up, Bob Knight was a coach
that when you went into a game, you thought to yourself,
the other team might have players, but they're not going
to be more prepared than Indiana. From an x's and
o's standpoint, the personalities aside, do you ever see or
(12:31):
feel similarity in terms of listening to the coaches in
terms of their preparation talk between those two guys that
you've had to do so many pregame shows.
Speaker 3 (12:39):
With, Well, no, I don't see a difference.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
Coach Knight was demanding on players of basically anybody in
his program. Wasn't amending on those people to be what
they should be and what they can be. That kind
of thing you get the same thing from Kurt Signetti.
He hires the right people, number one, because he vets
them all. He knows who they are before they get there,
(13:04):
and he knows what he's going to get from those people,
and they produce for him. And that's the trust he
has and the people that he gets because he, like
I said, he vets everybody that's in the program. So
and Bob Knight did exactly the same thing. He wanted
guys that were going to buy into his philosophy, his thoughts,
how to play the game, those kinds of things. He
(13:25):
did it with players, he did it with coaches, He
did it with the people that he surrounded himself with. So, yeah,
they're so much alike in that vein. They are totally
different personalities. And I say totally different only from the
standpoint that Coach Knight, as everybody knows, was so controversial
and so many different ways, and Churtz Signetty, I don't
think is in that context. His personality is different in
(13:48):
that way. And then how he handles players is different
than what Bob did. That's not a negative on either guy.
It's just the way it was at the time that
they were coaching and has been. So those kinds of
things change over the years, too, but they never I
don't think they ever changed with coach Knight and with
coach Signetti after his twenty six I think it was
twenty six years he was an assistant and learned a
(14:11):
lot of things from a lot of different coaches, and
then got his own programs at Indiana, vergs to Pennsylvania
and then Elon and not of course James Madison and
now Indiana. He doesn't vary from it, and in his
philosophy and his thinking process and how he goes about
running the program is as good as I've ever seen.
And it's simply so, very again, very simply like a
(14:35):
lot of what Bob Knight did because he were in
the program the way he thought it should be run
and it was hugely successful.
Speaker 3 (14:41):
And vice versa with Kurt Signetti.
Speaker 1 (14:43):
Okay, lastly, Don, I wanted to ask you this. There
were a lot of people, understandably and rightly so, per
Signetti being one of them, it talked about how happy
they were for Don Fisher to see that moment on
Saturday Night. So I'd like Don Fisher to say, what
individual or individual? I realized the fan base in general
is all encompassing, but was there anybody specifically that you
(15:06):
thought of as that game was ending that you thought
to yourself, that's who I'm happy for.
Speaker 2 (15:12):
Well again, and there's no individual that I thought about
that for I thought about that.
Speaker 3 (15:18):
For the who's Your Nation. I really did.
Speaker 2 (15:21):
I wanted this program to take off at some point
football wise, and even when it got started early and
looked like it might change, it has not. In all
those years, and that there have been a humongous number
of people coaches that I've enjoyed immensely at Indiana, Guys
that I had the greatest amount of respect for, Obviously
(15:43):
Bill Mallory and Bill Lynch and Terry Hepner and those
type of people. I loved all those people. They were
just great folks and they were really good coaches. They
just didn't hit it at the right time, and unfortunately
for all of us, Who's your Nation suffered because of that,
And now it's changed completely. And that's why I'm really
(16:03):
happy for the entire Hoosier Nation, because these people have
gone through a lot over the years.
Speaker 1 (16:08):
Well, don for the Hoo's your Nation. You've been the
town crier for many years and that was more crying
probably than actual town bugle blowing. But so the time
is now and celebrate it and enjoy it. And January first,
at four o'clock, you will be calling a college football
playoff game in the Rose Bowl for the Indiana Hoosiers
and we certainly look forward to it. Always appreciate the time. Don,
(16:29):
and I certainly hope you were able to continue to
enjoy what took place on Saturday.
Speaker 3 (16:33):
Absolutely appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (16:34):
Thanks Ja, Don Fisher joining us the voice of the
Hoosiers
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