Inspired by Zach Calzada, Fernando Mendoza passes torch

As the 2025 college football season was set to begin, Fernando Mendoza sent Zach Calzada a direct message via social media with a Cuban flag. The Cuban American quarterbacks had never met, but Calzada had played a crucial role in the Heisman Trophy winner’s career.

As Mendoza struggled to garner scholarship offers in 2021 as a high school senior in Miami, he found hope in Calzada in 2021. Then after transferring from Cal ahead of this season, he wanted to reach out to the man who inspired him.

At about the same time that Mendoza was texting Calzada, Puerto Rican wide receiver KC Concepcion was telling Texas A&M beat writers to get their popcorn ready. In Nashville, a cocky Mexican American was singing a tune never heard in the Music City as Diego Pavia promised to chase a national football championship with Vanderbilt. 

Up in the plains of West Texas, Mexican American Jacob Rodriguez quietly entered the season as the Big 12 Preseason Defensive Player of the Year. In South Florida, Cuban American coach Mario Cristobal welcomed high expectations for his Miami Hurricanes. 

Latino Excellence

The Year of the Latino in College Football closed out with Cristobal’s No. 9 Hurricanes upsetting defending national champion Ohio State 24-14 in the Cotton Bowl.

Fittingly, perhaps, the last college football game of 2025 ended with a Cuban American coach celebrating a victory in the College Football Playoff quarterfinals on New Year’s Eve.

Moreover, Latinos swept most of the major college football awards in 2025. Mendoza, who led No. 1 Indiana to the Big 10 Championship Game title and the top seed in the CFP, won the Heisman Trophy. He also won the Davey O’Brien and Maxwell Awards.

Rodriguez, the Big 12 Defensive Player of the Year, won the Butkus, Chuck Bednarik and Lombardi awards. He also finished fifth in the Heisman Trophy race as three Latinos received Heisman votes for the first time in a single election.

Pavia fell short of his national championship prediction, but he was the SEC Offensive Player of the Year and the Heisman Trophy runner-up. Concepcion lived up to his vow to entertain Texas A&M fans.

Concepcion won the Paul Hurnung Award, which is given to the most versatile player in college football. He also pulled off a rare triple as a First Team All-SEC selection as a wide receiver, punt returner and all-purpose. 

Along the way, they proudly celebrated their Latino roots and embraced the opportunity to inspire other Latinos to play football. 

Diverse skills

“I would say it’s all about trying to pass the torch,” Mendoza said. “And someone that I watched as a high school kid was Zach Calzada. He’s the quarterback for the University of Kentucky. When he was at Texas A&M I believe he either beat LSU or Alabama.

“I don’t remember. It was one of the two teams. And he had that fantastic win. I was like, ‘Wow, he’s Cuban American too. Look at that. It’s possible.’ I just hope to be an inspiration and a torch for any young Latino quarterback out there.”

Memorable upset over Alabama

For the record, Calzada led Texas A&M to an upset over then-No. 1 Alabama in October 2021. Mendoza was a senior at Miami’s Christopher Columbus High at the time when Cal was the only FBS school to offer him a football scholarship. 

Mendoza spent three seasons at Cal. He graduated in three years before transferring to Indiana, where he has led the undefeated Hoosiers to the CFP quarterfinals. He’ll face No. 9 Alabama at the Rose Bowl for a chance to advance to the national semifinals. 

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The Tide also have a pair of accomplished Latinos on their squad in Mexican Americans Josh Cuevas, the starting tight end, and David Bird, the long snapper.

Cuevas and Bird, who played at Cal for two years with Mendoza, also embrace the responsibility to inspire fellow Latino football players.

“As little kids, growing up, you’re kind of looking for those kinds of public figures to base your game off of and even seeing if you even have a chance of getting to the next level,” Cuevas said. “I’m just so grateful I can be that for a little kid here and there. 

“And even for some of my family, little cousins, they’ll call me, ask me questions all the time, ‘Hey, what do I need to do to get recruited?’ This and that. I’m all ears for them and here’s, like, a resource.”

Latino diaspora

Cuevas’ parents have Mexican roots from the states of Jalisco and Durango. His dad Ivan was actually born in Mexico at his grandmother’s home in Ciudad Guzman, Jalisco. 

Mendoza’s parents are Cuban Americans. Like Calzada’s paternal grandparents, both sets of Mendoza’s grandparents fled Cuba after Fidel Castro’s Communist regime took over. 

One of Mendoza’s grandparents was one of the 14,000 so-called Pedro Pan children. Those minors fled Castro’s Cuba from 1960 to 1962 under the cover of darkness in a clandestine exodus because their parents feared what Castro would do to help convert children into his communist ideology. 

Without mentioning Castro, Mendoza has paid tribute to his Cuban grandparents. He delivered part of his Heisman Trophy acceptance speech in Spanish after becoming the first Cuban American and third Latino to win the Heisman Trophy. 

Calzada is proud of Mendoza. He was humbled to see the video of Mendoza mentioning how he was inspired when Calzada upset Alabama in 2021.

‘Awesome to see’

“It was awesome to see that video,” Calzada said. “For me it highlights an impact that I was able to have not just for him, but also people I never knew about. It was an honor to see him bring my name up. I’ve been a big fan of his, and it was great to see.”

Calzada can relate to Mendoza’s story in a way few Americans can. The Calzada family’s odyssey out of Cuba was a circuitous one with stops in Panama and then Florida, Missouri and Georgia before the family settled in the suburbs of Atlanta. 

Zach’s paternal grandfather Hector Calzada Sr. fled Cuba after Castro’s regime stripped his U.S.-educated father Agustin of his three pharmacies and most of the family’s wealth. He tried to apply for an exit visa but was greeted outside the U.S. embassy by two lines of applicants, each of which stretched four blocks outside the embassy.

Cuban sacrifices

“I had nothing,” Hector Calzada Sr., who died earlier this year, told Our Esquina. “They took it all away. They didn’t let me take anything. They took all the money in my bank account when I said I was leaving. It was very difficult, very difficult.”

Through the charity of others, especially a church in St. Louis, the Calzadas built a life in America. Zach’s father, Hector Calzada Jr., was an accomplished swimmer at Tulane before a distinguished career in corporate America. 

Zach and his sister Carolyn, who played soccer at Texas A&M and then Notre Dame this season, have capitalized on their grandparents’ and parents’ sacrifices. They both graduated from Texas A&M. Zach got his MBA from Incarnate Word before transferring to Kentucky. Carolyn is set to receive a graduate degree from Notre Dame.

Fernando Mendoza received his degree in business administration from Cal before taking a snap at Indiana. Cuevas already graduated from Alabama with a degree in Human Environmental Sciences. 

Pavia received a degree in Biology from New Mexico State before transferring to Vanderbilt ahead of the 2024 season. Rodriguez also received his degree. Concepcion and Bird are juniors.  

Mario Cristobal leads Hurricanes

“For me and through my grandparents’ story it’s just embracing the American dream,” Calzada said. “They had to endure a lot and sacrifice a lot for a better life. For me and my sister it’s just been about putting our best foot forward in whatever we do.”

Mario Cristobal got a college education at Miami through a football scholarship. He’s considered one of the best coaches in college football. Cristobal, Miami junior linebacker Raul Aguirre Jr., Mendoza, Rodriguez, Cuevas and Bird are still alive in the College Football Playoff.

Cristobal eliminated Concepcion’s Texas A&M squad, which was captained by Mexican American linebacker Taurean York. Then Miami beat an Ohio State squad that featured five-star freshman defensive back Devin Sanchez and offensive guard Joshua Padilla. Sanchez and Padilla both excelled in the CFP quarterfinal loss to Miami on New Year’s Eve, but Cristobal and Aguirre advanced.

The year of the Latino in College Football extends into 2026 with Mendoza, Cuevas and Bird at the Rose Bowl and Rodriguez in the Orange Bowl. Through their actions on the field and commitment to education, they’re inspiring another generation just as Calzada once inspired a young Mendoza.

“I’m just looking forward to meeting any young Latino quarterbacks,” Fernando Mendoza said. “Not even just quarterbacks, any Latinos across college football and anybody aspiring to play college football to try to chase excellence in the sport.”