Indiana football's rise to national title contender rewards fans who endured decades of losing

Bill Murphy has been an Indiana football season ticket holder for 66 years. He says he has rarely missed a game even though 55 of them have been losing seasons in a historic stretch of bowl-less holidays.

One of those rare misses stands out: The 1968 Rose Bowl, when Indiana lost 14-3 to O.J. Simpson and a USC team that went on to be crowned national champion. Murphy was 15 at the time, and his parents weren't on board with sending him to California alone. But neither Murphy nor his parents could have anticipated the bowl drought that followed. The Hoosiers didn't make another bowl until 1979, and after that, 1986.

Now 77, Murphy wasn't sure this day would come again. So a backup plan was established in case of an emergency.

''I told my wife, son and daughter, I told them, ‘If I die before we go to the Rose Bowl again, I want you to take my urn and buy a program, buy a seat, set the program and urn on the seat, and I'll be there with you guys,''' he said.

Murphy's story would resonate with any lifelong Indiana football fan, though he warns there may not be many. He grew up a dedicated supporter of Indiana's losing football team in Bloomington, a city that rallied around the powerhouse and championship-winning basketball team.

The script has since flipped a bit. Hoosiers fans have had more to cheer about the past season or two when it comes to football than basketball. A team that was once an afterthought in its community has a new brand of committed fans who have the chance to head to Pasadena for the program's biggest game in years: Top-seeded Indiana will play Alabama on Thursday in the Grandaddy of Them All for a chance to advance to the College Football Playoff semifinals.

The program has reached new heights over the past two years under back-to-back AP Coach of the Year Curt Cignetti, finally abandoning the title of losingest program in the history of the Bowl Subdivision and handing the unwelcome crown to Northwestern earlier this year. Indiana finished the regular season as Big Ten champion with a perfect 13-0 record behind quarterback Fernando Mendoza, the school's first Heisman Trophy winner.

''It's beyond my wildest dreams,'' Harrell said, admitting that having this level of confidence in the team is an unfamiliar feeling. ''We have always expected the worst. We could always find a new way to lose the game. It's been kind of weird how quickly I've gone from that way of thinking to expecting to win. I expect this team to win every time they take the field, and I think that's just a testament to the job Curt Cignetti has done.''

Not all fans have earned their stripes like Harrell and Murphy. The Indiana football bandwagon is filling up.

Memorial Stadium reached the brim with new followers this season. ''Heis-Mendoza'' chants on Saturdays become common this fall, and for the second straight year, all four home conference games sold out.

Airlines have adjusted accordingly to the high demand. Delta, American and Southwest Airlines added additional nonstop flights from Indianapolis to Los Angeles in the days leading up to the Rose Bowl.

''People get excited because people like winners,'' Murphy said. ''(There are) not a tremendous amount of people like me that will go support their team win or lose, and I've seen a lot of losing football over the years.''

''Fortunately for me, I get to go this year and actually sit in a seat and see the game," Murphy said. ''I'm still pinching myself, trying to make sure I'm not dreaming.''

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