Fernando Mendoza, Heisman Trophy winner, now national champion, and potentially the number one overall draft pick.

That plus more comes up on Tuesday's edition of the Lockdown Raiders podcast for January 20th, 2026.

You are Locked on Raiders, your daily Las Vegas Raiders podcast, part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. And welcome here, Raider Nation, to another edition of the Locked On Raiders podcast, part of the Locked-on Podcast Network, your team every day. Welcome here, Raider Nation, to another edition of the Locked-on Raiders podcast, part of the Locked-on Podcast Network, your number one sports podcast network. We're very proud of that. We're also very proud of the fact that this show continues to grow each and every day, and that's because of your support and the great job that my man Ari does behind the scenes, making sure we look good and sound good by way of the YouTube page. So tip of the cap to you, Raider Nation, tip of the cap to my man Ari. We shout him out. We appreciate him. He's on Twitter at Ari Produces. You can hit me up as well at your boy Q254. And if you want to be a part of the show, we got the Lockdown Raider podcast voicemail line for you 707-654-4-6993.

A lot of calls, a lot of texts. Really, actually, a lot more texts than calls on today's show. We'll have a couple of calls, but multiple texts that will get to a lot of great feedback about the national championship game and the Raiders head coaching search. We'll do that in segment number three. Segment number two, we'll actually talk about the head coaching search for the Silver and Black. It'll take a little bit of a backseat to the national championship game and Fernando Mendoza, what he brings to the table. But the latest and the greatest when it comes to the Raiders head coaching search and names that have been eliminated and names that we feel like are on the way, interviews on the way that could really be in line to be the next Raiders head football coach. We'll do that segment number two.

Here is segment number one, news and notes of the day, and it all has to do with the national championship game as Indiana beats Miami 2721.

Mark Davis, Tom Brady, John Spitech were all in attendance, and then some in the building

on the sideline pregame for the game. I thought it was awesome to see everybody there in attendance, knowing everybody was paying attention to Fernando Mendoza, knowing that the Raiders have the number one overall pick, and just to see them on the sideline, watching him when he warms up, watching them throughout the course of the game, and they were in for a heck of a treat there's no doubt about that it was a very

entertaining national championship game fernando mendoza was 16 for 27 186 yards a touchdown run on

fourth and five in the fourth quarter that was huge and it's so funny watching the game and looking at

the stats and looking at the box score it wasn't some phenomenal game you know it wasn't a joe Burrow lighted up type game while he was at LSU. It wasn't one of those where he's throwing around the yard for 300, 400 yards and five touchdowns. It wasn't even as a dominated performance as he's had so far in the playoffs. I mean, look, going into the National Championship game, Fernando Mendoza only threw five incompletions. Like, he was 16 for 27. Miami has a defense that's no joke, right? We talked about it on the show leading into it. And I said that, yeah, he's going to struggle. He's going to have to, you know, do everything he can, lay it on the line to win that game because Miami's not just going to roll over and die, and they didn't. But when Fernando needed to have it, he had it, right?

He didn't turn the ball over, and when he needed to have certain throws, he had some back shoulder throws that he had on third and fourth down. When it had to have it, had it. And then that fourth down run, fourth and five, 12 yards, it's a called quarterback keep. He takes it. Not only does he pick up the first down, but he goes 12 yards to the house, gets the touchdown.

He has to dive into the end zone. It's a called quarterback keep. He takes it. Not only does he pick up the first down, but he goes 12 yards to the house,

gets the touchdown.

He has to dive into the end zone, kind of does a little bit of a twist.

He showed his toughness.

He got hit early in the game right in the mouth.

It should have been a targeting call.

It bloodied his lip.

They didn't call it.

That's fine, right?

He wasn't complaining about it. He just got back up and kept on fighting. He got hit early and often by Miami. Miami is a tough, tough, gritty team. Mario Cristobal has got things going right there in Miami. So that team's going to be around for a while. They did it right. They built it in the trenches. And they're a tough bunch, right? And there was some dudes along that defensive line from Miami that made life miserable for Indiana.

But again, when push came to shove, Fernando Mendoza got it done. Again, tough as nails. You know, and there was Sunday players all over the field for both Indiana and Miami. So that's, that's something. I mean, that's just when you look at it and say, well, what did he do? What did he do? Well, you got it done against Alabama

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