ANN ARBOR — Indiana football coach Curt Cignetti admitted the staff had a "lot of discussions" about replacing Josh Hoover in the second half of a 13-6 overtime win over Michigan on Saturday.
While Hoover wasn't listed on IU's availability report leading into the game, he wasn't 100% from an apparent injury he suffered against Ohio State. The No. 6 Hoosiers (7-1, 4-1 Big Ten) put up only 49 yards of total offense in the second half with Hoover only attempting two passes during that stretch.
Late in the third quarter, Michigan scored its first points of the game after intercepting one of those attempts deep inside Indiana territory.
Cignetti considered pulling Hoover for backup Grant Wilson throughout the second half, but opted against it.
"There were a lot of discussions about Grant Wilson and Josh Hoover," Cignetti said. "Grant had a good week of practice. He's very capable, he's big, strong, can run. But I think at the end of the day, we felt like it's been Josh's season. And even though he's not 100%, we gotta finish it out with him. And he responded."
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Hoover ended up helping Indiana pull out the win in overtime by scoring the game's lone touchdown on a keeper off the right side line. He set up the score by throwing his longest completion of the day, a 21-yarder to tight end Brock Schott.
It was his only completion after halftime.
Hoover finished 8 of 18 for 81 yards with an interception. This was only the second time in his career that he didn't complete at least 50% of his passes in a single game and the first time in 10 games that he didn't throw at least one passing touchdown.
"We found a way to get it done," Cignetti said. "And probably surprised them with our decoy Brock shot down the seam. And then who would have ever thought we'd run Josh down there for a touchdown? The element of surprise is still alive in college football."
Michael Niziolek is the Indiana beat reporter for The Bloomington Herald-Times. You can follow him on X @michaelniziolek.
This article originally appeared on The Herald-Times: Indiana football almost replaced Josh Hoover at QB vs Michigan. Here's why they didn't