The team opened the year as 100-1 underdogs, and didn't lose a game all season. Hats off to the Indiana Hoosiers!
MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. – By now you know the Indiana Hoosiers are national champions after their 27-21 victory over Miami on Monday, Jan. 19 Hoosier nation turned out in droves, clearly turning Hard Rock Stadium – Miami’s home field – into a majority red color.
The favored Hoosiers relied on their defense the entire first half, leading 10-0 but the game turned when Hurricanes running back Mark Fletcher Jr. exploded for a 57-yard touchdown cutting the deficit to 10-7. Momentum shifted again when Indiana’s Mikail Kamara blocked a punt which was recovered in the end zone for a touchdown and a 17-7 lead.
Then the fourth quarter turned this conservative methodical game into a college football classic.
Miami started it by driving 81 yards in 10 plays to make it 17-14 on another Fletcher touchdown. Indiana drove 63 yards and faced a fourth-and-five from the 12 yard line. Coach Curt Cignetti called timeout, electing to pass up the easy field goal and try for a first down. What followed was Heisman winner Fernando Mendoza running a quarterback draw, cutting over a Miami would-be tackler, getting a blindside hit by another Miami player and composing himself just shy of the end zone to jump with two hands on the ball and break the plane for a touchdown! It was a spectacular run, which because of the moment and the player will be forever remembered and instantly immersed into Indiana folklore! It was over, right? Far from it.
Every time it looked like one play would end the game, Miami made a defensive stop or converted a first down. The resilient Canes drove 91 yards in eight plays and scored on a 22-yard Malachi Toney touchdown, making it 24-21 with about half the quarter to play. Then it was Indiana’s turn to march 53 yards, converting two third downs and milking the clock. Faced with a fourth-and-five from the Miami 18, Cignetti elected to kick a field goal extending the lead to 27-21. After the ensuing kickoff, the Canes had 1:42 to drive 75 yards. With 52 seconds left, they were already at Indiana’s 41 yard line, but quarterback Carson Beck got greedy and tried to squeeze a pass downfield into double coverage, which was intercepted by Jamari Sharpe at Indian’s six yard line. Checkmate!
Hard Rock Stadium went crazy! Indiana had gone from the worst team in FBS history to a championship program. As excited as Hoosiers fans were, they appeared to be unable to capture the gravity of the victory, as if it were an unimaginable moment they would soon wake up from. Unfamiliar territory is an understatement.
Mendoza was the MVP, finishing a pedestrian 16-27 for 186 yards. He was pressured all night and sacked four times. But again Indiana did not beat itself, with no turnovers. When they played Abba’s "Fernando" on the loud speakers for all to hear, everyone knew the connection, who the MVP was and sang in unison. It was the kind of moment never to be duplicated.
This improbable, almost impossible run had come to a fitting end with a perfect 16-0 season. The last team to do that was Yale in 1894. Ironically, the Hoosiers scored 666 points this year which is usually a bad omen. A team that started the year as a 100-to-one shot, finished it as undefeated champions. Anyone who saw this coming best go to confession immediately. The phrase "the whole is greater than the sum of its parts" symbolizes the Hoosier players, almost all unheralded or unknown before arriving at Indiana.
Mendoza, a one-star athlete from Miami, was never even recruited by the Canes and came to Indiana via Cal. In this age of NIL, the Hoosiers showed it can still be done through hard work, discipline and commitment. This may be the exception going forward but the underdog upstarts from Bloomington are 2026 college football champions!
Congratulations to the Indiana Hoosiers and that’s not a typo!
This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: Indiana Hoosiers win the CFP championship 27-21 over Miami
Category: General Sports
