Ryan Day had to hire Matt Patricia last season after Jim Knowles left for Penn State, but the defense continued to dominate. Ohio State finished 1st in total defense and 7th in rush defense. However, they met their match (to a degree) in Indiana’s Fernando Mendoza, especially late in the game during the Big 10 Championship. That was after the Heisman winner started the game with a brutal hit from Caden Curry.

On the first play, Mendoza completed a 9-yard pass, but Caden Curry hit him hard. An eerie silence quickly swept the Hoosier nation in a jam-packed Lucas Oil Stadium. Concerns quickly surfaced about whether the QB’s throwing arm suffered damage. It was a legal hit, on time, and a 6’3″ and 260 lbs Curry might have thought of ending Indiana’s title hopes on the first play. And that’s precisely what Matt Patricia also thought.

“Caden Curry hit him so hard, he goes down, and I was like. Okay, all right, here we go. [But] He got up, and I was like. Uh, oh, we’ve got a problem,” Matt Patricia said on the Good Morning Football podcast on May 1. “I think he was probably one of the most challenging quarterbacks we faced all year. A guy who can make all the throws on the field. That’s what you see first and foremost: very smart, really good in the pocket, and I mean, straight, tough.”

After lying briefly on the ground, Mendoza got up, corrected his helmet, and walked up to the sidelines. His brother and backup QB, Alberto Mendoza, took over for him as the QB1 watched from the sidelines. But only after Alberto’s single 2nd down play, Fernando walked into the field as the crowd applauded him while he stood under center. When Fernando notched a first down on 3rd-and-4, it didn’t look like he was injured just two plays earlier.

He caught the snap, took a step back in the pocket, and ran left amid a horde of OSU defenders trying to tackle him. But before OSU’s #8 could tackle him, the Hoosiers’ QB1 threw a short pass to Charlie Becker for a first down. Mendoza passed for 222 yards in the game for a touchdown, earning an 89.6 QB rating, and Indiana won the Big Ten title 13-10. In truth, the defeat wasn’t due to Patricia’s faulty plays but to Mendoza’s brilliance.

“He actually grabbed me during the Combine. We talked for a little while and were just so impressed by him,” Patricia said about meeting Mendoza at this year’s NFL Combine. “I know for a fact he’s been working really hard, getting ready for his moments. He’s been studying tape. He’s been trying to figure out defenses and schemes, and just taking a look at what the NFL defense looks like compared to college defenses. I think that’s a great pick for the Raiders.”

Fernando Mendoza passed for 3,535 yards for Indiana at an impressive 72% efficiency and also rushed for 276 yards. Against Miami, in the national championship game, Mendoza was the one who sealed the game. His ‘leap’ into the end zone for a touchdown is one of the most standout sporting moments, as he put everything on the line for the play and won it for the team. No wonder the Raiders selected him 1st overall this year. As for Matt Patricia, Mendoza is a lifelong fan of his defenses.

Fernando Mendoza shares a fan moment involving Matt Patricia

Before arriving at Ohio State as DC, Patricia was a longtime New England Patriots assistant and later served as the Detroit Lions’ head coach for three years. Mendoza, a fan of the Patriots, grew up watching Patricia’s defenses as the coach became the team’s DC in 2012 and remained with Bill Belichick’s team till 2017. So, when Mendoza got a chance to meet Patricia at the Manning Passing Academy, it was a fandom moment.

“Coach Patricia does a fantastic job,” Mendoza said before the Big 10 title game. “That guy is a fantastic football mind. I was a Patriots fan growing up, so I’ve been lucky enough to watch his defense for a long, long time. At that point, I wasn’t watching defenses very technically. But I’ve always had the pleasure of being a Coach Patricia fan. A lot of quarterbacks have struggled throughout the entire season with [him], and there’s a reason for that.”

Matt Patricia is in his 2nd year at Ohio State now and would want to address any lapses that might have occurred against Indiana or Miami last year. This year is also an uphill battle since the team lost 47 of its 97 players from last year. Now, the program has 44 new players, and with a new roster also comes uncertainty. As for Mendoza, he will likely learn behind Kirk Cousins this year and finally become a QB1 for the Raiders next year.