MIAMI BEACH, Fla. — Mark Cuban understands what this moment means for Indiana football, probably more than most.

Cuban, the billionaire entrepreneur, is a minority owner of the Dallas Mavericks. He knows what winning looks like. Knows what — and how long — it takes to build a successful program. As an Indiana alum — he graduated from the business school in 1981 — he also has watched its rapid rise from one of the most unsuccessful programs in college football history to the brink of a national title.

Cuban has poured millions into his alma mater over the years, long before Curt Cignetti took over the football team in 2024 and made it a national contender, including a $5 million donation in 2015 for a sports media center. Recently, Cuban has become a significant donor for the football program and earlier this year told Front Office Sports he has donated more money for the current transfer cycle.

Those donations were intended to help build the Hoosiers into a title contender, but even Cuban couldn’t foresee a rise this dramatic. Indiana will enter Monday’s College Football Playoff championship against Miami as the No. 1 team in the country looking to build on its best season in program history.

“I’ve literally had Centenarians tell me how unimaginable this has been,” Cuban said via email. “Players on the ’68 Rose Bowl team tell me the same thing. It’s just all unreal.”

At a time in college football when name, image and likeness and the transfer portal dominate the landscape, Cuban’s support for the Hoosiers shows how the right financial backing — and an institution’s ability to attract the right celebrities and deep-pocketed alumni — can help alter a program’s trajectory.

“It takes a village. It takes money,” Cignetti said Saturday. “But it’s not all about money. We’ve got a lot of alums, a lot of rich alums. Mark Cuban is a very visible guy. … We kind of hit it off right off the bat. He’s got instant recognition, which only helps.”

Cuban has voiced his support for the team over the years and watched up close at the Peach Bowl when Indiana dominated Oregon to punch its ticket to the national championship. He has enjoyed the up-close ride but made it clear that simply getting to the title game isn’t the goal.

“An appearance is fun. It’s been an amazing run,” Cuban said. “As someone who has lost (two) NBA Finals and won one, I can tell you losing hurts a lot more than winning is fun.”

The Hoosiers haven’t given any indication they’re done winning, though.

They’re 26-2 since Cignetti took over and have gone 15-0 this year, earning their first No. 1 ranking in school history. Last month they won their first Big Ten title in nearly half a century. They’ve beaten Alabama (38-3) and Oregon (56-22) in the CFP by an average of 34.5 points.

Part of that success can be credited to the Hoosiers’ Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback Fernando Mendoza, who has thrown 41 touchdowns this season and has completed 31 of 36 passes in the playoff.

Part is because of their defense, which has been among the nation’s stingiest all season.

But a huge factor in the Hoosiers’ success is their measured, blunt-spoken head coach Cignetti, who is the first back-to-back AP coach of the year.

“He is CigGPT,” Cuban said. “He and (athletic director) Scott Dolson have redefined how to build a winning team in the NIL era. To IU fans this is everything.”

Cignetti returned the praise to Indiana’s biggest donor. He and Cuban are three years apart in age and were born in the same hospital in western Pennsylvania.

“If Mark Cuban wanted to give $10 million, that would be like me donating $10,000,” Cignetti said. “But we’re glad that he’s involved. If he keeps doubling his donation, it’ll be big one day.”

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Debate continues

College football leaders gave every indication Sunday that they remain stuck in a yearlong debate about expanding the playoff from 12 teams to 16 or beyond.

Commissioners and school presidents met on the eve of the College Football Playoff title game, facing a Friday deadline from ESPN — the $7.8 billion bankroller of the postseason — to decide on changing or staying at the current 12-team model.

The debate boils down to two conferences, the Big Ten and SEC, that both want to expand but have widely different visions of how far expansion should go.

“I think that’s up to two people,” American Conference Commissioner Tim Pernetti said.

He was speaking of Tony Petitti of the Big Ten and Greg Sankey of the SEC, who did not reach any agreement during the last scheduled meeting before Friday’s deadline.

“Still more work to do,” Pettiti said as he quickly made his way toward an escalator at the Miami Beach hotel where the meeting was held. “One-hundred percent, we’re still working.”

The Miami-Indiana final Monday night will mark the end of the current contract, and a six-year deal worth $1.3 billion a year kicks in next season. Its revenue-distribution model doles out more to the SEC and Big Ten than the Atlantic Coast and Big 12, among the power conferences. Just as importantly, it leaves the two biggest leagues squarely in charge of what comes next.

The SEC is pushing for an expansion to 16 teams, with an emphasis on at-large bids — a format favored by the other Power Four leagues and most of the smaller conferences that are hoping for access into whatever comes next.

The Big Ten has pushed for a bracket of up to 24 teams with multiple automatic qualifiers from each conference. It could do away with the need for conference title games and replace them with seeding games to determine, say, two or three of the automatic spots.

“It’s a system that would keep a lot of teams in it, put some more value into the regular season,” Indiana athletic director Scott Dolson said in an interview Saturday. “This is really about quality people coming together” to make a decision.

If the commissioners can’t agree on a new number, the tournament would automatically stay at 12, with a deadline of Dec. 1, 2026, to make any changes for the following season.

The only real news coming out of the weekend was a social media post from President Donald Trump saying he would sign an executive order to give an exclusive four-hour window to the Army-Navy game, which takes place the second Saturday in December — a date currently wedged between conference title games and the start of the playoff.

A move to 16 or more games could put the playoff in conflict with the annual meeting between service acadamies.

“This national event stands above Commercial Postseason Games,” said Trump, who will attend Monday night’s final.

Mississippi State president Mark Keenum, the chair of the CFP board of managers, tried to strike a tone of calm, not commiting to the idea that any chance for compromise is dead.

“This was not a deadline day of any kind, so they’re still talking, and we anticipate the discussions will continue,” Keenum said.

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