From WSJ:
Is the fever about to break on Colorado and Coach Prime Mania? It nearly did Saturday night in Boulder, in a sloppy double overtime contest against 24-point underdog Colorado State—“We started out playing like hot garbage,” Coach Prime acknowledged—but the Buffs rallied
to stay undefeated at 3-0. The Most Unexpected and Delightful Party in Sports pushes on for at least another week.
Oregon is next, in Eugene. The also-undefeated, 10th-ranked Ducks are averaging 58 points per game and are the biggest threat Colorado has faced to date. If they fail to burst the bubble, fifth-ranked USC looms on Sep. 30.
It seems unlikely that a Colorado team which looked tired and disorganized against CSU will finish the month unbeaten. (They also lost two-way star Travis Hunter to a cheap hit.) It’s possible they will be 3-2 at month’s end, cooling the hype, giving the Coach Prime skeptics their Eager Moment of Schadenfreude, and we will finally start paying attention to other college football teams and coaches. We might look back and say:
Remember when we all decided the biggest story in sports was Coach Prime and Colorado Buffaloes?
I doubt it fades entirely, however. Sanders has done too much already. It’s been stunning to watch one of the country’s most misbegotten programs (1-11 last season) instantly transformed into the team that everyone wants to watch. I couldn’t have been the only East Coaster on the couch early Sunday wondering:
Why the heck am I watching a Colorado-Colorado State game at 1 a.m.? It’s reminiscent of Gordon Ramsay overhauling a decrepit diner. For years, Colorado served cold oatmeal. Now: Prime rib.
Buffalo football is suddenly one of the hottest tickets on Earth, catnip for celebrities and star athletes in other sports. Coach Prime, meanwhile, is the sun. Only Sanders can make a global movie star like the Rock feel like the second-most famous person in a mountain town. Even the often-injured NBA star Kawhi Leonard showed up to watch the game Saturday. As the Internet commentariat cracked: Kawhi doesn’t even show up to his
own games.
Everyone craves a bite. ESPN and Fox hosted their pregame gabs on campus, Coach Prime dropping into both shows as the unquestioned Guest of Honor. Sanders also got a sit down Sunday on “60 Minutes”—a clear indicator that the story has progressed to a cultural phenomenon. This is the second Coach Prime column
I’ve written in less than two weeks, and if they keep on winning, there will be more.
You’re not even mad. You’re curious, too.
Coach Prime arrived at the right time. For years, football has been stuck in a stale cycle of dominant teams, the same coaches giving the same bland sound bites. A summer’s worth of smoke-filled room conference chaos—Colorado is another program bailing on the Pac-12; it’s going to the Big 12—threatened to alienate the audience further.
But
what’s happening in Colorado feels new. With more than 50 transfer players, including some from Sanders’s time at Jackson State—and a similar number pushed out the door—it represents what an aggressive college football program can be in 2023, as the sport shifts its power from schools and conferences to the people who actually make the game.
Colorado players celebrate a double overtime win against Colorado State. PHOTO: RON CHENOY/USA TODAY SPORTS VIA REUTERS CON
In this new landscape, personality matters. Tradition isn’t essential, and geography is a mere detail. Sanders is unabashed about college football’s entrepreneurial possibilities, whether it’s name, image or likeness, or the NFL for a lucky few. Colorado HQ is outfitted with famous Sanders-isms, including this all-timer: IF YOU LOOK GOOD, YOU FEEL GOOD. IF YOU FEEL GOOD, YOU PLAY GOOD. IF YOU PLAY GOOD, THEY PAY GOOD.
“My kids who play for me, they didn’t choose a university,” Coach Prime told “60 Minutes.” “They chose me.”
Perhaps the apex of Prime Mania is that there’s already speculation about what Sanders does
after Colorado. Would Prime thrive at a different school? The SEC? The Big Ten? Would he jump to the NFL? (“I would never do that,” he told Rich Eisen of the pros.) Why stop with football? It’s only a matter of time before the management gurus and office consultants start offering Coach Prime 101. Wait until your boss closes the 9 a.m. meeting and says “Now give me my theme music!”
He does it his way, unabashedly. Sanders is happy to upend coaching conventions, whether it’s the theme music, his on-field style, his sanitized expletives (“bull junk”) and, most of all, his willingness to engage with outside noise. He happily turned a criticism from Colorado State’s coach about his habit of wearing a hat and sunglasses into motivational fuel—“They messed around and made it personal,” he quipped—and also made it a viral marketing bit for his sunglasses sponsor. Sanders greets his media appearances with the casual ease of a man who knows how to talk on camera. (The other night he followed up a live halftime TV interview with
another live halftime TV interview.)
He does this all with the mild wink of a showman who wants you to know he’s having fun, too. Sanders surely suspects Colorado will have its hands full with Oregon and USC, especially if Travis Hunter is out, but he’s not going to do the standard coach’s routine of pooh-poohing the heightened expectations. Coach Prime isn’t going to chastise students for rushing Folsom Field after squeaking out a victory over 0-2 Colorado State. Let them enjoy. It’s been a while.
Does it all come apart with a losing streak? It’s possible. College football is a long season, and a hot program can be rendered human very quickly. Colorado is an exciting but newly-assembled team, capable of brilliant flashes but also careless mistakes. There are lots of critics eager to say ‘I told you so’ when Sanders takes a few Ls. I’m not there. I think Coach Prime is winning.