Silver And Black Pride
Silver and Black Pride’s Mendoza Mania series is about to dive into one of the most iconic performances of the 2026 NFL draft No. 1 pick’s/new Las Vegas Raiders quarterback’s college career, as the matchup against Penn State is widely considered Fernando Mendoza’s “Heisman moment”.
This was a definition of a hard-fought win for the Hoosiers. They were on the road, gave up the lead in the fourth quarter and came back to win with a 10-play, 80-yard drive where Mendoza famously hit Omar Cooper Jr. in the back of the end zone with about 30 seconds left to give Indiana a 27-24 win.
This certainly wasn’t the Heisman Trophy winner’s most impressive stat line, going 19-for-30 (63.3% completions) with 218 yards, two touchdowns (one passing, one rushing) and an interception. However, this was a situation where the boxscore was misleading, as he tossed a season-high five “big time throws”, according to Pro Football Focus, on top of the game-winning drive mentioned above.
In full disclosure, I included clips from this game in my original Mendoza breakdown (see the related article below). To avoid repeating and duplicating information, each clip below wasn’t covered previously and the plays included in the original breakdown won’t be seen below. Unfortunately, that includes the aforementioned pass to Cooper, but a full breakdown of that play is in the related article if you’re interested.
Mendoza is great at staying calm and throwing under pressure, but he can be a little too fearless and doesn’t have a good feel for when the pressure is coming in the pocket. That showed up a few times in this game, and is one of his areas of improvement heading into the NFL.
With the ball on the hashmark, Penn State decides to blitz the corner on the short side of the field. That’s a typical pressure in this situation, especially in college with the wider hashmarks, and the defense tips the play call pre-snap by having the safety lineup directly over the corner/wide receiver. In other words, the warning signs were there, and the quarterback should anticipate that the blitz is coming.
Since the left tackle is occupied by the defensive end and the rest of the offensive line sliding to the right, the quarterback looks left initially and is responsible for either getting the ball out of his hands quickly or getting out of the pocket if the corner comes off the edge. However, Mendoza doesn’t pick up on it and starts scanning to the other side of the field. That makes him a sitting duck, and he ends up taking a sack to set up third and goal from outside of the 10-yard-line.
What’s frustrating is that this could have been a touchdown if the ball goes to the running back in the flat, since the defense was in man coverage and the linebacker had to avoid getting picked by the outside receiver (No. 7) and safety.
This next clip is the opposite, sensing pressure that isn’t...
