BLOOMINGTON, INDIANA – Josh Hoover of the Indiana Hoosiers during Indiana’s spring football game at Memorial Stadium on April 23, 2026. (Photo by Justin Casterline/Getty Images for ONIT)
Getty Images for ONIT
Curt Cignetti turned to Josh Hoover to take over for Heisman-winning and national championship quarterback Fernando Mendoza to run the Indiana Hoosiers’ offense in 2026. The TCU transfer threw for 9,629 yards and 71 touchdowns while starting three of his four seasons with the Horned Frogs.
While many eyes will be focused on how Hoover performs, let’s take a look at the previous 10 years a quarterback won the Heisman and how he, or his replacement, fared the following season.
LSU: 2023 Jayden Daniels | 2024 Garrett Nussmeier
Nussmeier was a rare post-pandemic/portal era player to spend his first three seasons as a backup with the same team before taking over the offense, which he did in Baton Rouge. He was sixth nationally in passing yards per game (312) and was tied for 10th in touchdown passes (29), though he was intercepted a dozen times during the Tigers’ 9-4 campaign. Nussmeier played nine games during an injury-riddled 2025. Had he qualified, he would have been 73rd nationally in pass efficiency.
USC: 2022 Caleb Williams | 2023 Caleb Williams
After transferring from Oklahoma and winning the Heisman in 2022 as a sophomore, Williams followed with a junior season that saw him finish seventh nationally in pass efficiency with a rating that was higher than his Heisman year when he was fourth. During that 2023 season, Williams played in 12 games before passing on the bowl. He threw for 3,633 yards with 30 touchdown and only five interceptions while rushing for 11 scores. Despite totaling 41 TDs, or 3.4 per game, he finished outside the top 10 in Heisman voting.
Alabama: 2021 Bryce Young | 2022 Bryce Young
Young followed his 2021 Heisman-winning season by finishing sixth in voting (17 first place votes) behind five other quarterbacks, including winner Caleb Williams. He threw for 3,328 yards and 32 touchdowns with only five interceptions in 12 games. The Tide finished 11-2 with Young opting out of the bowl. He threw 47 TD passes in 15 games during his 2021 Heisman year, which concluded with a national championship.
LSU 2019 Joe Burrow | 2020 Myles Brennan, Max Johnson, TJ Finley
The Bengal Tigers had it all going in their favor under Ed Orgeron in 2019 when Burrow won the Heisman and led the team to a national title. That was followed by two seasons of mediocrity and instability at quarterback, at least in 2020 when three started at the position. That included Brennan whose season and, ultimately career, came to an end three weeks into the pandemic-delayed schedule due to injury. Those were the only starts of his career, and he threw 11 TD passes.
Heralded recruit TJ Finley started the next five games (5 TD, 5 INT) in what would be his only playing time at LSU before commencing a transfer excursion. Johnson, son of Super-Bowl winning quarterback Brad Johnson and nephew of former Georgia coach Mark Richt, was another true freshman who stepped in to start the final two games. He threw eight TD passes with only one pick and won the job in 2021 with freshman Garrett Nussmeier serving as the primary backup.
The trio combined to rank 57th nationally in pass efficiency with 24 touchdowns and nine interceptions for a 5-5 team. The Tigers won their last two games behind Johnson to break even.
Oklahoma: 2018 Kyler Murray | 2019 Jalen Hurts
Hurts followed Murray’s Heisman performance by being the runner-up to Joe Burrow. Hurts was also second to the LSU quarterback in pass efficiency during a season in which he was third in total offense (368 yards per game) and accounted for 52 touchdowns, including 20 on the ground to rank seventh, and second among quarterbacks. The Sooners went 12-2 in a season that concluded with rout at the hands of LSU and Burrow (8 total TDs) in a CFP semifinal two weeks after the Heisman ceremony.
Oklahoma: 2017 Baker Mayfield | 2018 Kyler Murray
Murray made it two straight Heisman winners for Oklahoma, and the only time in the prestigious award’s history that the same team had quarterbacks win it in consecutive years. Murray served as Baker Mayfield’s backup in 2017 after sitting out a season following his transfer from Texas A&M. He took over the Sooners’ offense in 2018 and led the nation in total offense (383 yards), was second nationally in pass efficiency, second in passing yards (4,361) and third in touchdown passes (42). He also ran for 1,001 yards and 12 scores. OU went 12-2 and lost a CFP semi to Alabama and Heisman runner-up Tua Tagovailoa.
Louisville: 2016 Lamar Jackson | 2017 Lamar Jackson
Jackson is an answer to a trivia question in that he was the youngest player to win the Heisman – by five days over Jameis Winston (below) in 2013 – when he won the award as a sophomore before finishing third to Oklahoma’s Baker Mayfield and Stanford running back Bryce Love as a junior. Many of his numbers were better in 2017 while playing the same number of games, including averaging 405 yards of total offense per game versus 393. True, that’s splitting hairs for a player who had a remarkably similar number of combined passing and rushing attempts in 2017 (662) as 2016 (669) while totaling 51 touchdowns during his Heisman season, and following up with 45.
Oregon: 2014 Marcus Mariotta | 2015 Vernon Adams
Adams took over for the NFL’s No. 2 selection and led the nation in pass efficiency and yards per attempt (10.2) in his lone season at the FBS level while battling through a broken finger that cost him a couple of games. He threw 26 touchdown passes and six interceptions in 10 contests. Adams played three seasons at FCS member Eastern Washington where in three seasons he set a Big Sky record with 110 career TD passes.
Florida State: 2013 Jameis Winston | 2014 Jameis Winston
Winston redshirted his first season in Tallahassee and did not take the field for first time until the start of his 2013 Heisman campaign. His collegiate debut against at Pitt, which was memorable in itself, launched a season in which he led the nation in pass efficiency and set what was an ACC record with 40 TD passes in leading the Seminoles to a national title.
It was no surprise that a few of his numbers slipped the following season, his last as a collegian, including dropping to 27th in pass efficiency thanks in part to TD/INT figures that went from 40/10 to 25/18 while playing one less game. Still, his total offensive output (305 yards per game) was the same as his Heisman campaign, and the ‘Noles were undefeated before losing to Oregon and the quarterback noted above in a CFP semifinal. Winston was the No. 1 pick in the 2015 NFL draft.
Texas A&M: 2012 Johnny Manziel | 2013 Johnny Manziel
Like Jameis Winston, Johnny Football did not take a snap as a college football player until his first game of his Heisman season following a redshirt year. In the same number of games, Manziel had better numbers in most categories through the air in 2013, including efficiency rating (17 points higher), touchdown passes (37 to 26) and passing yards per game (317 to 285).
The difference in 2013, his second and final season in leading the Aggies’ offense, is that after leading the SEC in rushing (1,410 yards) and rushing touchdowns (21) in 2012, his numbers fell off (759/9) with 57 fewer attempts on the ground.