With football season approaching, we’re going through Indiana’s roster to look at each position group going into fall camp.
Curt Cignetti grabbed Kurtis Rourke out of the transfer portal to play quarterback for his first year at IU, and that match worked out very well. He’s hoping to extend that run of quarterback portal success in year two, turning to Fernando Mendoza (Cal) in 2025.
The entire quarterback room looks different for the Hoosiers this season. Second-string quarterback Tayven Jackson transfer out after the season ended, and quarterbacks coach Tino Sunseri left to become UCLA’s offensive coordinator. Cignetti hired Chandler Whitmer from the Atlanta Falcons to replace him.
Roster turnover — who’s gone
- Kurtis Rourke (exhausted his eligibility, went to NFL)
- Tayven Jackson (transfer — UCF)
Roster turnover — who’s back
- Alberto Mendoza (redshirt freshman)
- Tyler Cherry (out for the year with an injury)
Roster turnover — who’s new
- Fernando Mendoza (redshirt junior; transfer — Cal)
- Grant Wilson (sixth-year senior; transfer — Old Dominion)
- Jacob Bell (3-star, Naperville, Ill.)
- Maverick Geske (walk-on, Indianapolis)
Projected depth chart
Here’s our best estimate of Indiana’s quarterback depth chart.
- Fernando Mendoza, redshirt junior, 6-foot-5, 225 pounds (19 career starts at Cal)
- Alberto Mendoza, redshirt freshman, 6-foot-2, 203 pounds
- Jacob Bell, freshman, 6-foot-2, 202 pounds
- Grant Wilson, sixth-year senior, 6-foot-3, 217 pounds (14 career starts at Old Dominion)
- Alberto Mendoza, redshirt freshman, 6-foot-2, 203 pounds
There’s no question over Fernando Mendoza’s status as Indiana’s starting quarterback. The backup situation is less clear, but IU should want his younger brother, Alberto, to earn that job. The pecking order between Bell and Wilson is unclear, but the Hoosiers will obviously hope to not need to go that far down the depth chart this season.
Why it will work
Mendoza enters fall camp with a lot of hype as one of the best quarterbacks in the Big Ten. He’s on the Maxwell Award preseason watch list, and is being talked about as a potential first-round pick in the 2026 NFL Draft. Some numbers from last season support the noise: 273.1 passing yards per game (third in the ACC), 68.7 completion percentage (second in the ACC), and a 16:6 touchdown-to-interception ratio. He’ll have existing rapport with wide receiver Jonathan Brady, a fellow Cal transfer; and most of the remaining surrounding cast on IU’s offense should be stronger than Cal’s. Mendoza should offer more mobility than Kurtis Rourke provided in 2024 while playing through an ACL injury, but his passing is his game’s centerpiece. Indiana’s offense has so much potential this season, and Mendoza’s ability to run the offense and make the most of his weapons is a big reason why.
Why it won’t
The depth behind Mendoza is a little concerning, should anything happen during the season. Wilson has collegiate experience, but missed most of last season with an injury, and his performance when healthy wasn’t anything exceptional. Alberto has potential, and Cignetti has praised him at times when talking about Fernando. But he’s very unproven — he’s played only a few snaps at the end of the Western Illinois game last year.
Additionally, it’ll be interesting to see if there’s any drop-off in the coaching department. Sunseri was extremely well-regarded and did a great job with Rourke last year; it wasn’t surprising that he left for a bigger role elsewhere. And Whitmer is relatively unproven in this sort of position — he was the Falcons’ pass game specialist last season, and before that, he’d only held quality control assistant and graduate assistant jobs. That’s not to say anything of Whitmer’s qualifications or coaching ability, but it’s fair to wonder what his impact will look like compared to everything Sunseri did last year.
Prior previews:
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