Christopher Columbus High assistant football coach Robert Linfors remembers when Heisman trophy-winning quarterback Fernando Mendoza was a third-stringer on the end of the bench. Though the team would go on to win a state championship back in 2019, sophomore Mendoza would only make a handful of appearances.
“Guys would get pouty, but not Fernando,” said Linfors, who now coaches running backs and is the dean of students. “He would show up to meetings with a spiral notebook and would write down every play.”
With the College National Championship set for 7:30 Monday night at Hard Rock Stadium, Mendoza is perhaps the most talked-about man in the world of college football. He now plays for the undefeated Indiana Hoosiers, who face off against coach Mario Cristobal’s Miami Hurricanes, who are the underdogs. Cristobal, too, is a Columbus alumnus.
Twenty-two-year-old Mendoza, who graduated from Christoper Columbus in 2022. He may well be the key to the game. While at high school in Miami, he was also an admired and beloved student.
Teachers, students and even members of the school newspaper think of Mendoza as a great athlete, but a humble and friendly person who was widely admired.
“He is so genuine, a great listener,” said Daniella Rodriguez, who taught Mendoza in an advanced placement psychology course. “And [he]isn’t afraid to show who he is.”
Mendoza, ironically, grew up in a house near the University of Miami with his parents, Elsa and Fernando. He has a brother who is two years younger named Alberto, who is also a quarterback at the University of Indiana. Like many at Columbus, Mendoza often talks about his Cuban roots. According to Pro Football Network, all four of his grandparents came to the United States from Cuba. Though Mendoza was born in the United States he made a relief trip at age 15.
“My grandfather and Alberto and I, we went back, we saw some cousins who had ended up staying in Cuba, and just saw the community as a whole,” Fernando told NBC Sports. “It was a very transformative experience.”
I attended Columbus High and was a year behind Mendoza. In October of his senior year, a friend threw me a 17th birthday party. Another friend who was on the football team invited Mendoza. He knocked on the door, greeted my friend’s parents, who were hosting the party, and was cordial to everyone. At the end of the night he wished me a happy birthday and talked to me for some time about school and his plans after graduation, before saying his goodbyes and leaving.
Two of my friends who attended the party have fond memories. Andrew Almaguer, who helped host the party and now attends Florida International University with me, mentioned Mendoza was friendly.
“He was so nice and easy to talk to,” said Almaguer.
Another friend, Steven Rodriguez, was also at the party and said, “That was the first time I ever spoke to him, and after that, he always said ‘what’s up?’ to me in the hallway and spoke to me between classes.”
Mendoza spent most of his sophomore year on the bench at Columbus, but he didn’t let that affect him on or off the field. He continued to believe in himself and let those around him boost him to be great. In 2020, he led Columbus to a tri-county championship, which was a playoff created for the South Florida teams that didn’t take part in the FHSAA playoffs. This was the first in the school’s history.
Coach Linfors mentioned a fond memory from Mendoza’s senior season. It was the last game of the season, and the team had just lost in the state semi-final to Venice High. Many of the seniors, including Mendoza, were emotional as they realized that their high school playing days were over. He shared a moment with his brother and father, then shortly after, with tears still streaming down his face. He thanked Linfors for all he had done for him in his years at the school.
“It was so refreshing to see that,” he said. “He’s a team player and a leader.”
Rodriguez, the A.P. psychology teacher, shared this story. Toward the end of his senior year, Mendoza committed to attending Yale, but on national signing day, the University of California at Berkeley, a slightly less prestigious school with a better football team, offered him a spot. Mendoza was stressed. She recalls that he approached her and said a phrase that now seems ironic,
“ I know I’m not gonna make it in college football,” he said.
In his time at Cal Berkeley, the college football world got its first taste of Mendoza, as he led the team to huge wins against rivals like Stanford and other conference opponents like UCLA and Oregon State.
Those at Columbus remember those three years.
“I was the moderator of our school paper, ‘The Log,’ one of my students wanted to do a story on him when he just got to Cal,” said Joseph Bussatto, a teacher at Columbus. “Fernando agreed to an interview with no questions. It just shows his willingness to always give back.”
Adds Linfors: “When Fernando came in, he was like a breath of fresh air. “He’s a team-first guy, and he showed that at Cal and he showed that here for three years.”
After his second season at Cal, Mendoza then joined his brother and coach Curt Cignetti at the University of Indiana. This was a significant move for Mendoza, as it was the one that led him to his current position.
Mendoza later credited Coach Cignetti for a great deal of his success in a speech he gave at his Heisman ceremony in New York City on December 13th, 2025, saying, “You drove me to a level I didn’t even know I had inside of me.”
Then he added, “Thank you to Coach Dunn and to Christopher Columbus High School for giving me a home, a dream to follow, and more importantly, a brotherhood. Adelante.”
