Fernando Mendoza and his Indiana offensive teammates took the field with an undefeated season on the line, a four-point deficit, 80 yards to go, 111 seconds to get there, no timeouts and 100,000 people screaming their lungs out.
On the first play, Mendoza was sacked. It got louder. It got more desperate. The clock ticked.
And then the junior quarterback did what he has done repeatedly this season. He locked in, rose up and delivered. The Drive of the Year in college football was a Heisman Trophy–quality display of poise, accuracy and grit—with the Catch of the Year at the end by receiver Omar Cooper Jr.
These are the moments legendary seasons are made of.
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Regrouping from the sack, Mendoza threw a strike over the middle to Cooper for 22 yards, then spiked the ball to stop the clock. He fired a bullet outside to E.J. Williams Jr. He took a deep shot to Cooper that was incomplete, then came back with a rifle down the seam to tight end Riley Nowakowski for 29 yards.
At that point, the chances of a winning score began to seem real. Wideout Charlie Becker, a backup who was seeing playing time due to the injury to standout Elijah Sarratt, made a leaping, foot-down grab at the Penn State 7.
After that, the Nittany Lions ordered up all-out blitzes, bodies flying at Mendoza. He was fortunate to even unload the ball for a pair of incompletions to bring up third-and-goal.
Once again, Penn State brought the house. Mendoza lobbed a pass to the middle of the field and the back of the end zone for Cooper, who rose to astonishing height to pull it in with defensive back Zakee Wheatley underneath him. At that height, and with his momentum carrying him out of the end zone, there seemed to be no way he could get a foot down.
Replay review confirmed that Cooper did it. Somehow. Touchdown. It defied physiology and belief.
The No. 2-ranked Hoosiers won, 27–24, protecting their College Football Playoff positioning. And after a full day of top-volume overreacting, Fox Sports announcer Gus Johnson nearly expired on the play.
Cooper’s catch was an athletic play for the ages. It will live on in the minds of Indiana fans whose memories are crowded with basketball highlights but not many on the gridiron—at least not until Curt Cignetti swaggered into town in late 2023. Indiana is a jaw-dropping 21–2 under Cignetti, whose told-ya-so confidence has made him a hero of outsized proportions in the state.
But even Cig seemed a little overwhelmed by this one.
“You know what, this was an unbelievable win,” the 64-year-old Cignetti told Fox Sports’s Jenny Taft on the field immediately afterward, his voice quavering with emotion. “I’ve seen a lot of stuff in my days? I’ve never seen nothing like this.
“We’re lucky to win. But I am so proud of these kids.”
For Mendoza and Cooper, the last drive was a demonstration of perseverance after making significant miscues earlier in the game. Cooper, a redshirt junior from Indianapolis who is one of a handful of Tom Allen recruits who stuck around and has thrived under Cignetti, had a perfect Mendoza pass in the end zone skip off his fingertips earlier in the game, leading to an Indiana field goal in the second quarter. For a guy who has excelled at making difficult catches all season, it was a surprising miss.
“That’s my fault,” Cooper told Mendoza after the play.
Then in the fourth quarter, with a 20–7 Indiana lead down to 20–17, Mendoza was late with a throw to the sideline that was intercepted. Seven plays later, the Nittany Lions scored to take the lead and put the weight of the world on the Hoosiers.
“That’s on me,” Mendoza said. “The team showed belief.”
Here’s the thing about the California transfer—when he throws a pick, you see his best come out. On the road. In the fourth quarter.
In a tie game at Iowa, Mendoza threw one to the Hawkeyes to end a drive. Next time he got his hands on the ball, he completed a 24-yard pass to Cooper and then hit Sarratt over the middle for a 49-yard touchdown that won the game.
At Oregon, Mendoza threw a crossing route off his back foot that was undercut by a Ducks defensive back and returned for the tying touchdown. With Autzen Stadium fully activated, Mendoza blocked it out and immediately led a 75-yard drive for the go-ahead score. He was 6 of 8 on the drive.
Now this. At 10–0, he’s delivered the Hoosiers to the cusp of a playoff bid, with games remaining against Wisconsin (2–6 entering the day) and Purdue (2–8).
Mendoza didn’t have his best game at Penn State—he was 19 of 30 for 218 yards with the one TD and one interception, also running for a score. He came into the game second in the nation in pass efficiency, but will lose some ground after this.
So what. When everything was on the line, a guy who was the No. 134-ranked quarterback nationally in the high school class of 2022 delivered a Heisman moment. See you in New York in mid-December, Fernando.
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