sports-ofall- sorts fans, Brian and Sally Shapiro, traveled to the Rose Bowl over the New Year’s holiday along with their daughter, Ellen, and her girlfriend, Faun Ryan, to see Indiana University play Alabama. Ellen and Faun both live in Traverse City. When Brian and Sally aren’t busy running Shapiro’s Deli in Indianapolis, they are at their home in Omena, or possibly on the road attending an Indianapolis college or professional game. They were among an estimated 70,000 IU fans out of a total 90,000 attendees at the game. The attendees had experienced an unusual amount of rainfall leading up to the game.
Around and under the tent where the IU pre-game festivities were held was a field of mud puddles. As Sally reported, being good Midwesterners, they dressed for the occasional – mud boots and all!
One reason for the enthusiastic show of support was that this was IU’s first ever time to be ranked #1 seed in the college football playoff field. A lot of credit is being given to head coach Curt Cignetti, who in just two seasons completely turned IU’s losing record around. An interesting linkage with another Indiana football team, when Cignetti was assistant coach at North Carolina State in 2003, he coached their quarterback, Phil Rivers, who earned ACC Player of the Year honors that year. Rivers subsequently retired from the Indiana Colts in 2020. He received some recent publicity after the Colts brought him back briefly at the end of this season to substitute for their injured quarterback.
