Colorado: Perfect timing

When Deion Sanders took over the Colorado University football program back in 2022, it was met with lots of skepticism.

Sure, Coach Prime had wonderful success at Jackson State, but could he turn around a struggling program in big-time college football?

The 2022 Colorado Buffaloes football team finished their season with a 1-11 record. The team averaged a dismal 15.4 points per game, which ranked 127th in the nation. For perspective, there were 131 FBS teams at the time.

The team fired their head coach, Karl Dorell, midway through the season after an 0-5 start. His replacement, Mike Sanford went 1-6, and was also canned after the season ended.

Since 2010, Colorado has had just two winning seasons, with one being in the shortened COVID season in 2020.

The Buffaloes have had eight coaches roam the sidelines since 2010 as well. Colorado has been searching for stability for quite a while now.

What did the Buffs find? Coach Prime.

Deion Sanders, the NFL legend, “Neon Deion” if you will, has been in the coaching game for a couple of years now.

Deion Sanders started coaching at the high school level, where he was a head coach for four years. He was the head coach at his Prime Academy from 2012-2013, and then at the Triple A Academy from 2015-2016.

Prime also was an offensive coordinator at the Trinity Christian High School in Texas, where he coached his sons Shilo and Shadeur.

Coach Prime was then promoted to the college game. He was hired in 2020 to be the head coach at Jackson State, an HBCU in Jackson, Mississippi.

It was there that he made a household name for himself as a coach. In three seasons, Sanders led the Tigers to an overall record of 27-6. To go along with this, he captured two SWAC championships.

Recruiting success also followed at Jackson State. Sanders brought his two sons, Shaduer and Shilo, with him. Both of them were three stars, respectively. That was not Prime’s biggest splash, however.

That was with Travis Hunter.

Hunter was a five-star prospect coming out of high school, and the number one player in his class. In the winter of 2021, the Georgia native was committed to Florida State.

That was until he flipped to Jackson State, making him the highest-rated recruit to ever commit to an HBCU.

In his time at Jackson State, Deion Sanders led Jackson State to new heights, experiencing success that had never been seen before in school history. Sanders also brought more eyeballs to HBCU football than ever and has advocated for more exposure to get these programs into more of the mainstream of college football.

After the 2022 season at Jackson State, Sanders got the call from Colorado for their head coaching job, and he took it.

His tenure started off controversial after a video was posted of him basically telling the remaining players from last year's team to transfer. Sanders was quoted as saying, “I’m bringing my own luggage with me, and it’s Louis”.

After a record-setting crowd showed up to his first spring game, it was apparent that the whole college football world would be tuned into Colorado football.

In week one of 2023, Deion’s team took down 17th-ranked TCU. This win set the nation on fire.

Unfortunately, the success wouldn’t be sustainable. After a 3-0 start, and an AP rank as high as No. 18, the Buffaloes finished the season at 4-8.

Coming into this season, not much was expected of Colorado. The over/under for wins this year was set at only 5.5.

It is now week 11 in college football, and the Buffaloes have surpassed that benchmark.

Colorado is now 6-2, and ranked at No. 20 in the College Football Playoff poll. What is even crazier, is that they have a chance at the Big 12 championship and the College Football Playoff.

Colorado is currently third in the Big 12 race at 4-1 and has a big game coming up this weekend against Texas Tech.

In order for the Buffaloes to make the championship game, they will most likely need to win out and hope that Iowa State drops another game, or that BYU can drop two.

We are in a reality where Coach Deion Sanders and his Colorado Buffaloes have a shot to be on the big stage, where no one thought they’d be.

Sanders has done a wonderful job resurrecting this program to this point, but we’ll have to wait and see just how far they can go.

Evan Pochas is a second-year majoring in broadcast journalism. To contact him, please email ejp5753@psu.edu.