PASADENA, Calif. — Thursday’s Rose Bowl represented a landmark afternoon for Indiana football. The program that had entered 2025 as the losingest team in college football history entered the new year as the Big Ten champion with an undefeated record and a No. 1 ranking for the first time.
Then things got even better. The Hoosiers’ 38-3 drubbing of No. 9 Alabama in the College Football Playoff quarterfinals was the Crimson Tide’s worst loss since 1998 and worst bowl loss ever.
Was it also the greatest win in Indiana football history? Let’s rank the top 10.
10. Indiana 56, Nebraska 7 (Oct. 19, 2024)
Nebraska may be a shell of its former powerful self, but this is when Indiana’s Year 1 breakthrough under Curt Cignetti began to feel real. The Hoosiers had gone 3-9 in 2023 but got off to a 6-0 start in 2024 when 5-1 Nebraska visited. The result was a 49-point beatdown in which the Hoosiers rolled up 495 yards, forced five turnovers and proved they were a force to be taken seriously in a season in which they would go on to earn an unlikely Playoff bid.
9. Indiana 36, Penn State 35 (Oct. 24, 2020)
The Big Ten nearly didn’t have a football season amid the COVID-19 pandemic, but when it finally kicked off in late October, the Hoosiers shockingly earned their first win in 33 years against a top-10 team at the time of the game. Indiana was outgained 488 to 211, but Michael Penix Jr. scored a touchdown and 2-point conversion with 22 seconds left to force overtime, then won the game with a touchdown pass and iconic (though controversial) stretched-out-to-the-pylon 2-point run.
Penn State went on to a rough 4-5 season, but there’s no taking away the euphoria of a top-10 win in the moment. The Hoosiers went on to finish No. 12, their first final ranking since 1988 and best since 1967.
8. Indiana 27, Purdue 24 (Nov. 17, 2007)
Amid arguably the wildest college football season ever, Indiana clinched a winning record for the first time in 13 years, earning a spot in the Insight Bowl. It did so with a dramatic win over rival Purdue. The Hoosiers blew a 24-3 lead, but Austin Starr kicked a 49-yard field goal with 30 seconds left to set up a cathartic moment for the program after the death of coach Terry Hoeppner months before the season. Hoeppner’s widow, Jane, embraced Starr afterward and was center stage in the celebration.
7. Indiana 26, Purdue 0 (Nov. 24, 1945)
Amid World War II, coach Bo McMillin led Indiana to its only undefeated season with a 9-0-1 mark and No. 4 final ranking. It started with a 13-7 win at Michigan, which would go on to finish No. 6 that season, and ended with a shutout of rival Purdue, which was ranked No. 18 at the time.
6. Indiana 31, Ohio State 10 (Oct. 10, 1987)
The unranked Hoosiers took down No. 9 Ohio State in Columbus for the first time since 1951, led by 126 rushing yards from 1989 Heisman Trophy runner-up Anthony Thompson. It propelled them into the top 20 for a while in a season that ended with an 8-4 record and a 27-22 Peach Bowl loss to Tennessee under coach Bill Mallory.
5. Indiana 30, Oregon 20 (Oct. 11, 2025)
The 2024 run to the Playoff was a stunning breakthrough, but it featured zero wins against ranked opponents. Though Indiana had already humiliated then-No. 9 Illinois 63-10 a few weeks earlier, winning at No. 3 Oregon felt different. The Hoosiers’ only top-five road win ever cemented them as contenders again rather than potential one-hit wonders. Eventual Heisman winner Fernando Mendoza bounced back from a pick six, threw the go-ahead touchdown and got the better of Dante Moore to lead the Hoosiers to a landmark win at Autzen Stadium that put them on the path to the Big Ten title.
4. Indiana 38, BYU 37 (Dec. 21, 1979)
A run of incredible Holiday Bowl games involving BYU began with a dramatic shootout in San Diego in 1979. Under coach Lee Corso, the Hoosiers beat the No. 9 Cougars thanks to a 62-yard touchdown when Tim Wilbur picked up a punt that bounced off a teammate in the fourth quarter, followed by a missed BYU field goal in the final seconds.
It gave the Hoosiers their first bowl win, an 8-4 record and a No. 19 final ranking for Corso’s best season.
3. Indiana 19, Purdue 14 (Nov. 25, 1967)
A week after losing their undefeated record and falling out of the top 10, the Hoosiers toppled the rival No. 3 Boilermakers to capture the Old Oaken Bucket and their only win against an AP top-five team prior to 2025. It earned them their last share of a Big Ten championship and only Rose Bowl bid until 2025. Though they lost to USC in Pasadena, they were No. 4 in the final AP poll, published before the bowls at the time.
2. Indiana 13, Ohio State 10 (Dec. 6, 2025)
The Hoosiers beat a No. 1 team for the first time and thus became No. 1 for the first time. And they did so by beating Ohio State for the first time since 1988 to win their first Big Ten championship since 1967. And yet, it’s not even the Hoosiers’ biggest (or most dramatic) win of this season.
1. Indiana 38, Alabama 3 (Jan. 1, 2026)
Not only did Indiana win its first-ever game as the No. 1 team in college football, it left no doubt against the most dominant program of the past two decades. Alabama didn’t look like it belonged on the same field as the Hoosiers, led by Mendoza and Cignetti, who earned their first Playoff win and made Indiana look like the favorite to become college football’s first first-time national champion since Florida in 1996.
If so, there could be even bigger wins to come.