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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tIndiana quarterback Fernando Mendoza holds the trophy after their win against Miami in the College Football Playoff national championship game, Monday, Jan. 19, 2026, in Miami Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo\/Marta Lavandier)<\/p>\n
The latest award ceremony for Mendoza, the transfer from Cal who grew up a few miles from Miami\u2019s campus, came exactly four weeks after Indiana won its first national championship 27-21 over the Hurricanes in their home stadium. It was also a week before the NFL combine, and just over two months from the opening night of the NFL draft on April 23, when Mendoza very well could be the No. 1 overall pick by the Las Vegas Raiders and their new coach.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019d be blessed and honored to play for the Raiders, or I\u2019d be blessed to play for any team. Any NFL team that drafts me, I\u2019d be ecstatic,\u201d he said. \u201cI know at the draft, I\u2019ll probably shed a tear or two just because it\u2019s such a full-circle moment for me. \u2026 The goal of transferring to Indiana was to make the NFL. It wasn\u2019t to be a great college player. It was to try to develop into being an NFL quarterback one day.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mendoza threw for 3,535 yards and an FBS-leading 41 touchdowns while completing 273 of 379 passes (72%) with only six interceptions. He had 4,712 yards passing and 30 TDs in 20 games over two seasons at Cal, which gave him a late scholarship offer after he had been prepared out of high school to \u201cput myself into student debt\u201d to play football at Yale \u2014 since no athletic scholarships are offered in the Ivy League \u2014 because he loved the game so much.<\/p>\n
Now the 22-year-old QB is preparing to move on to the highest level, knowing that college success won\u2019t automatically translate to the pros.<\/p>\n
\u201cCollege is great, but that part\u2019s behind me,\u201d he said. \u201cI feel like I\u2019ve been satisfied with my college career. However, now I\u2019m on to the NFL career. It requires a new skill set. It\u2019s a grown man\u2019s league.\u201d<\/p>\n
His Heisman Trophy<\/p>\n
When Mendoza accepted the Heisman Trophy in December, his intention was to keep the trophy in Bloomington forever, where he felt it belonged.<\/p>\n
It wasn\u2019t until a couple of weeks later, when the Heisman Trophy was in a case on the Indiana campus, that he realized he also got one of his own to keep.<\/p>\n
\u201cThen I took it back home, and so it\u2019s in my living room, which is great,\u201d he said. \u201cThink about that decoration.\u201d<\/p>\n
He even took his trophy to St. Paul Catholic Center in Bloomington, where he regularly attended Mass, to share with the church leaders around Christmas. He also hopes to take the trophy to his high school in Miami.<\/p>\n
Mendoza\u2019s heir apparent<\/p>\n
The ceremony for the Davey O\u2019Brien Award, named for the former TCU quarterback and 1938 Heisman winner, is held only a few miles from the TCU campus. That is also where the quarterback who likely will replace Mendoza was a starter the past three seasons.<\/p>\n
Josh Hoover threw for 9,629 yards and 71 touchdowns over 36 games for the Horned Frogs before leaving in the portal for Indiana even before the national championship game.<\/p>\n
Mendoza said he hadn\u2019t had the opportunity to speak with Hoover, and said any advice he would have for his successor would be given in person.<\/p>\n
___<\/p>\n
Get poll alerts and updates on the AP Top 25 throughout the season. Sign up here. AP college football: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/ap-top-25-college-football-poll and https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/college-football<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) \u2014 Heisman Trophy winner Fernando Mendoza is now starting to shift his mindset toward…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":479719,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[436],"tags":[49,48,514,82],"class_list":["post-479718","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nfl","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-nfl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/479718","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=479718"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/479718\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/479719"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=479718"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=479718"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=479718"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}