Fernando Mendoza and Curt Cignetti take Indiana to the promised land. It took one last gamble to realize the impossible dream

n out of trouble coming from his right, sidestepping his own splayed linemen in the process.

He touched his hand to the ground to keep his balance and stumbled forward.

And then, on a fourth-and-4 at Miami’s 12-yard line that felt more like fourth-and-destiny, Fernando Mendoza put the football in front of him and jumped, stretching as far as his frame would allow. Imagine if you will, if Superman were to leap horizontally for an end zone instead of vertically for the sky. That’s what Mendoza looked like.

It did not come easily. Turning over an iceberg never is. Miami, a 10-seed no one thought belonged in the College Football Playoff, made Mendoza look the most Clark Kent of anyone this playoff. The Canes left the Heisman Trophy winner literally bloodied and bruised, a hit busting open his lip in the first quarter of what turned into three sack night for Miami.

And every time the Hoosiers landed what seemed like the decisive haymaker, Miami bounced back like some sort of whack-a-mole.

Indiana blocked a punt; Miami scored. Mendoza leapt into the end zone, Miami scored again, the game only ending when Jamari Sharpe, a Miami kid who dreamed of one day playing in the Dolphins home stadium, picked off Carson Beck near the goal line.