MIAMI, Fla. — Final month, simply minutes after Indiana beat Ohio State for its first Large Ten championship in 57 years, Hoosiers quarterback Fernando Mendoza couldn’t maintain in his feelings. He needed to let free.
“The Hoosiers are flippin’ champs!” he instructed Fox Sports activities’ Jenny Taft, earlier than crediting each place group on the group and explaining how the group is “process-oriented.”
Flippin’? Course of-oriented?
“THE HOOSIERS ARE FLIPPIN’ CHAMPS!” 🗣️@IndianaFootball QB Fernando Mendoza was with @JennyTaft after profitable the @bigten championship ‼️ pic.twitter.com/qNJBmXCSfW
— FOX Faculty Soccer (@CFBONFOX) December 7, 2025
For greater than a 12 months, Mendoza’s postgame interviews have drawn love and a spotlight for his or her distinctive supply and excellent grammar and prose.
Mendoza speaks like a coach or politician — perhaps higher — laying every thing out, typically trying into the digicam whereas delivering a solution. He has dropped phrases like “migration” and “conglomerate” in interviews over the previous month. In a world the place athletes are educated to say as little as attainable for concern of going viral in a foul manner, Mendoza appears to all the time ship one thing.
“Folks may assume it’s pretend, nevertheless it’s 100% him,” stated Alberto Mendoza, Fernando’s brother and fellow Indiana quarterback.
Mendoza first went viral final 12 months, because the quarterback at Cal, when he instructed ACC Community after a late landing drive to beat Stanford, “I’ll bear in mind going 98 yards with my boys.” That line landed on T-shirts, however Mendoza’s near-tears proclamation that Cal was 6-6 and would go to a bowl recreation helped the clip resonate with faculty soccer diehards. It’s nearly not possible to get a foul quote out of him.
“He’s unbelievable,” head coach Curt Cignetti stated. “I take notes.”
“THAT WAS AN AMAZING COMEBACK … I LOVE MY BOYS … GO BEARS FOREVER!”
Fernando Mendoza overcome with emotion after his game-winning drive vs. Stanford 🥹@CalFootball | @qb_fernando pic.twitter.com/yYZvGQDhPY
— ACC Community (@accnetwork) November 24, 2024
Folks from Indiana, Cal and Mendoza’s advertising and marketing company agree that it’s simply Mendoza’s pure persona. The one media coaching notes he ever acquired from them was to shorten his solutions. He didn’t have to name-drop each teammate.
“It’s tremendously as a consequence of our mother and father,” stated Alberto, who speaks with the identical confidence and cadence as his older brother. “They taught us methods to communicate to individuals, methods to carry ourselves, methods to act in knowledgeable method.”
Like solely he can, Fernando on Saturday referred to their 14-year-old brother Max as “an awesome businessman and particular person.”
His use of “flippin’” in Indianapolis was genuine, too. There is no such thing as a cursing from Fernando, even in non-public.
“He’ll be like ‘gosh darn it’ when he will get scored on in (video video games),” stated Indiana receiver and roommate Charlie Becker, whom Mendoza known as “such a younger man” in his on-field interview after beating Ohio State.
The quarterback’s supply isn’t any accident. Mendoza stated at Saturday’s nationwide championship media day that he took public talking lessons in highschool and at Cal, and he watched YouTube movies about public talking.
These research, alongside together with his now-famous LinkedIn web page, got here from a want to enhance how he introduced himself for a life after soccer — lengthy earlier than he was a Heisman Trophy winner and presumed No. 1 NFL Draft choose. He’s conscious individuals say he talks like ChatGPT. He guarantees he’s an actual one who does regular issues.
“Such an necessary half is communication,” Mendoza stated. “That’s how you actually get your self throughout the road. That’s how you actually painting your self and provides an excellent impression to a different particular person. That’s one thing I might suggest to anyone, particularly any younger sports activities athlete, is the way in which that you simply symbolize your self and the way in which that you simply’re capable of come throughout to your friends, to your coaches and to, later, possession, it’s so necessary in your journey.”
Way back to his first press conferences because the beginning quarterback at Cal, Mendoza would look into the digicam whereas delivering solutions. His Heisman Trophy acceptance speech final month, through which he acquired emotional speaking about his mom and motivated ignored gamers to consider in themselves, drew widespread reward.
Fernando Mendoza after profitable Heisman:
“I need each child on the market who feels ignored, underestimated to know, I used to be you… You do not want probably the most stars, hype… You simply want self-discipline, coronary heart, and individuals who consider in you. And it’s essential consider in your personal talents.” https://t.co/S7I1RuA7dN pic.twitter.com/Vrekz6mPMX
— Terrible Asserting (@awfulannouncing) December 14, 2025
For nearly an hour on Saturday, Mendoza took each query, good and not-so-good, in stride. There wasn’t a single wasted reply, as he tried to present every reporter what they have been in search of.
“He desires to make a private reference to everybody,” stated Greg Campbell, Indiana’s assistant athletic director for strategic communication. “That’s distinctive in quite a lot of methods for any stroll of life. He desires individuals to really feel like, whenever you ask him a query, he’s answering your query and never answering it for anyone else. He’s so personable and simple to love and work with.”
Mendoza has performed the optimistic counter to his head coach Cignetti, who appears to love leaning into his personal curmudgeonly narrative. Cignetti will hardly ever crack a smile. It’s exhausting to seek out Mendoza not smiling. They’re the yin and yang of emotional leaders who take the Hoosiers into Monday’s nationwide championship. If Indiana wins its first title at school historical past, the world will await Mendoza’s subsequent postgame message.
“He doesn’t say lots within the constructing or on the apply subject. He’s not a vocal man,” Cignetti stated. “The place you get a full style of Fernando Mendoza is through the interview course of.
“And it’s all the time an A-plus interview.”
