Just about everything was set up for the homecoming game of all time last time at Hard Rock Stadium in beautiful downtown Miami Gardens. The conquering hero Hurricanes, the #10 and the lowest Power Four seed in the College Football Playoffs, had rolled through a juggernaut of three consecutive high-pressure games in College Station, Texas, New Orleans and Hotlanta to somehow find themselves through luck of the draw as de facto home team last time for the Championship Game. For their coach Mario Cristobal, proud Miamian who defected to Oregon just like some truly special people, it was an especially sweet return. Yes, just about everything was in order for a celebration that would caravan straight to South Beach and probably not end until spring break.
Everything except the fact they were facing what was clearly the top team in the nation, the even more unlikely Indiana Hoosiers, and their leader and heart Fernando Mendoza, already the Heisman Trophy winner, was having a homecoming of his own. And the proud 2021 alumnus of Christopher Columbus High School, a mere 19 miles from Hard Rock itself, did not disappoint. THE ATHLETIC’s Chris Branch just dropped this gushing endorsement into my and his other subscribers’ inbox:
Last night, watching Indiana’s 27-21 title win over Miami, I couldn’t get two things out of my head:
From the game itself, there is no better visual than Fernando Mendoza leaping across the goal line in the fourth quarter, on a fourth down, to essentially secure a ring. It was a gutsy call from Indiana coach Curt Cignetti to go for it up 17-14, but the play was all Mendoza, the Hoosiers’ Heisman winner from Miami, muscling through Miami players on Miami turf to cement one of the best stories in the history of sports. Extremely cool.- Zoom out, and there’s no denying this is the most incredible title in the modern history of college football, if not the entire lineage. Indiana was 3-9 in 2023 and is historically one of the worst programs in the sport. The Hoosiers hired Cignetti and, in two seasons, he’s gone 27-2 (16-0 this year!) with a national championship. There’s no hyperbole in saying it is quite literally unbelievable.
The LOS ANGELES TIMES provided a slightly less breathy and more anonymous recap :
Mendoza’s TD gave turnaround artist Curt Cignetti’s team a 10-point lead — barely enough breathing room to hold off a frenzied charge by the hard-hitting Hurricanes, who bloodied Mendoza’s lip early, then came to life late behind 112 yards and two scores from Mark Fletcher but never took the lead.
Indiana finished 16-0 — using the extra games afforded by the expanded 12-team playoff to match a perfect-season win total last compiled by Yale in 1894. In a bit of symmetry, this undefeated title comes 50 years after Bob Knight’s basketball team went 32-0 to win it all in that state’s favorite sport.
Seeking more hyperbole? Branch’s colleague Christopher Kamrani had a cornucopia of thoughts of his own:
- While Millennials and Gen Z-ers continue to flood social media accounts about how much they miss 2016 for some reason, where’s the love for 1996? That was the last time a program won a national championship for the first time when The Head Ball Coach™ led Florida to its first title. Until Monday. Thirty years later, Indiana became the first first-time champion since Steve Spurrier’s Gators were crowned.
- Remember when college football was in the throes of an existential crisis (which one? LOL) about what the subjectivity of the preseason Associated Press poll means? That was several years ago. Back in August. Well, the Hoosiers debuted at No. 20 in the preseason poll. The only national champion since 1990 that started lower was Auburn in 2010, when the Tigers came in ranked No. 22.
(O)nce upon a time, the Indiana superstar quarterback was an undervalued commodity in the highly subjective world of high school recruiting rankings. Mendoza… was ranked the 2,149th player in the country in the 247Sports Composite. It’s not an exact science, but man, you’re telling us there were 2,148 players better than this dude?- This was only the third time since 1945 — 1988 (12.5) and 2024 (25.6) — that IU beat its opponents by an average of at least 10 points per game. The Hoosiers won 12 of 16 games by at least 10 points this season, including three of their four largest wins against ranked teams ever.
- Cignetti went 27-2 in his first two years at Indiana. The only other coach in the modern era who came close to starting off that spectacularly was Urban Meyer at Ohio State when the Buckeyes went 24-2 in his first two seasons there. But, like, you know who didn’t go 27-2 in their first two years at schools they developed into title contenders? Nick Saban (19-8 at Alabama). Kirby Smart (21-7 at Georgia). Jimbo Fisher (19-8 at FSU). Dabo Swinney (15-12 at Clemson).
Given all of that, the fact that the ‘Canes were able to get three scores and actually have a chance to win before a last-minute Carson Beck interception ended that dream should be seen as at least a moral victory. But this is South freaking Florida, and we all know only true winners get to enjoy the spoils. You know who you are. And yep, Fernando Mendoza’s on top of that A-list now, too.
Until next time…