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100 Days Out …
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Wednesday, May 21st, is an important day on the Colorado football calendar.
On Wednesday at 10:00 a.m., MT, single game tickets will go on sale for season ticket holders (a week later for the general public). It will be our first chance to get extra tickets for games we want to see most.
May 21st will also mark the 100-day mark in the countdown to the CU 2025 season opener against Georgia Tech (Friday, August 29th, 6:00 p.m., MT, ESPN).
As we pass the midway mark between the end of the 2024 season and the kickoff of the 2025 campaign, the national websites are in search of content. The month of May is the quietest in the college football calendar, so list making is the order of the day.
Both ESPN and CBS posted their “100 Days Out” stories this week. While Colorado and Coach Prime may not be the story in college football this year, it hasn’t kept the national pundits from speculating about the Buffs.
The Buffs made ESPN’s list of “10 must-know storylines“, with ESPN writer Kyle Bonagura posting the following:
Deion without Hunter and Shedeur at Colorado: The Colorado Buffaloes proved a lot of the skeptics wrong last year by posting a nine-win season and losing out on a chance to play in the Big 12 title game due to a tiebreaker. It was a remarkable improvement over the previous season, when Colorado finished in last place in the Pac-12. But for Deion Sanders, here’s where the real test probably begins. Even with a generational talent in Travis Hunter and a dynamic quarterback with his son, Shedeur Sanders, the Buffaloes were still just 13-12 over the past two seasons. They masked a lot of issues. Without them, the team’s on-field identity will inevitably evolve. And with that, we’ll also likely get a better understanding of how committed Coach Prime is to the job long term.
Thoughts … Some writers just won’t let it go. In Bonagura’s world, CU was “just 13-12 over the past two seasons”, with no mention of the fact that CU was 5-19 in the two seasons before Coach Prime arrived, or that the Buffs hadn’t had a winning season in the past eight before last year’s 9-4 campaign. It’s also hard to take the “CU was all Travis and Shedeur” storyline a few weeks after the NFL Draft, when all Buff fans heard was that Travis couldn’t play both ways, and that Shedeur was not good enough to be a starting quarterback in the NFL.
Andy yes, it’s also frustrating to see the resurrection of the “how long will Coach Prime last at CU?” narrative. A year ago, the party line was that Coach Prime would leave with his sons after the 2024 campaign, either to the NFL or a “better school”. Even after Coach Prime signed his contract extension, and reiterated his love for CU and Boulder, the pundits still can’t put away the template that Coach Prime doesn’t want to be in Boulder, and that he will soon jump at the chance to ditch Colorado and the Buffs.
Over at CBS Sports, the 100 days out “Prominent storylines” also included dear ‘ol CU …
The post-Travis Hunter, Shedeur Sanders era at Colorado
Speaking of week-by-week check-ins, two straight years of the Deion Sanders Colorado football experience have brought unprecedented attention to the Buffs and levels of real success not foreseen for a program that was 1-11 as recently as 2022. Travis Hunter’s run to a Heisman Trophy, Colorado finishing in a four-way tie for first place in the Big 12 standings and much more of 2024’s breakthrough normalized having one of football’s biggest stars wearing the headset on the sideline at the power conference level. The individual successes of Hunter and Shedeur Sanders drew some of the attention away from Coach Prime, and our discussions pivoted to football instead of focusing on what had been viewed as unorthodox methods of flipping the roster through the transfer portal.
Two notable things have happened since Sanders first told a meeting room full of players that he was “bringing his Louis” that have changed how we view that transition now. The first, and most important, is that his methods produced results in the form of nine wins and a top-25 finish last season. But also because of the changing portal and NIL rules, we have now seen similar roster overhauls in the wake of coaching changes. First-year coaches at Purdue, West Virginia, UCF and North Carolina will have transfer portal classes that, according to 247Sports, range between 39 and 53 players with Barry Odom (53) and Rich Rodriguez (52) each taking at least 50 transfers.
That first Colorado portal class was a never-before-seen outlier, but given the recent trends, the Buffs portal-heavy approach is not a differentiator. Colorado has also boosted its high school recruiting prowess since Sanders arrived, giving evidence that this is a staff looking to build the future and not just for the upcoming fall. Now, Colorado is judged by results, like everyone else, but without a Travis Hunter Heisman push or Shedeur Sanders NFL Draft storylines, the attention will fall back to the superstar head coach. Colorado is 10th on the odds board to win the Big 12 (+2700) and have a preseason win total of 6.5, so another first place finish might not be the expectation, but this should again be a winning season for Coach Prime.
Thoughts … For a Buff fan, this “storyline” is a much fairer treatment of the current state of the Colorado football program as the 2025 season approaches:
— “real success not foreseen for a program that was 1-11 as recently as 2022”. An acknowledgement that CU’s 13-12 record under Coach Prime shouldn’t be viewed through the prism of other programs, but from where the Buffs are compared to where they were two years ago;
— “That first Colorado portal class was a never-before-seen outlier, but given the recent trends, the Buffs portal-heavy approach is not a differentiator”. Coach Prime was roundly criticized for his method of rebuilding a roster, but this off-season, there has been hardly a whisper about the copycats, with other coaches following the exact same template;
— “Colorado has also boosted its high school recruiting prowess since Sanders arrived, giving evidence that this is a staff looking to build the future and not just for the upcoming fall. Now, Colorado is judged by results, like everyone else”. How refreshing is that statement? It may seem like a come down for CU to not be the odds-on favorite to host the Big Noon Saturday several times during the season, but that’s okay. Having CU be a team which will be considered – at a minimum – competitive in every game this fall, is great. For long time Buff fans, it’s hard to remember entering a season in which the Buffs were on par with every team on the calendar … 2004, perhaps?
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Buff fans can argue that the 6.5 over/under win total projection for Colorado is unfair. Yes, Coach Prime and CU have exceeded the expectations of Las Vegas in each of his first two seasons in Boulder. Still 100 days out the beginning of the 2025 season, I’m perfectly content with Vegas projecting that CU, with a new quarterback and some still-to-be-filled holes in the roster (running back and linebacker, in particular), will have to settle for a winning season in 2025.
We’ve had just over 100 days to bask in the glow of a nine-win season, and have about 100 days left before every team starts over with an 0-0 record.
Come Wednesday, I’ll be online, picking up some extra game tickets for friends … and marking the 100-day mark in the countdown to the Georgia Tech game.
I hope you’ll join me as I continue to enjoy the ride …
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2 Replies to “100 Days Out …”
Great analysis and writeup, Stuart! We will hopefully surprise this coming season. Go Buffs!
I’m in.
Go Buffs