Indiana football's spring game highlights Kurtis Rourke's spot at top of QB pecking order

BLOOMINGTON — Indiana football coach Curt Cignetti has built a quarterback room to his liking. 

The Hoosiers wrapped up spring practice with the offense beating the defense 34-25 in the program’s first spring game since 2019.

Indiana’s quarterbacks combined for 326 passing yards and two touchdowns in the two-quarter scrimmage. Ohio transfer Kurtis Rourke spent the entire game working with the first-team offense and took the most snaps (52) by a wide margin over Tayven Jackson (21 snaps). 

“I think there's a healthy competition there heading into summer and fall camp,” Cignetti said. “Competition is a great thing.” 

The competition remains open, but the spring game showed there’s a clear pecking order in the position battle coming out of camp. 

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The best moments for Rourke during the spring game came on the offense’s 15-play, 75-yard final drive. He completed eight straight passes to get IU inside the 20-yard line while using every part of the field. 

Rourke leaned on receiver Sage Sarratt, three catches for 31 yards, and tight end Zach Horton, three catches for 18 yards, on the drive. He hit Sarratt on an out route to the sideline for a 15-yard gain that was one of his better throws of the night. 

He capped off the drive with a 3-yard touchdown to Andison Coby for the go-ahead score.

"We had some flashes of good plays throughout the whole night," Rourke said.

He made a few off-target throws, but his only real bad decision in the game was a short pass intended for Donaven McCulley that was nearly picked off at the end of the first quarter. Kobee Minor jumped the route and would have been a pick-six if he hadn’t dropped the would-be interception. 

The other miscue for Rourke was not throwing the ball deep out of bounds when he was being chased out of the pocket by defensive end Mikail Kamara. Rourke threw the ball short of the line of scrimmage and Cignetti told the officials to throw the flag. 

Rourke, who was 20 for 30 for 148 yards with a touchdown on seven drives, felt it was a good night overall for the first-team offense. 

"Today was a good showcase of what we can do,” Rourke said. 

Jackson had the hotter start, but Cignetti was quick to note that some of that success came against some of the more inexperienced defenders in the team’s secondary including true freshman Dontrae Henderson. 

Henderson fell down on Jackson’s 65-yard completion to Coby. Jackson had a pair of completions to Coby that accounted for 105 of his 170 yards. The redshirt sophomore ended up 10 for 13 with a touchdown and interception. 

He completed his first eight passes. 

“I was trying to figure out if our two offense was that good or our two defense was that bad,” Cignetti said. “I think I know the question to that -- or the answer. I think the freshman corner got exposed a little bit in the boundary. But Tayven made some nice throws, and Andison made a play or two.”

Freshman quarterback Tyler Cherry only got six snaps in the scrimmage working with the third-team offense. He was 1 of 3 with 8 yards and the offense didn’t have a first down on either possession he was in the game for. 

More:All eyes on Indiana football quarterback Kurtis Rourke going into spring game

Kurtis Rourke wants to help Cignetti build on his winning ways 

Rourke had options in the transfer portal, but Cignetti’s past success gave Indiana an edge over the competition. The resume Cignetti infamously touted in one of his first press conferences — he told potential recruits to “Google me” — was a key factor in Rourke’s decision-making process. 

Indiana’s marketing team even turned that audio sound byte into an advertisement for season tickets. 

"To hear he's not here to just start rebuilding, he's here to win in year one," Rourke said. "That says a lot about who he is as a coach."

Cignetti’s confidence resonated with Rourke since he’s just as accustomed to winning. 

In high school, he led Holy Trinity High School to a Halton Championship as a junior. He had a 21-11 record at Ohio and led the program to back-to-back bowl appearances. 

He put up big numbers at each of those stops as well, from the 4,250 career yards and 63 passing touchdowns he had in high school to the 7,576 yards (66.1% completion percentage) and 50 touchdowns he threw at Ohio.

The time Rourke has spent learning Indiana’s playbook in recent months has him excited about what’s to come. 

"I love the play book, the design they have and the way they call it," Rourke said. "It always seems like they are a step ahead and really puts defenses on their toes."

While Rourke comes out of spring camp seemingly in the driver’s seat of IU’s quarterback competition, he’s not taking anything for granted. 

He spoke after the spring game about building more chemistry with his new teammates and further immersing himself in the play book. He’s also been tasked by the coaching staff to improve his footwork during the offseason. 

“We are going to continue to keep growing and improve all the way until fall," Rourke said. 

Michael Niziolek is the Indiana beat reporter for The Bloomington Herald-Times. You can follow him on X @michaelniziolek and read all his coverage by clicking here.