Savage Comeback Energy

Talk about a plot twist nobody had circled on their calendar. The Indiana Hoosiers football team, a program that has lived longer in the basement of NCAA history than a forgotten Christmas decoration box, just walked into the 2025 Big Ten Championship and knocked off the giant of giants, the powerhouse Buckeyes of Ohio State. Indiana’s football legacy has more losses than a yard sale punch bowl, and everyone knows it. Flip through the record books and you’ll find Ohio State hanging out near the top with polished trophies, legendary coaches, and fans who treat football like it’s a second religion. Indiana, meanwhile, has been the “maybe next year” program for decades, the team ESPN references briefly before turning attention back to the favorites. So when the scoreboard declared Indiana as the champions, it didn’t just surprise the handful of die-hard fans—it slapped the entire football world across the face. The worst team beat one of the best. The underdog refused to play the role they were assigned and changed the ending everyone expected.

Here’s where this becomes more than football. This is life. Because life loves to tell certain people that their story is already over, that their “record” defines them. And if you’ve ever felt like the world has already filed you under “lost cause” or “never gonna make it,” then you might understand the Hoosiers better than any sports analyst ever will. There’s a story in 2 Kings 7 that doesn’t get much attention in Sunday sermons because the heroes of the moment are four lepers. They were outcasts pushed outside the city, living in the leftovers of society while Samaria was under siege. Inside the walls, people were starving and hopeless. Outside the walls, these four lepers were slowly dying and forgotten. One of them finally said, “Why sit here until we die?” In other words, what do we have to lose by trying? So they got up—sick, weak, rejected—and walked toward the enemy camp. No weapons. No backup. No applause. Just motion. When they arrived, the enemy was gone. God had already scared the army away. The victory, the food, the resources—they were all there waiting. And the first ones to discover the miracle were the very people everyone else believed were worthless.

That’s the Bullshit Factor truth staring us right in the face: sometimes the miracle doesn’t show up until you move. Indiana didn’t show up to that championship based on historical credentials. They showed up because it was a new game. They walked in hungry because nobody expected them to eat. They played like a team that was tired of dying in the same story. And the thing about hunger is, it beats entitlement every single time. When you have something to prove, when your whole identity has been shoved in the “loser” category long enough, you stop caring about what people think and you start caring about what you can become.

The world loves to count you by your worst stats. They keep receipts. They bring up your failures. They assume your future will repeat your past because that’s the easiest storyline to believe. But your record doesn’t determine your purpose. Your lowest moments don’t eliminate your highest potential. Those lepers didn’t become heroes by waiting for circumstances to change—they became heroes by deciding they wouldn’t stay stuck another second. They discovered something no one else dared to go look for. The miracle wasn’t random. It was revealed to the ones who moved.

And maybe that’s the message buried beneath the cheers in Indianapolis. Maybe your life is still in the first quarter. Maybe the story’s biggest comeback hasn’t happened yet. Maybe all the losses you’ve collected, all the times you’ve been dismissed or underestimated, were actually building the kind of grit that makes impossible victories possible. Giants fall. Favorites choke. Nobodies rise. And rock bottom becomes the most dangerous launching pad in the world when someone decides they’re done letting statistics define what is or isn’t possible.

So here’s the callout. Why sit there until you die? Why keep accepting whatever label life slapped on you? Why assume the scoreboard can’t change? What if the thing you’re wishing for is already waiting—you just haven’t walked into the camp yet? Indiana didn’t win because they were favored. They won because the game was played. The lepers didn’t save a city because they were strong. They saved it because they moved. And you won’t see what God has already cleared for you until you refuse to stay where doubt left you.

The worst team winning anyway is not just a shocker. It’s a reminder. The underdog still has teeth. Your story is not finished. The world’s expectations do not own your outcome. And if you take one brave, trembling step out of the familiar and into faith, you might just find the victory was ready before you were. Go shock somebody. Including yourself.