Souhan: College football has never been better, especially if you live in Indiana

Remember when everyone involved with college football told you they couldn’t afford to pay players, as they were jumping into their private jets to recruit 17-year-olds?

Remember the whining over the transfer portal, which gave college football players the same rights as all other U.S. citizens to leave one job for another?

Remember when college football was doomed?

Not to conflate college football with the rest of the world, but it’s almost as if rich people who held all the power just didn’t want to share.

On Monday night, Jan. 19, top-seeded Indiana will face 10th-seeded Miami (Fla.) in the College Football Playoff national championship game at Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens, Fla. Miami, which will be playing on its home field, is a traditional power but has made it this far because it purchased a quarterback from a program that had been more powerful in recent years: Georgia.

Carson Beck could make up to $6 million to play one season of college football. In the past, he would have been ruled ineligible if someone bought him a cheeseburger.

Has paying players ruined college football?

The freedom to transfer and the ability to pay players has created a more equitable system. Now Alabama can’t hoard the three best quarterbacks in the country. Now the blue-blood programs have the same depth problems as everyone else.

Now college football is closer to the formula concocted by the most successful sports league in North American history — the NFL.

There are plenty of differences, but college and pro football are both succeeding for this reason: Every team knows that they are one coach and one quarterback away from excellence.

Take Indiana. I’ve covered Gophers football games at Indiana. The “crowd” was mostly band members and parents. Indiana football was something to do for a few weekends in the fall before the basketball season began.

Indiana had not won a Big Ten title outright since 1945. The Hoosiers dominated the Big Ten this season, and are dominating the college football playoffs, because of three people:

And guess what: We have yet to see a television executive, university president, athletic director or college football head coach trade in their Mercedes for a used AMC Gremlin. (Look it up.)

What does this new reality mean for the Minnesota Golden Gophers football team?

Not much.

The head coach, P.J. Fleck, is good enough to keep his team competitive but hasn’t won big since the 2019 season. There is no basis for firing him, but he doesn’t inspire hope that Gophers will ever become a powerhouse.