Small-School Roots Shine in the College Football Playoff

College Football Playoff opening-round weekend may have gone poorly for the Group for Five, but it was a win for small-school football.

Two of the four winners on Friday and Saturday, Alabama and Ole Miss, have head coaches with very recent NAIA and NCAA Div. II experience. In turn, the quarterfinal round features three programs helmed by coaches who were at programs below the Div. I level as recently as 2016.

Curt Cignetti, head coach of top-seeded Indiana, already had the Hoosiers bound for their first Rose Bowl Game since 1968 before the Playoff’s first round. While it took Indiana almost six decades to get back to Pasadena, Cignetti was at another Indiana less than a single decade ago.

Cignetti’s meteoric rise through the coaching ranks, which saw him land his first head-coaching post at Div. II Indiana University Pennsylvania just 15 years ago, which has been well-chronicled. His career arc could be labeled wildly unique — if he wasn’t about to face an opponent with a similar coaching trajectory.

When Indiana — the one in Bloomington — kicks off against that iconic San Gabriel Mountain backdrop come Jan. 1, Cignetti’s team does so against Alabama and Kalen DeBoer.

DeBoer took on one of the most difficult jobs in college football when he left Washington to succeed Nick Saban. Saban, of course, built the most dominant dynasty of modern college football, and did so with Cignetti on the ground floor.

Cignetti was on the first national championship-winning staff of Saban’s in Tuscaloosa, overseeing the Crimson Tide’s wide receivers and run game from 2007-2010. Likewise, DeBoer is up against a familiar program with Alabama facing Indiana, and in a similar scenario.

No, Indiana was not a national championship contender when DeBoer was there as offensive coordinator in 2019. But with freshman Michael Penix Jr. breaking out late in the season, and the Hoosiers winning eight games for the first time since 1993, DeBoer’s brief tenure and the residual success of the 2020 team helped reset expectations of what Indiana football could be.

And in much the same way Cignetti elevated the Hoosiers with an approach molded at a lower level of the game, DeBoer cultivated his winning approach in NAIA.

DeBoer is further removed from small-school football than his upcoming quarterfinal counterpart, departing then-NAIA (and present-day NCAA Div. II) member Sioux Falls after the 2009 campaign. However, his time helming his alma mater unequivocally shaped DeBoer’s approach at the Div. I level.

““You're the equipment manager, you’re admissions, you're all these different jobs and wear all these different hats,” DeBoer said in 2023 when asked of leading an NAIA program. “And I think you understand all the work that it takes and so you have an appreciation for the people in your organization.”

Such a hands-on approach perhaps showed up in Alabama’s come-from-behind, 34-24 win at Oklahoma. In his Monday press conference last week, DeBoer noted being involved with the wide receivers during practice.

It’s a group that stepped up against Oklahoma’s stout defense, too, with four Tide receivers catching multiple passes; Lotzier Brooks hauled in multiple touchdowns.

With DeBoer and Alabama rallying to score the first of the weekend’s wins for the SEC, new Ole Miss head coach Paul Golding debuted with a splash in the league’s second Playoff win.

Golding, immediately tabbed successor with Lane Kiffin leaving for LSU, oversaw a 41-10 thrashing of Tulane that felt more lopsided than the final score. While the Green Wave being so thorough outmatched seems like a strike against college football’s underdogs at large, the loss coming to Ole Miss specifically is noteworthy for the Rebels having both a head coach and quarterback with Div. II backgrounds.

Ferris State transfer playmaker Trinidad Chambliss took over the Ole Miss in late September. He now continues his pursuit of a second straight national championship, having lead Ferris State to last year’s Div. II crown, with a coach in Golding who also reached the NCAA Div. II Championship Game.

Golding was defensive coordinator at Delta State in 2010 when the Statesmen faced Minnesota-Duluth. He returned to the DSU staff in 2009, having broken in at the Mississippi school in 2006 as a graduate assistant, after spending two years as defensive coordinator of another Div. II program, Tusculum.

A player at Delta State before joining the coaching staff, Golding left an impression on former Statesmen coach Rick Rhoades as told to the Scott County Times earlier this month:

“I knew he would make a great coach,” Rhoades said to the newspaper. “And he has.”