Through Unwavering Faith, Fernando Mendoza Brings His Decorated College Career Home

Christmas is a busy time for Catholic priests, with Masses spread across Dec. 24 and 25. But a Christmas Eve text received by Father Patrick Hyde of Saint Paul Church, on the Indiana University campus, prompted him to hit pause.

Are you available? I’d like to bring over the Heisman.

“When someone offers to bring the Heisman Trophy by,” Hyde says, “you clear the schedule.”

Fernando Mendoza, a Saint Paul parishioner since enrolling at Indiana last winter, said after winning the Heisman that he would bring the trophy to the priests who he’d gotten to know quite well. Mendoza and teammate Charlie Becker attend Mass together, came in for prayer sessions on the Fridays before home games and went to breakfast with Father Ben Keller. They were immersed in the parish community.

Still, Hyde chalked up the proposed Heisman visitation as a well-intentioned gesture that might not actually play out.

“It’s not like he would have been marked absent,” Hyde says. “No one would have thought twice if he didn’t. But he wanted to share something special with the priests who had blessed him.”

Hyde and Keller have been on tour with the Hoosiers throughout the postseason, from the Big Ten championship game to the Rose Bowl to the Peach Bowl to the finale Monday, the College Football Playoff national championship game against Miami. They’re the most conspicuous fans in every stadium, wearing their white Dominican habits, just two more members of the exponentially growing Fernando Mendoza Fan Club.

“The only reason I’ve gotten to this point is because there’s so many different people helping me in my journey, and [the Saint Paul priests] have been one,” Mendoza says. “They’ve done so much to help me, whether it’s confession or just to be able to talk or just Mass every Sunday. So I really give a lot that I have accomplished this season to the Lord, and we give thanks to God.”

Mendoza’s earnest, articulate wholesomeness has been as captivating as his quarterback play. The more America gets to know him, the more it swoons over him.

He’s smart, graduating with a business degree from Cal in three years. He’s tall, handsome, athletic, rich—and soon to be richer as an NFL first-round draft pick. An admitted people pleaser, he’s unfailingly polite. Teammates struggle to find faults, settling on the minor sin of leaving delivery boxes in the living room of the apartment he shares with Becker and his younger brother, Alberto. (“But my room is OCD tidy,” Fernando notes.)

His passionate, emotional Heisman acceptance speech sufficiently moved Kentucky-based thoroughbred executive Tom Ryan, managing partner of SF Bloodstock and SF Racing, to name a racehorse Mendoza. The regally bred 2-year-old, under the care of mega-trainer Bob Baffert, could be one to watch on the Triple Crown campaign trail a year from now if he stays healthy.

Indiana quarterback Fernando Mendoza | Kevin D. Liles/Sports Illustrated

Fernando’s speech included mentions of his Cuban heritage and a tearful ode to his mother, Elsa, who has multiple sclerosis. That, plus everything else, has an older generation declaring him to be perfect marriage material for their children or grandchildren.

He’s so popular that even one prominent Miami fan is questioning her loyalties to The U. Lourdes Le Batard, the Cuban-born mother of broadcast personality Dan Le Batard, said on The Dan Le Batard Show last week that she was rooting for the hometown kid (Mendoza) over the hometown team (the Hurricanes). Dan, a Miami graduate and unabashed Canes supporter, was apoplectic.

It made for great television, even if it wasn’t completely serious.

“I want Miami to win,” Lourdes clarifies. “But I want Fernando to do well. He’s a polite person. He has feelings. He’s a great person for children to look up to—we haven’t had many of those lately. He’s humble. He’s the biggest thing in his sport and he never says, ‘I’m so great.’ ”

The fact that Mendoza has become the biggest thing in his sport is a stunning turn of events, considering how little college football wanted to do with him five years ago. His Miami journey has come full circle, leaving his home city as a nobody and returning for his final college game as the face of the most unlikely 15–0 team in history.

It was January 2022, and Cal was scrambling for a quarterback. The Golden Bears had landed Purdue transfer Jack Plummer as their starter for the ’22 season, but didn’t have a freshman QB in the signing class after a late decommitment. There were just a couple of weeks left before the second and final national signing day on Feb. 1.

One day, Cal offensive coordinator and quarterback coach Bill Musgrave got a call from an old friend in the business, David Lee. After a 45-year coaching career, Lee had retired in South Florida and was working part-time with some quarterbacks. He wanted Musgrave to know about a lanky kid with a live arm named Fernando Mendoza, who was committed to Yale but wanted to play power-conference football. For some reason, Lee said, nobody at that level was recruiting him.

“We’re scraping around, trying to get to six wins and go to a bowl,” Musgrave says. “If someone I trust calls me about a quarterback, I’m interested.”

Musgrave started watching Mendoza’s film from Christopher Columbus High School and liked what he saw. He went to Cal head coach Justin Wilcox and suggested that the Bears initiate the recruiting process.

“We’ve got a lot of quarterbacks in California,” Musgrave says Wilcox told him. “There are a lot of quarterbacks in Texas and other places. We’re going to fly over all those QBs to recruit one from Miami?”

But Wilcox went along with Musgrave’s wishes, and by the end of the month Mendoza was on a campus visit. When he got back to Miami, he decommitted from Yale and signed with Cal.

“I’m not saying he couldn’t make the NFL out of Yale,” Musgrave says. “He could be Ryan Fitzpatrick [who went to Harvard and had a long NFL career]. But if he goes to Yale, he’s not the Heisman Trophy winner and he’s not playing Monday night.”

Fernando Mendoza looks to throw during a game for Cal. — Fernando Mendoza played two seasons at Cal, racking up 4,712 yards and 30 touchdowns. This season at Indiana, he has thrown for 3,349 yards and 41 TDs. | Darren Yamashita-Imagn Images

In retrospect, it’s mind-boggling that the nation whiffed on Mendoza as a prospect. He recalled crying on his bed over the lack of interest from major programs, with Elsa insisting that something would work out.

He was the No. 134-rated QB in the 2022 class, with decent but not overwhelming stats while surrounded by high-level talent at Columbus High. And his passing mechanics needed work.

“He had a pretty elongated, raw throwing motion,” says John Garcia, a longtime recruiting analyst based in South Florida. “I think that slowed down his recruitment. Everyone was always glowing about him as a person, so you figured someone would take a chance on him. You were rooting for him to succeed, but you could see why the SEC and ACC schools were a little slow on him.”

Among those who passed: Miami. Mendoza wore green-and-orange face paint to Hurricanes games. He went to Hurricanes football camps when Manny Diaz was the head coach. His high school was five minutes from the Miami campus. The U ignored him, not even offering a preferred walk-on spot.

“That kind of pissed him off,” Garcia says.

A prophet without honor in his home land, Mendoza traded coasts. He was buried on the depth chart as a freshman and redshirted, but Musgrave liked what he saw when Mendoza got opportunities in practice. At the end of scrimmages, Cal gave a few plays to the freshmen, ending with a fourth-down play from the 9-yard line—one play to get the ball in the end zone. If the offense scored, the defense did push-ups. If the defense held, the offense did push-ups.

“Two or three times in a row, Fernando would make a play and the defense would do push-ups,” Musgrave recalls. “He had an uncanny ability to come through in the clutch.”

After that season, Musgrave returned to the NFL ranks and Jake Spavital was hired as Cal’s offensive coordinator. Mendoza again started the season on the bench, running third string behind Ben Finley and Sam Jackson V. By the fifth game, Wilcox tabbed him to start. That began a run of 19 straight starts for Cal, capped by a three-touchdown, 324-yard total offense performance in a rivalry triumph over Stanford.

When Mendoza hit the transfer market after the 2024 season, he was in demand—Miami actually was interested the second time around, among other programs. But Indiana jumped in early and with vigor, selling Fernando on the opportunity to play with his brother and continue developing toward pro readiness.

On Christmas Eve, Mendoza committed to the Hoosiers. Exactly one year later, he was at Saint Paul with the Heisman Trophy.

Hoosiers quarterback Fernando Mendoza smiles during CFP media day. — Hoosiers quarterback Fernando Mendoza, a once-overlooked QB who has transformed his abundant charisma into tangible leadership, found his ultimate counterpart in coach Curt Cignetti, a once-overlooked coach doing the best work of his life. | Grace Hollars/IndyStar / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

Transforming Mendoza from good to great was the challenge for the Indiana brain trust: quarterbacks coach Chandler Whitmer, offensive coordinator Mike Shanahan and head coach Curt Cignetti. They had proof of concept on their side—the last three starting quarterbacks they’d taken in the transfer portal all blossomed.

At Indiana, Kurtis Rourke saw his pass efficiency rating jump to 176 in 2024 from 132 the previous season at Ohio. At James Madison, Jordan McCloud improved his rating 50 points in ’23 and Todd Centeio improved 36 points in ’22. If Mendoza made a similar leap from the 145 rating he posted in his final season at Cal, Indiana would have something special.

Mendoza worked at integrating himself into his new team, learning everyone’s name within days. He rounded up receivers for early morning throwing sessions. Whitmer, who had watched all of his Cal video, gave him pointers to improve his mechanics.

But Mendoza began spring practice by trying too hard. Ever the high-achieving people pleaser, he wanted to win everyone over and justify Indiana’s financial investment (a reported $2 million).

“He was putting a little too much pressure on himself,” Whitmer says. “He was hired a little high-strung to start. And it was like, ‘Well, you’re going to make mistakes. You’re still human. We’re going to limit how many they are, but they’re going to happen.’ ”

Even in the season opener against Old Dominion, Mendoza says he was “trying to be Superman” and struggled. His efficiency rating of 110 was the second lowest of his college career. But hard work and good coaching helped him turn the corner—his happy feet calmed down, and his sharp mind slowed down. Mendoza threw 14 touchdown passes with zero interceptions in the next three games, and the Hoosiers took off.

“His preparation just helps him to be more comfortable,” Whitmer says. “When you know where to go with the ball and you have a plan, it helps you play free and confident. And his willingness to get better is a big part of it. He won the Heisman and he’s still asking, ‘Help me get better.’ ”

It’s nearly impossible to do better than he has in two playoff games. He’s completed 31 out of 36 passes for 369 yards, with eight touchdowns and no interceptions. Those masterpiece passing performances against Alabama and Oregon have boosted his efficiency rating to 187.96, which leads the nation and is the highest by any FBS quarterback since Jayden Daniels in 2023.

Along the way, he has become the ebullient co-star to Cignetti’s stone-faced leading role. It’s quite a buddy flick the two have put together—a once-overlooked coach doing the best work of his life alongside a once-overlooked QB who has transformed his abundant charisma into tangible leadership.

“I saw how one guy could kind of bring a team together,” Cignetti says. “You can have close, tight teams, but this team here is extremely close. He was the glue sealing the open edges and cracks, probably to a degree I had never seen before.”

The white-robed Father Patrick will be in Hard Rock Stadium for one more game with this undefeated team, one more chance to see the quarterback he has befriended wearing crimson and cream. The pastor of St. Paul has been at Indiana for a decade, witnessing a lot of losing football. He calls the last two seasons under Cignetti “one kind of catharsis after another, a total renewal of school spirit.”

Indiana quarterback Fernando Mendoza throws the ball against Oregon in the CFP semifinal. — Fernando Mendoza has a contingent of fans who he has stayed true to during his time at Indiana: the Saint Paul Church. | Kevin D. Liles/Sports Illustrated

Beating Ohio State for the Big Ten title was a breakthrough few could have imagined. Following that up with the beatdown of Alabama in Pasadena—a dizzying combination of opponent and setting—strained the limits of belief.

“The Rose Bowl,” he says, “was a resurrection moment.”

The flourishing of Fernando Mendoza, proudly, publicly Catholic, has added a deeper layer to it all.

“He’s inspiring young people to make their faith a normal part of their life,” Hyde says. “When I was growing up, being outwardly religious was a threat to your popularity. For young people to see someone with his popularity being outspoken about it, so can they. The authenticity of his faith and his gratitude are really remarkable.”