Saturday’s National Championship Media Day offered plenty of storylines, but none bigger than the hometown hero now poised to decide it.

NBC6 caught up with Indiana Hoosiers quarterback Fernando Mendoza, the Heisman Trophy winner and Christopher Columbus graduate, and if there’s one word he keeps repeating, it’s home.

Two days before the National Championship, Mendoza is back in Miami, with everything on the line.

“Brotherhood with Christopher Columbus, can’t thank the school enough, get to play in Miami in front of all my Columbus brothers,” Mendoza said.

Mendoza grew up minutes away from the University of Miami’s campus, part of a tight knit community that helped shape him long before the spotlight found him.

“It means so much to me and my brother growing up in Miami,” he said. “Being Cuban, living in Miami, my grandparents immigrated from Cuba, the American dream. It means so much to my family.”

That background now fuels one of the most unlikely runs in college football this season.

Mendoza is a 2-star recruit out of high school, and his road back to South Florida was anything but traditional.

“It doesn’t matter what star recruit you are, you gotta put the work in,” he said. “I wanna share that message with youngsters.”

The matchup brings familiar ties on both sidelines, including Miami head coach Mario Cristobal, another Christopher Columbus product, who was a high school teammate with Fernando’s father.

“Mario Cristobal has done a fantastic job,” he said. “Paved the path for Christopher Columbus football players.”

But Mendoza said this moment goes beyond any one connection.

“It’s a great honor to represent Christopher Columbus High School,” he said. “A great opportunity the Columbus community will get to experience.”

And now, with a National title at stake, it all comes down to one game.

“It’s a national championship,” he said. “I do it for my teammates, for my coaches.”

He’s rewritten every expectation placed on him. But now, on the brink of college football’s ultimate prize, the story gets its most emotional chapter yet, right here, where it all began.