Heisman Trophy favorite Fernando Mendoza was a redshirt freshman and Cal’s third-string quarterback at the start of the 2023 season when he walked into the office of tight ends coach Tim Plough.
“Would you be willing to meet with me?” Mendoza asked. “Would you be willing to teach me the offense and talk to me about quarterback play, go through the game plan with me?”
Mendoza knew that Plough had spent virtually the entirety of his career as an offensive coordinator or quarterbacks coach.
“He has this insatiable desire to be a great player. And when you’re the third-string guy, you’re not getting a lot of one-on-one time with the quarterback coach or the OC,” Plough said this week. “So he was kind of looking for some guidance, some mentorship.”
Thus began what tutor and pupil labeled the Midnight Meetings. For the rest of the season, Mendoza arrived at Plough’s office nightly at 9 p.m. and the two spent as many as three hours watching film, talking fundamentals and mechanics of the position and studying that week’s game plan.
Even though Mendoza had no shot yet at getting onto the field.
Two years later, Mendoza now leads the nation with 33 touchdown passes as Indiana’s star transfer. He helped the unbeaten Hoosiers to a No. 1 ranking and the top seed in the College Football Playoff.
The Miami native is now the face of Indiana football, but his college foundation was laid in Berkeley after Cal gave him his only FBS scholarship offer. The Golden Bears have gotten no closer to the Heisman than running back Chuck Muncie’s runner-up finish 50 years ago in 1975.
In a way, that will change on Saturday evening if Mendoza — who graduated in three years from Cal’s Haas School of Business — strikes the Heisman pose.
Former Cal running backs coach Aristotle Thompson, now at Northwestern, believes Old Blues should celebrate Mendoza as one of their own.
“If you’re a Cal alum, you should be extremely proud,” Thompson said. “Fernando Mendoza is a Cal graduate. He’s always going to be a Cal Bear.”
Tight end Jack Endries, who was Mendoza’s favorite target last season at Cal before transferring to Texas, said changing addresses didn’t change how his ex-teammate feels about Berkeley.
“He’s a Cal fan. To this day, we still talk about everything and all the changes,” Endries said, referring to the Bears firing their coach Justin Wilcox and hiring alum Tosh Lupoi. “I’m hoping he wins it. He’s the guy.”
No longer teammates, the two talk on the phone multiple times each week and are such close friends that Mendoza invited Endries to attend the Heisman Trophy ceremony in New York City. Unfortunately, the Longhorns’ preparations to face Michigan in the Citrus Bowl prevent him from being there for his pal.
Endries stressed that Plough and Thompson “were definitely his two biggest role models.”
Plough is now the head coach at UC Davis (9-3) and has his alma mater set to host Illinois State (10-4) on Saturday in the quarterfinals of the FCS playoffs. He spent just the one season at Cal and it remains special to him.
When neither Sam Jackson nor Ben Finley caught fire at quarterback over the Bears’ first five games in 2023, Mendoza was given the starting job in Week 6 against No. 15 Oregon State. The Bears lost, but Mendoza threw his first two touchdown passes and the offense produced 40 points.
“Once he was named the starter, I figured he was going to start meeting with the OC,” Plough said. “Then he came back that next night: ‘We’re going to meet still, right?’”
Mendoza also spent time in Thompson’s running backs room, looking for tips on how to be more effective with his legs.
“He’s a competitor. He’s not afraid,” Thompson said. “You don’t have to be the fastest guy out there. You don’t have to be Michael Vick to move the chains.”
Mendoza started 20 games for Cal, twice beating rival Stanford and helping the Bears into bowl games each year (although he entered the transfer portal last year before Cal played UNLV at the LA Bowl).
He showed a strong arm and accuracy, passing for 4,712 yards and 30 touchdowns over two seasons despite playing behind an offensive line that allowed 49 sacks last season.
Beyond the numbers, Plough was sold on Mendoza as a leader.
“He had something that the rare quarterbacks have. You realize that the only way you’re going to be great is if you make your teammates great,” Plough said. “He was making the guys around him better. Everyone’s level of play rose.”
When the 2023 regular season ended, offensive coordinator and QBs coach Jake Spavital left for the same job at Baylor and Plough accepted the head coaching job at Davis.
Both Mendoza and Wilcox asked Plough to stay on through the Bears’ matchup with Texas Tech in the Dec. 16 Independence Bowl.
“I decided to stay and delay my move to Davis because I loved Fernando and wanted to help him,” Plough said.
Fast forward two years and Plough can still see what he calls Mendoza’s “rage to master” the quarterback position. He’s not the least bit surprised by anything Mendoza has achieved.
The Heisman Trophy will be presented sometime during the second half of Davis’ playoff game on Saturday, so Plough will be busy. But his three sons, ages 5, 7 and 10, already have cast their vote for the guy they got to know during dinners at the house.
“They’ll be wearing their Fernando jerseys like they do every Saturday,” Plough said.
