60 Minutes - Germany Rearms, The Price of Life, Hoosier Hysteria

Episode Date: December 15, 2025

Germany is racing to rearm as the war in Ukraine shakes its sense of security, forcing the country to confront its military past as it strengthens its military might. Correspondent Bill Whitaker observes basic training in northwest Germany and speaks with defense minister Boris Pistorius in Berlin to find out how Germany plans to achieve its aim of building the most powerful armed forces in Europe. A new generation of drugs is offering hope to children who once had none. But these breakthrough therapies can cost millions for a single dose, and the American healthcare system still hasn’t figured out how to pay. Correspondent Scott Pelley sets out to understand the challenges of paying for these expensive treatments. An unscripted underdog saga is unfolding in the most unlikely setting this college football season. Indiana University’s perennially overlooked and outmatched Hoosiers have transformed into the #1 ranked team in the country. Correspondent Jon Wertheim speaks with head coach Curt Cignetti and dives into how this remarkable turnaround took shape – as the undefeated Hoosiers contend for a national championship. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Canada's Wonderland is bringing the holiday magic this season with Winterfest on select nights now through January 3rd. Step into a winter wonderland filled with millions of dazzling lights, festive shows, rides, and holiday treats. Plus, Coca-Cola is back with Canada's kindest community, celebrating acts of kindness nationwide with a chance at 100,000 donation for the winning community and a 2026 holiday caravan stop. Learn more at canadaswunderland.com. This past month we were invited by the Bundesphere, the German military, to observe basic training as a squad of recruits ran punishing drills, honing the skills they would need to defend against an enemy assault. Everything we are training here for could be one day real. We don't hope that, but we're preparing exactly for.

exactly for that. Because of the war in Ukraine? Yes, of course. A new class of drugs can save the lives of children like Maisie. Trouble is one dose costs millions of dollars. It was cheaper for her to die. They were banking on her dying. Neither health insurance nor government

has figured out how to pay for the next wave of miracle medicines. I liken it to a coming tsunami, which is basically going to overwhelm the employer-sponsored insurance system. Indiana entered this season as the losingest program in major college football history, more than 700 defeats.

To imagine the astonishment last weekend when the Hoosiers took down the defending national champions unbeaten Ohio State to win the Big Ten title. How'd they do it? You've got to adapt to just and improvise. Take what the defense gives you. Attack at all times. I'm Leslie Stahl.

I'm Bill Whitaker. I'm Anderson Cooper. I'm Sharon Alfonci. I'm John Worthy. I'm John Wertheim. I'm Cecilia Vega. I'm Scott Pelly. Those stories, and in our last minute,

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Visit your local Nissan dealer today, or nisan.ca for more details. We've turned for 48 months with 1,249 down conditions apply. This past week, Ukraine's president, Volodymyr Zelensky, reasserted he doesn't want to surrender any territory in exchange for peace with Russia, a declaration that followed earlier warnings from Russian President Vladimir Putin that if Europe engaged in a wider war, it would be defeated. Nearly four years in, the conflict continues to send shockwaves through the Western Alliance. European nations are beefing up their defenses.

Nowhere is the impact more profound than in Germany. Scarred by their country's Nazi past, Germans embraced pacifism after the Cold War. Defense spending collapsed, to the point some soldiers were buying their own gear. But Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, combined with pretext. persistent pressure from President Donald Trump for Europe to shoulder more of its own defense transformed the landscape. Today, Germany is racing to rearm. This past month, we were invited by the Bundesphere, the German military, to observe basic training at the Munster Army base in northwest Germany.

A squad of recruits ran punishing drills, honing the skills they would need to defend their position against an enemy assault. The major in charge... ...has been training troops since 2018. The Bundeswehr won't reveal his name to shield his identity from hostile actors. So have you seen a difference in the recruits of today versus years' past. Yes, I think there's a huge difference.

They know what they're here for, and it's getting more clear to them that everything we're training here for could be one day real. We don't hope that, but we're preparing exactly for that. Because of the war in Ukraine? Yes, of course, yeah. The war in Ukraine has shaken Germany's sense of security. But the country is also shaking off the shadow. of its brutal military past.

This Holocaust memorial in Berlin, a stark reminder of that history, stands close by the Reichstag, where the National Parliament is moving to restore Germany's military as Europe's most powerful force. Defense Minister Boris Pistorius has overseen a 23% uptick

in enlistments over last year. How is the war in Ukraine changing Germany's views? Germany's view of its own security. I grew up in the Cold War, and since February 22, we all experienced in Germany and in Europe that the war is back. We never expected that, and we were so hopeful that it would never happen again. But it does, and we have to do everything to be able to deter and defend.

Pistorius was appointed defense minister in 2023, almost a year after Russia's large-scale assault on Ukraine. When conservative Friedrich Mertz became chancellor this past May, he kept Pistorius, the blunt-talking social democrat, in his post. I mean, you have to be clear what you want, what you are standing for. We met him at the Bender Block, the Berlin building complex, once housed the Nazis' army high command. Today, it's Germany's equivalent of the Pentagon. When we spoke with Pistorius this past month, he didn't pull any punches on run. Russian President Vladimir Putin's ambitions.

There is not only the war against Ukraine. This is a war against a root-based international order. And at the same time, he does not stop stressing what he's really longing for, like a renaissance of the Soviet Empire. He wants to be the dominant power in Europe, and he wants to be the third of three world powers like China and the U.S. This is what he is heading for. Pistorius warns Putin is rapidly rebuilding Russia's military,

and he told us Russia could be in position to attack the West by the end of the decade. When does Germany need to be ready for war? We should do everything to be that in 2029. This is our objective. This is still a way to go. Three days after Russia's 22 invasion of Ukraine, Then-Chancellor Olaf Schultz told the Bundestag, Germany's parliament, the incursion marked a zeitenvinde, a turning point for Europe.

He announced a special 100 billion euro fund to kickstart Germany's military build-up. Three years later, in the run-up to his election as Chancellor, Friedrich Mertz said he was troubled as well by President Trump's threats to pull back from NATO. My absolute priority will be to strengthen Europe as quickly as possible so that, step by step, we can really achieve independence from the U.S.A. You're gambling with World War III. After this contentious Oval Office meeting with President Zelensky this past February, Friedrich Merrittz posted, we must never confuse aggressor and victim in this terrible war. And he pushed Parliament to exempt defense spending from German.

Germany's debt break, the constitutionally mandated spending cap. The money started flowing. The defense budget is projected to rise almost 80% by 2029. How big should the German military be? Germany is the third biggest economy in the world, and the biggest one in Europe, of course. So everybody in Europe expects us to be the strongest ally in NATO in Europe. With the surge of federal funding, the long, moribund German defense industry is springing back to life.

The drones are the future of warfare. We met Sven Kruke in Berlin. He is co-CEO of drone manufacturer Quantum Systems. The company, with factories in Germany and Ukraine, just landed a 25 million euro contract with the Bundeswehr to produce. produce up to 750 intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance drones, ISR for short. We have now more than 1,500 at the battlefront day by day in use. 1,500 drones. Drones.

In use in Ukraine, day by day, night by night. Drones, including quantums, have helped reshape the battlefield. A few months after the 2022 invasion, Russian forces tried to cross the Donets River in eastern Ukraine. eastern Ukraine. Explosions and smoke obscured their movements. A quantum drone equipped with a thermal camera helped Ukraine see, target and stop the advance. And this actually was our moment where everybody has seen quantum systems and especially ISR drones can make a difference.

Kruk told us Germany isn't investing enough in cutting-edge technologies, but we saw evidence evidence the defense ministry is thinking outside the box, way outside the box. It's funding tests to see if these giant Madagascar hissing cockroaches can be repurposed from repulsive pests to miniature battlefield assets. This is the left turn and this is the right turn. Stefan Wilhelm's year-old startup swarm biotactics in central Germany is working with the Bundeswehr to develop technology that can steer the creepie critters autonomously and send them on reconnaissance missions.

He let me take control. Wow. They're super resilient, and as you can see, I mean, they can crawl through tiny spaces, can go up the wall into pipes, like underground and rubble. You know this is really bizarre. Is it? Swarm's insect neuroscientists attach electrodes to the roach's antenna. They insist this doesn't hurt, stimulating their natural ability to navigate.

The electrodes are hidden in these bug-sized backpacks, along with a battery and microchips. They're working to shrink the technology to soon look like this. Swarm's AI-generated videos shows how they might be deployed, carrying cameras, microphones, and Doppler radar into war zones. Right now we're hearing that Russia is re-arming itself. They've got more tanks, more armaments. How does this compete? We have to be smarter.

We have to use intelligence, we have to use autonomy, because we wouldn't have enough personnel or enough equipment if you look at what Russia produces right now. So I think this is a shift we see in the German start-ups. Still, Germany is placing a big bet on its biggest defense contractor, Rhein Matal, a major major. As a major arm supplier to German troops in both world wars, Rhein-Mittal and its subsidiaries

have won a commanding share of recent government contracts. We are the fastest-growing defense company in Europe at the moment. Armin Papperger has been CEO since 2013. Pragmatic, forceful, strategic, he built Rhein-Metal into a pillar of NATO rearmament. Rhein-Metal was an ammunition company. going from amonitions to vehicle platforms. But now we go to digitization, we go to satellite business,

we go to naval business. His company's success and support of Ukraine made him the target of a Russian assassination plot. But that didn't slow him or the company down. Rhein Matal is building and expanding 13 arms factories across Europe. We educated two generations. If something happens in the world,

We call Washington and Washington will help us. That changed. President Trump said it very clear. America has her own problems. The Europeans has to help themselves. And now, with the Ukrainian-Russian war, it's very clear about that, that we have to do more. In 2024, Germany began sending its 45th armored brigade, 5,000 troops to Lithuania, once brutally occupied by the Nazis.

Lithuania now welcomes German troops bolstering NATO's eastern flank, Germany's first permanent deployment of a combat-ready brigade abroad since World War II. Despite the uptick in enlistments, the Bundesphere faces a manpower challenge. It wants to add about 75,000 active-duty troops to its all-volunteer force by 2035. History weighs on recruitment. The issue still sparks protest. A recent poll found an overwhelming majority of 15 to 25-year-olds would not take up arms. If volunteer numbers fall short, the government may reintroduce the draft.

Soldiers we met in basic training told us they find the reluctance of their generation to volunteer troubling. I think a lot of it must have to do with the history of World War II. Yes, of course. Private Lassa told us he's proud to serve. Nobody wants to go to war, but if it happens, you have to be there, to defend your country. The week before we spoke to Defense Minister Boris Pistorius, he presided over a public swearing-in of new recruits in Berlin. Deutsche!

Deutsche! Deutschland, they shouted. The world hasn't heard Germany assert itself like this since World War II, but times have changed. When you talk about rebuilding the German military, there are many people who recoil at that thought. I try to explain them if you want to live

in peace, in freedom, security, security, with the right to go on the street and to demonstrate against or for whatever you want, to love however to want and you to believe in any God you want, then you need to be willing to defend it because otherwise there might be people like Vladimir Putin who will take that kind of living away from us. just a credit card company. We're people just like you who believe in the power of yes. Yes to new opportunities. Yes to second chances. Yes to a fresh start. That's why we've helped over four million Canadians get access to a credit card because at Capital One, we say yes,

so you don't have to hear another no. What will you do with your yes? Get the yes you've been waiting for at Capital One.ca.ca.com.com.com.com. Terms and conditions apply. A new class of drugs is saving the lives of children who once had no hope. These high-tech medicines can replace defective genes, but there's a catch. Many cost millions of dollars for a single dose, and American health care hasn't figured out how to pay. We wondered how medicine could be priced so high, and how insurance plans could refuse a life-saving treatment. so we ask the people you're about to meet, a drug maker whose company charges $3 million for its medication,

a CEO whose insurance plan won't pay, and a mother named C.G. Green. C.G. was overjoyed that a new drug could save the life of her daughter, Masey, until she found no one would pay the price of life. Tiny Macy was born in her life. 2017, C.G. Green says that from the start, her daughter was mysteriously ill. When you brought Macy home, what did you begin to notice? Initially, she just sounded like she had a cold all the time. She just sounded really

congested. And after, I'd say like two weeks, I noticed that Masey, like, wasn't holding her head at all. She was just like jello. Her head, like, neck was like jello. And her head would just flow. C.G. had a feeling something was terribly wrong, something doctors couldn't name, until one took a blood sample to test for spinal muscular atrophy, SMA. And she left with the blood, and she came back in, she goes, you heard me when I said, we're testing for SMA. And I said, yes, I heard. And she goes, do you know what that is? And I go, no.

She put her hand out. And I said, please don't touch me. Please don't touch me because I knew everything I had been feeling. Please don't touch me. I said, what can we do? What can you do? And shook her head. She said, love her and squeeze her.

A missing gene caused Maisie's muscles to waste away. SMA is often fatal by age two. Then, just in time, in 2019, something like a miracle was approved by the FDA. Just one dose of a drug called Zoolgensma can replace the gene to stop the disease. But the dose is $2 million. Macy was on her state's Medicaid. The insurance company that managed Medicaid said it would not pay. I became very angry to know that there was something that could help her, and I knew, without a shadow of a doubt, I was burying my daughter before she was two.

It was cheaper for her to die. They were banking on her dying. Maisie's story is a view on what's coming to American health care, because today there are more than 300 high-cost genetic therapies in clinical trials. some for diseases suffered by millions of patients. I liken it to a coming tsunami, which is basically going to overwhelm the employer-sponsored insurance system. Few know health care finance, as well as Jonathan Gruber, he's chair of economics at MIT

and an architect of the Affordable Care Act. What happens when you have genetic cell and gene therapies that treat cancer or heart disease, which are much more common, that's when the tsunami here. the tsunami hits and we're threatened to be underwater. What problems are the high prices already causing today? The first problem is that many companies in America are what we call self-insured.

They pay their own medical bills, about two-thirds of the insured in America in such arrangements. They can't afford to pay this. So they're facing a difficult financial decision, which is, do I cover this drug and potentially go bankrupt? or do I not help my unlucky employee? That's the painful question Mike Poor faced. It should not be that only the rich can afford the best care. Poore is CEO of Mosaic Life Care,

a non-profit hospital system in Missouri with about 5,000 employees. In 2023, Mosaic decided not to cover gene therapies because Mike Poor told us employee premiums would jump $125 a month. But a few months later, an employee had twins with SMA, like Masey. And the gene therapy for the twins would be $4.2 million. Yes. Denied coverage, the family went public and blamed Mosaic. I got death threats.

my family was threatened. What did you do to protect your family? Actually sent them away and decided to stay on at the hospital and then just work to make sure that the children got the care they needed. From the moment his health plan denied the claim, Mike Poor appealed to philanthropists and legislators.

Finally, state Medicaid paid to children. treat the twins. What's really important here is to understand that this is one situation, but it is a bellwether of what is to come. Every new gene therapy breaks a record for the most expensive drug ever. You seem to be saying there's a storm coming. It's definitely a storm coming. Who charges millions for a drug?

Doug Ingram is among them. The CEO of Surrepta Therapeutics took us into a freezer at four degrees below zero where he stores a levitis, which costs $3.2 million for one dose, which may be all that is needed to slow Duchenne muscular dystrophy, a muscle-wasting disease that confronts parents with this prognosis. They're always told, your boy has Duchenne muscular dystrophy. There's nothing we can do about it. Go home, love him, because the disease is going to steal him from you bit by bit, day by day, and he will die, and you've got to get used to that.

People hear $3.2 million for your drug, and they think greed. Here's what they should think. So first of all, if the question is, is this the right price or only price in place? can society afford this, you're going to hear me say that it absolutely is, and society absolutely can afford it, and we'll go into that. If you're asking me whether this is the sort of price that we should be happy with and satisfied in the long term with gene therapies and genetic medicine, I'm going to tell you absolutely not.

Ingram's company uses an engineered gene that instructs the child's cells to make a protein to protect the muscles. A modified virus carries the gene to the cells. Development took 18 years. So the first question is, could you even do this and do this safely? The second question that was obvious is, if you could, you have to manufacture this stuff. And at the moment in time we did the calculation, you needed more gene therapy manufacturing capacity

than all of the capacity that exists on the planet Earth at the time. the time, every company, every research facility, every university. And we'd never made a vial of anything that looked like a gene therapy at that moment. And the next thing, you'd have to raise billions of dollars. You have to go to investors and paint a picture of the future and literally raise billions of dollars to do this. We didn't have billions of dollars. It took three billion to create a levitis, according to Ingram.

One of his challenges now is recouping that investment in a rare disease that has only about 15,000 patients in the U.S. Ingram says the price will come down with manufacturing experience, future competition, and in his view, streamlined federal regulations. Today, on average, it takes more than 10 years to develop a therapy. It costs nearly $3 billion on average to make a therapy. And at the beginning of that journey, the probability of it being successful is nearly zero. And in the context of that, of course, therapies when they're eventually approved are going to be very expensive. So what we need to do is fix that.

We've had 60, 70 years of layering and layering and layering of requirements, all for the lawnable goal of ensuring that the therapies that are approved in the United States are both safe and effective. We have to do the hard work of getting under that and strict it down to those things they're absolutely necessary, informed by the science that we have today, not the science we had in the 60s, and find a way to make therapies less than $3 billion with a higher probability of success. Despite mixed results, the FDA approved Elevitus. About 1,100 patients have been treated.

Two died of liver failure. About half of the patients were covered by Medicaid. It's too soon to fully evaluate how well Alevidus is working, but the vile Doug Engram showed us was made for a boy named Leighton, and months after his treatment, Leighton's parents told us he is, quote, thriving, stronger, and more independent. Is there a bad guy in this equation, employers who won't pay, drug companies that are charging enormous fees? for these drugs.

The manufacturer is not the bad guy. The company's not the bad guy. Really, there's no bad guys here, Scott. We just have to recognize a society that something's changed. We have a new, miraculous, and expensive mode of treatment, and we society need to recognize

that we need to act jointly to absorb those costs. Economist Jonathan Gruber says, in his view, absorbing those costs will require government's support and negotiated prices. Until then, parents, including C.G. Green, must improvise. Green pursued philanthropy for her daughter, Maisie, set up a GoFundMe page, and demanded a meeting with the insurance company. You wanted them to look her in the eye?

Yes. I wanted them to look her in the eye and say, we're the reason you're going to die. The insurance board, blink. Maisie received the genetic therapy drug Zoolgensma in 2019. One dose, one hour, and the effect was what? You can't even describe it. Amazing. Amazing, Maisie. It changed her life.

It changed our life. It was what she needed. Can we meet her now? You sure can. We'd love to meet me, see. Expected to die by age two, she was six when we met, after a treatment so successful that C.G has appeared in testimonials for the drug company. The impairment suffered before the drug cannot be reversed.

Maisie doesn't walk, but she's making straight A's in school. Hi, Maisie. Hi. C.G told us the progress of the disease appears to have stopped. And what is the price of that? It's a precious little wave. I'm so glad to meet you. You say nice to meet you?

Nice to meet you. Your own miracle. My very own miracle. This episode. This episode is brought to you by Square. You're not just running a restaurant. You're building something big. and Squares there for all of it, giving your customers more ways to order,

whether that's in-person with Square kiosk or online. Instant access to your sales, plus the funding you need to go even bigger. And real-time insights so you know what's working, what's not, and what's next. Because when you're doing big things, your tools should to. Visit square.ca to get started. Indiana is the setting for three all-time great sports movies, Hoosiers, Rudy, and breaking away. And now comes another cinematic underdog story set in the state, except this one is unscripted.

Over the last century, defeat has been the near constant companion of Indiana University football, but then arrived a new coach who'd never gotten a shot at the big time. He brought new players, a new energy, and cue music. Suddenly, Hoosier hysteria reigns as top-ranked Indiana is the unlikely darling of college football. The Hoosiers are undefeated, just upset Powerhouse Ohio State, and might win a national championship before the credits roll. They come from the cities and they come from the smaller towns. More than 55,000 fans converging on Bloomington to watch the Indiana Hoosiers.

Built from limestone extracted from local quarries, Memorial Stadium is 65 years old, but this is a completely new look. Home to a football dynamo. Indiana had always been a basketball school, no longer. This season, the Hoosiers have won at home, and on the road. Rose to the corner, touchdown, Surrett. They've won in blowouts, and won with their season on the brink. This game-witting touchdown.

This game-winning touchdown against Penn State stands as the play of the year in college football. And they're hardly doing it with prized recruits. I think a lot of people on our team, whether it's coaches, players, or staff have all been overlooked. You say outcasts and transfers and rejects, you guys are doing pretty well. Well, I wouldn't say we're like, for sure, outcasts and rejects. I think we're all still really, really good football players here. That's Fernando Mendoza, Indiana star quarterback. He's come to embody the team.

A few years ago, he was a middling Miami high school player. Just last night, he won the Heisman Trophy, the first in IU history. Can you pause for a second and admire the story? Human nature is like, wow, like, how did I get here? And there's a little bit of an imposter syndrome from that point. Whoa, am I supposed to be here? I was a two-star recruit. I wasn't a five-star who's supposed to be in this position,

who's supposed to be on the number one team in the nation. Talk about your imposter syndrome. God, does the program still have imposter syndrome? I think that we believe. We believe. The belief has been hard won. Indiana entered this season as the losingest program in major college football history,

more than 700 defeats. It's a rat. Corny! Dutch down, Indiana. So imagine the... astonishment last weekend when Indiana took down the defending national champion, undefeated Ohio State, to win the Big Ten title. The previous time Indiana was conference champion, 1967. Paint the picture of IU football the first 50 years you've been doing this job.

I'd say up and down except that most of it's been down. 40, 35, down to the 30. Don Fisher has been the voice of Indiana football since 1973. This is the greatest turnaround, and I hate that word, because I don't think it expresses really what these last two seasons have been like here in Indiana. Turnaround doesn't do enough lifting. It's even bigger than that. No, it's not a good enough term. So I'm thinking Peyton Manning wins a Super Bowl, like an hour up the road. You've got Notre Dame.

Football is not an alien sport to Indiana. Why did it seem so hard to unlock it here? A big problem for Indiana was we could not recruit offensive and defensive. of linemen. Big boys. The big guys. We just didn't have very many of them.

And football here was not a big sport. It just hadn't clicked as a football place. Was there one low moment? Oh, I don't know if there was one. Here's one. It's Indiana legend,

but the charismatic coach at the time Lee Corso confirms it to us. In a 1976 game, Lowly, Indiana took an early 7-to-6 lead over Mighty Ohio State. So unexpected that Corso burned a timeout.

for the purpose of commemorative photos. When the game ended, Indiana still had seven points. Ohio State had 47. One diehard fan in attendance that afternoon, John Mellencamp, Bard of Indiana, who's been going to Hoosier Games ever since his father took him as a kid. In the 90s, he funded this indoor practice facility,

in hopes it would lure recruits. You've been a fan for like 50 years. You're not a bandwagon guy. No. So I've been around thick and thin. How thin did it get? Pretty thin. He says that for years the tailgates drew more interest than the actual games.

You're going to these football games and the stadium's half full and fans are leaving it at halftime. Whoa, whoa. They're not even half full. Less than half full. Yeah, less than half full. I mean, you know, like if this is the stadium, there's just like a few people up here. In 2023, yet another dismal season, the team finished three and nine. And the athletic director, Scott Dolson, set out in search of answers.

What was the hole you had to fill? I think certainly the right coach is the biggest hole to fill. As he scoured for candidates, he had some non-negotiables. We wanted an existing head coach. We wanted a coach who was offensive-minded, who had developed quarterbacks. So the slick offensive coordinator at the big school, that's not who you wanted. No, we really felt having that head coach experience was really important.

Dolson went off the board and settled on a little known lifer, who'd won relentlessly but also been overlooked relentlessly. So two years ago when Kurt Signetti's name surfaces as a candidate, what did you know about him? Anything? Nothing. You've been covering college football for more than 50 years, and you'd never heard his name before. Never heard his name.

And when he became the hire, I was surprised by it. by it, but then I looked him up a little bit. I googled it. I googled him. Yes, I did. That was a direct order from the new coach. How do you sell your vision of your culture? Mere weeks on the job, tired of the Who Are You Questions, Kurt Signetti

dropped his usual modesty and said this. It's pretty simple. I win. Google me. Here's what Googling would have revealed. Signetti pinballed around the country's sidelines. Once an assistant for Nick Sabin and Alabama, he left the big time to take head coaching jobs at smaller schools like Elon University and James Madison.

When Indiana called, Signetti was well beyond the usual sell-by date for a maiden job at this level. You've had terrific success wherever you've been, but at age 62, this was your first power-four big-time job. Did you come in here with a bit of a chip on your shoulder? The chip probably came from when I got here right away. I detected an atmosphere that you can't get it done here. You sense that. Oh, absolutely. As soon as I walked in the building.

Facilities that had been neglected, the stadium banners that looked old, the offices that looked like they were from 1980, and then, you know, just the general attitude of the people I met, the lack of excitement. Coming from a winning program, he was, well... I was furious, pretty much, because... All we did was win conference championships year and year out of this is the staff. That's your old school. Yeah.

And, I mean, we win. And so it was a clashing of two worlds, and I wasn't going to lower my standards. It erupted when Signetti was first introduced to fans at an Indiana basketball game. Purdue sucks. But so does Michigan in Ohio State. Go on you. As the kids say, shots fired. I had to see if the fans were dead or just on life support.

I had to wake them up and set an expectation and create some buzz and excitement. I think they woke up? A little bit. Get locked in, good warm up. The irony, Signetti is skeptical of anything resembling, look at me. He may be from Pennsylvania, but his temperament is pitch perfect for Southern Indiana. He's measured. He commands respect.

his fallback language is coach-speak. Coaches aren't in the habit of sharing the playbook, but what is the magic here? There's no magic here. It's fundamentals. I would like to think the leader, which is me, knows what he's doing and has a blueprint in the plan.

Create the intangibles on your football team, the culture, the mindset, a philosophy, on how you want to play. Under Signetti, the program is unrecognizable. The last two seasons, Indiana's gone 24 and 2 without losing a home game. That's the what. The how is more complicated.

It starts with a coach, not just his eye for recruiting talent, but his ability to develop it once it arrives. Based on what he's seen from his perch, a shack atop the stadium press box, where he can smoke, John Mellencamp has his own explanation for Signetti's success.

He does not show emotion. He's not emotional. Not outwardly. John, I've made my worst decisions being emotional. I bet you have to. The poise of Signetti, and the turnaround he's orchestrated, it makes for a hell of a Cinderella story. But this is also a story about contemporary college sports. Indiana's rise has been helped by new rules.

Athletes are now able to enter the so-called transfer portal and switch schools at will. Signetti fortified the roster by bringing 13 players with him from James Madison. Fernando Mendoza played at Cal Berkeley last season. Then there's the money. College players now can be paid for the licensing of their name, image, and likeness, and starting this year, they can get a cut of team revenue. Mendoza is reported to be making $2 million this season. I wrote a paper in high school saying why NCAA athletes should not be able to get paid.

It should not be. It should not be. And then now I'm contradicting myself as I'm getting paid now. So there's so many different dynamics that were never there in college football. And I think that's why you see so many teams either rising or fizzling just because of the new structure. Whether it's people talking about compensation in the locker room, which is either uniting or dividing a locker room, whether it's people going to not only one or two schools, like myself, going to four schools. I mean, you see coaches leaving mid-season.

it is, it's chaos. In 2024, thanks partially to donors, including IU alumni, Cuban, Indiana spent more than $60 million on football alone. This, as the school is cutting academic jobs and programs. There are people who will say, wait a second, these are tough times for colleges and universities, and you've got $50, $60 million being spent on one sport. That doesn't make sense.

So certainly the market is what the market is, and it costs a lot of money. But we earn that money. We make it through our revenue streams. And at the same time, people understand if we can get football going, the impact and the consequences for the rest of university are significant. You can have all the marketing meetings you want and changing logos and uniforms, but winning games is what's going to do it.

Absolutely. And I've joked before if I'd have known that winning consistently would have that impact, we should have tried that a long time ago. Big Ten champion, Indiana Hoosiers. Now the number one seat in the upcoming college football playoffs, the Hoosiers' next game is New Year's Day. But at Indiana, the joy is tempered by a fear this all could vanish as quickly as it emerged. The school vows to keep spending on football, far more than on basketball.

And in hopes the coach doesn't transfer out, Indiana recently gave Signetti an eight-year $90 million contract, more than 15 times his compensation at his last job. Been around this sport a long time. It's a lot different now than it was when you started. Do you embrace that? Oh, you have to embrace that. If not, you have no chance to be a successful.

Doesn't matter if you like it or not. Those are the rules of the road? You got to adapt, adjust, and improvise. Take what the defense gives you. Attack at all times. Aiden Fisher, on the key to Indiana's football success. The two best words I have for he's coach saying. At 60 Minutes Overtime.com.

Next week, 60 Minutes reaches a new high as Cecilia Vega treks to Mount Everest. Her guides were the Sherpas who risked their lives to assist climbers. Leading the expedition was a 19-year-old Sherpa. We're really almost there now. He set a record as the youngest person to climb the world's 14 highest mountains. Ah, it's windy. I do not like this at all. There's little margin for error. You can't be scared of anything if you do what you do.

Of course, you are scared, but you have to balance it in a way that you can be confident, you know, when you do things. What do you tell yourself when you get scared? I'm just trying to calm myself down and just realize who I am. I'm Scott Pelley. That story and more next week on another edition of 60 Minutes. And to those celebrating, happy Hanukkah.