Should Cal Get Partial Credit If Fernando Mendoza Wins the Heisman?

After guiding unbeaten and now No. 3-ranked Indiana to the game-winning touchdown in Saturday’s 30-20 victory over then-No. 3 Oregon in Eugene, Oregon, Fernando Mendoza is now among three players leading the pack in the race for the Heisman Trophy.

But how much should his time at Cal be credited with his unlikely rise to Heisman contender if he should win the award?

Afterall, he would not have been in position for stardom if Cal had not come along late in the recruiting process and offered him a scholarship out of his high school in Miami. He probably would have been at Yale if Cal has not come along at the last minute to become the only Power 4 conference team to offer him a scholarship.

And he spent three seasons ain Berkeley and even got his college degree from Cal while developing into a pro prospect and a quarterback that the elite college football programs wanted.

In his first season at Cal, when Mendoza worked with the scout team while redshirting the season, Cal’s offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach was Bill Musgrave, who was an offensive coordinator and/or quarterback coach for 11 NFL teams, including his current position as the Cleveland Browns quarterbacks coach.

In his redshirt freshman season in Berkeley, Mendoza became the Bears starting quarterback midway through the 2023 season, when Jake Spavital was Cal’s offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach. Spavital had been a quarterbacks coach and offensive coordinator at West Virginia and Texas A&M and is now the offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach at Baylor, whose quarterback, Sawyer Robinson, leads the nation in passing yards and touchdown passes (19) this season.

Last season, when Mendoza started all of Cal’s regular-season games, the Bears quarterback coach was Sterlin Gilbert, who had been the offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach at Texas, Syracuse, South Florida and Tulsa before coming to Berkeley.

We can assume Mendoza learned something about how to play quarterback at a high level from some of those folks.

Mendoza then announced on December 11, one day after Cal officially hired Bryan Harsin as its next offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach, that he would be entering the transfer portal. He chose Indiana, which had played in the College Football Playoff the previous season under Curt Cignetti and offered Mendoza an opportunity to increase his chances to be an NFL quarterback.

Now Mendoza is considered a possible early, first-round pick in the 2026 NFL draft. But before that he has become a strong contender for Heisman trophy. Alabama quarterback Ty Simpson and Miami quarterback Carson Beck are virtually tied for the lead in the Heisman race according to most betting sites.

However, Mendoza is a close third, with no one else near those three at the moment. Of course, the Heisman race gets reshuffled every week, and a lot can happen before the trophy is awarded.

But Mendoza’s numbers are as impressive as anyone’s at the moment.

He is currently fourth in the nation in both passer rating and touchdown passes (17) with just two interceptions. And his most impressive showing came on Saturday on the national stage, when he threw a perfectly timed, perfectly placed back-shoulder touchdown pass in the fourth quarter that put Indiana ahead for good.

Game on the line? Find Elijah Sarratt✅pic.twitter.com/9RR3mcGWmd
— PFF College (@PFF_College) October 11, 2025

For Cal fans that 75-yard drive was reminiscent of the Bears' Mendoza-led 98-yard touchdown drive at the end of the game against Stanford last year, giving Cal its fourth straight Big Game victory.

However, this time Mendoza did it while the nation was watching at intimidating Autzen Stadium, where the Ducks had won 18 consecutive games before the Hoosiers ended that run on Saturday.

It put Mendoza squarely in the Heisman race.

Five of the past six quarterbacks who have won the Heisman Trophy were transfers, but only Jayden Daniels followed a path similar to Mendoza’s.

Oklahoma’s Baker Mayfield (2017 Heisman winner), Oklahoma’s Kyler Murray (2018) and USC’s Caleb Williams (2019) had spent only one year at their first college before transferring to the school that made them a Heisman winner. Joe Burrow spent three years at Ohio State but he redshirted his first year and was a backup in the other two seasons before becoming a star at LSU.

Daniels had been a three-year starter at Arizona State, but his transfer to LSU occurred when the ASU program was under investigation for possible NCAA violations that led to a number of assistant coaches resigning and the eventual dismissal of head coach Herm Edwards the following September.

You don’t hear much about any contributions the Arizona State program had on Daniels winning the 2023 Heisman Trophy, being the second overall pick in the 2024 NFL draft and becoming an instant success as the Washington Commanders quarterback.

And you might not hear much about the influence Cal’s program and coaches had on Mendoza if he follows the same path to the Heisman.

But maybe you should.

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