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Passion
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Kansas State, historically, is one of the worst programs in all of college football.
Before Bill Snyder came to Manhattan in 1989, the Wildcats had posted only four winning records in the previous 53 seasons. In over half of those campaigns – 27, to be precise – the Wildcats lost at least eight games.
On the all-time list for losing streaks, Kansas State appears four times. The Wildcats hold the third longest streak ever, 28 games (1945-48), but also appear with streaks of 18 games (1961-62), 17 games (1964-66), and 16 games (1987-89). (BTW … Colorado State has the 6th-longest losing streak of all time, 26 straight games, running from 1960-62).
Perhaps the most telling stats on the history of woe for the “Mildcats”?:
- All-time wins: 585 … ranked 80th on the all-time list (mostly above programs who haven’t – as KSU has – been playing since the 19th century). The only Power Four teams with fewer all-time wins: Northwestern (576); Louisville (567); Duke (533); SMU (552); Indiana (530); Wake Forest (504); Houston (485); and UCF (302); and, perhaps more telling …
- All-time winning percentage: .463 (585-680-42) … ranked 115th on the all-time list. From the Power Four, only Iowa State, Northwestern, Indiana and Wake Forest have walked off the field as the losing team with greater frequency than has Kansas State.
[For comparison’s sake … CU has 735 all-time wins (31st), with an all-time winning percentage of .567 (46th). CU has 26 all-time conference titles … Kansas State has four].
With this history, you would think that the Kansas State fans wouldn’t be too upset about a (relatively) down year in Manhattan. Yes, the Wildcats came into the Colorado game with a 5-6 record, not what was expected from a team which was tabbed as the No. 17 team in the country in the Associated Press preseason poll.
But college football fans tend to have memory of a goldfish.
Current Kansas State head coach Chris Klieman has a 54-34 record in seven seasons at Kansas State. Considering K-State’s less-than-stellar history, as laid out above, you would think Klieman would be afforded a little more grace from the Wildcat Nation for, again, a relatively down year.
You would be wrong.
Passion for one’s football team is not reserved for schools with 100,000-seat stadiums and $200 million athletic department budgets.
Even if that is what is assumed to be the case by the national media.
Perhaps it was the blinders worn by the nation’s pundits which made what happened after last weekend’s Kansas State/Utah game a national story.
After Kansas State lost to Utah, 51-47, to fall to 5-6, Klieman went off on the Wildcat fans who were disgruntled about K-State’s struggles this fall.
“We’re down so many players, and I know a lot of people thought we’d come over here and lay down and that maybe the kids had cashed it in,” Klieman said. “Because I’ve heard it enough. I’ve heard I have cashed it in. I’ve heard the players have cashed it in, we need to get new leadership here, we need to get new players, new coaches. I’m tired of it. I got to be honest with you, I’m tired of it.
“I’ve given my friggin’ … life for this place for seven years. I’ve given everything for seven years. And I think I deserve a little bit of respect. I’m frustrated like everybody else is, but I love those kids. And I’ll go to friggin’ battle with those kids any day.”
Again, Kansas State has an all-time record almost 100 games under .500.
Again, Klieman has a 54-34 record in seven seasons at Kansas State. Other than the 2020 COVID season, every Klieman team before this fall has won at least eight games, with the Wildcats winning the Big 12 championship in 2022.
Considering K-State’s less-than-stellar history as noted above, you can understand why Klieman was frustrated with the what-have-you-done-for-me-lately Wildcat fans.
Oh … and this just in … Colorado fans are just as passionate about their team.
Colorado, before the extended drought of misery which has befallen the program over the past two decades, was ranked in the top 25 nationally in both all-time wins and all-time winning percentage.
Colorado football dates back to the 1890s. Prior to the 2010s, the only decade in school history in which the Buffs didn’t claim at least one conference championship was the 1950s, and that was a decade owned by the Oklahoma Sooners and head coach Bud Wilkinson (Oklahoma dominated not only the Big Seven … but the entire nation … going 93-10-2, winning ten Big Seven titles and three national championships).
And yet, even after being a national punch line for most of the 21st century, the Buff Nation has maintained its passion. The Colorado football program was a disgrace during its tenure as a member of the Pac-12, but Buff fans kept the faith. In the 15 seasons prior to the arrival of Coach Prime (excluding the 2020 COVID season), Colorado average home attendance was 45,687.
That’s almost 46,000 per game (about 90% of capacity) for a team which during that 15-year stretch had all of one winning season.
Then the Coach Prime tsunami hit.
How big a draw was Colorado? How many times do you think that the Fox Big Noon Saturday show has set up shop to feature a team coming off of a 1-11 season, and was a 17-point underdog on the road?
CU’s win over No. 17 TCU to open the 2023 season, followed by wins over Nebraska and Colorado State (with Big Noon Saturday in Boulder for both games; ESPN GameDay in town for the CSU game).
The fascination with CU continued throughout the 2023 season, with the Buffs appearing on a national network in nine of its 12 games, despite losing eight of its final nine games to finish 4-8. Colorado was then the only team in the country to have every game nationally televised in 2024, with the streak continuing eight games into the 2025 campaign.
The economic impact of Coach Prime has been estimated at over $200 million, with applications and donations to CU setting records.
And the Buff Nation has shown its devotion at the turnstiles as well.
CU average attendance in 2023 was 53,180 (Folsom Field capacity set at 50,188), with an average of 52,514 in 2024.
The passion of the Buff Nation for Colorado football can’t really be questioned … If you win, they will come.
But there are limits, both to national and local interest.
After being featured on national television on 21 of the first 24 games of the Coach Prime era … all four of CU’s games to end the 2025 season were televised by secondary networks.
After having only one game with less than 50,000 in attendance for the first 15 of Coach Prime’s 16 home games (the lone exception being the 2024 Thursday night home opener against North Dakota State from the FCS … with that game drawing just shy of 50,000, at 49,438), attendance at CU’s last two home games of the 2025 season demonstrate how frustrated the Buff Nation has become:
- Arizona … a 52-17 loss … 48,322
- Arizona State … a 42-17 loss … 43,348
We’ve discussed how critical this off-season will be for Coach Prime and Colorado (The Future of Colorado Football: Julian Lewis; and The Future of Colorado Football: The Next Two Months), and next weekend we’ll be discussing Coach Prime’s high school recruiting philosophy (Signing Day, believe it or not, is this Wednesday, December 3rd).
The Colorado 2026 season begins this week. Will there be requisite changes to the coaching staff, and will they come soon enough to attract recruits and transfers? Will Coach Prime be able to retain a core of talent from the 2025 roster, or will the 2026 team be a complete rebuild … again?
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Kansas State has a long and storied history of failure on the gridiron, but currently has a fan base which is criticizing their head coach for fielding a team which just barely earned bowl eligibility in 2025.
Colorado has a long and storied history of success on the gridiron, but currently has a fan base which would kill to have a coach fielding a team for which a bowl bid was the floor, not the ceiling, for the program.
Passionate fans exist for both programs, no different than the blue bloods of the FBS.
But the passion of the Buff Nation is currently being tested, and it’s up to Coach Prime to not only recognize the frustration … but figure out how to fix it.
Coach Prime after the 24-14 loss to Kansas State, finishing his third season with a 3-9 record: “We won’t be in this position again, I can promise you that”.
Passionate Buff fans can only hope against hope that this is more than just the latest in a long series of CU coaches making that same promise …
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3 Replies to “Passion”
Oh please, we’ve been hearing the same bullshit out of Coach Sanders since he started. Enough.
The post game press conference showed me that Prime realized he has been living in a bubble and that hiring friends and HOFers doesn’t necessarily equate to wins, nor does the strength of only his name equate to wins. I think he has also realized that his legacy is at stake because at the end of the day he will be remembered for the W-L record. No one will lambast Sapp or Faulk or even Shurmur or Livingston when it is all said and done, they will either praise or lambast Prime and Prime alone. I think his legacy is very important to him. He has never failed at anything. To circle back to the theme of the essay, Passion, Prime’s passions are his players and his legacy. Here’s hoping his passions align and he fixes this mess.
I wonder what the difference was from 2023, to 2024, to 2025 that shaped the win/loss results on the field?
I think Deion knows.
Looking forward to seeing what he does about it.
Go Buffs