Colorado football coach Deion Sanders seemed in good spirits Tuesday during his weekly news conference in Boulder. He handed out candy to reporters and congratulated the Colorado women’s basketball team. for its big victory Monday against No. 1 LSU and has generally tried to focus on the positives of his team this season despite their recent struggles.
But then came a question he didn’t like.
It was about his team’s struggling offense and who was going to call the pieces Saturday when the Buffaloes (4-5) host Arizona 6-3).
“Will the calling game arrangement always be the calling game arrangement?” a journalist asked him.
“Forget it, man,” Sanders said. “Let it be. You’re barking up a tree, you’re not going to get up. So let it go. We’re happy people here and we’re happy. We’re blessed… We’re not where we wanted to be, but we’re not not where we were. And we’re going in the right direction. So it’s all good… All this controversy and all that, we’re trying to raise these kids, man. Grown-up problems don’t help kids. And I’ve been through two divorces, and I know this for a fact: Adult problems don’t help children.
What was wrong with Deion Sanders?
Sanders changed his team’s offensive playmaker last week, promoting former NFL coach Pat Shurmur to the position in place of offensive coordinator Sean Lewis. Both now have the title of co-offensive coordinator. But the change didn’t seem to help the team through the first three quarters of its 26-19 home loss Saturday to Oregon State.
The Buffs gained just 78 total yards of offense in the previous three quarters quarterback Shedeur Sanders got some pain relief in the locker room and returned to score touchdowns on the Buffs’ final two possessions of the game.
Now, with three games left in the regular season, Colorado needs two wins to become eligible for a playoff bowl game after losing five of its last six games. It will be the 10th straight game the Buffs have played in front of a sold-out crowd — and the last game in front of fans at Folsom Field during a season that has gone poorly after a 3-0 start.
Sanders said he wanted to leave those fans with “positive hope.”
“I would like you all to understand how close we are to being what we want to be and doing what we want to do,” he said.
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He started the press conference by handing out his favorite candy – Now and Laters, a taffy-like treat. He then rattled off several positive stats about his team, including the fact that his team forced 18 turnovers, which ranked 10th.th nationally, according to NCAA statistics.
“Sometimes when we lose the way we lose, you have to find positives to energize the staff and energize the young men who are working hard to get there,” Sanders said.
The problem for Colorado is that there are other statistics that show where things have gone horribly wrong. Only one other team in the country has allowed more quarterback sacks than Colorado, which has allowed 46. No other quarterback has been sacked more than Shedeur Sanders, who had 45 of those sacks and had to resort to painkiller injections in his last two matches to help him finish, according to his father and coach.
“He’s getting more treatment because his body is extremely sore,” Deion Sanders said. “His body is extremely sore, extremely sore, because I know some of the things he doesn’t do that he does now to make sure he can go out and be at his best.”
The beating his son suffered and his potential to play in the NFL after this season have raised questions about whether Shedeur Sanders could remain in college in 2024. What could make him consider NFL next year?
“Why would we when we’re having a great time here?” Sanders said. “When we appreciate and love where we are, it’s hard to look elsewhere.”
Follow journalist Brent Schrotenboer @Schrotenboer. Email: [email protected]
