The baked salmon steaming on a lunch plate in the Dal Ward Athletic Center was a brighter shade of pink than Colorado faces after the most embarrassing football loss in school history. The Buffaloes might not be doing so hot on the field, but at least they’re eating well at the training table.
“Salmon?” said CU athletic director Mike Bohn, his sense of humor firmly intact despite the Buffs being dismantled by Montana State. “With what’s been going on around here, I’m surprised we’re still serving the good stuff.”
Might humble pie be a more appropriate entree, Mr. Bohn?
“I was thinking more like water,” said Bohn, just kidding.
If misery loves company, then it’s a good thing CU invited Colorado State to come out and play in our dusty old cowtown on Saturday.
Kind of stinks to be the Rams or Buffs right now, doesn’t it?
College football has not been in such a depressed state in Colorado in 20 years.
The Buffs are reeling from five straight losses, which got their old coach fired and made their new coach angry. But that’s nothing compared to the trouble CSU has seen lately. The Rams are trying to stay one step ahead of the law.
Seldom have two football teams with so little love for each other needed to hook up so urgently, in the hope of giving every CU and CSU alum in the state a reason to wear school colors again with pride.
When the Buffs and Rams should be trading smack talk, CU is instead staring at its cleats, trying to explain the inexplicable, a loss against a Division I-AA foe that opened the Dan Hawkins coaching era with a thud.
Far worse, at Colorado State, coach Sonny Lubick must skip the X’s and O’s to discuss recent suspensions and criminal charges against members of his football team. Lubick booted the three accused players, including senior cornerback Robert Herbert, from the squad this week.
Go bowling with the Rams? If felony allegations of bank fraud stick, some CSU athletes might do well to avoid jail.
“It doesn’t make us look good,” Lubick told reporters after a Wednesday practice. “We have for 13 or 14 years been pretty darn solid here, as solid as any program in America. I’d put us up in America with anybody, including Stanford and Duke.”
But what’s really at risk here is far bigger than a coach’s reputation. What’s in danger of happening to college football in Colorado is far more costly than the shame of surrendering 70 points in a conference championship game.
Any state resident old enough to have survived the disco fashion error of Buffs wearing those gosh-awful, powder-blue uniforms can tell you when it comes to football fever around these parts, Broncomania is forever, but what passes for fanaticism for the college game could go poof and be gone as quickly as the two magicians who pulled it out of our thin air: CU’s Bill McCartney and CSU’s Lubick.
Folks in Colorado are not inclined to take NCAA football as anything more serious than an excuse for a tailgate party, as witnessed by the average of 37,000 paying customers between the home openers for the Rams and Buffs last weekend. Heck, Nebraska draws a far better crowd for its spring game.
With booster support far short of their shared ambition to be nationally ranked, it is not enough that CSU and CU have returned their reluctant rivalry to Denver for the first time since 2003. Anything less than another dramatic finish in this series could kill what little buzz there now is for the Buffs or Rams. Of course, an opportunity to market the sport to 75,000 spectators comes with the possibility the line between school spirit and abusive behavior will be crossed.
“We want everybody associated with the game to think, ‘This is great’ rather than ‘This is crazy,”‘ said Bohn, well aware past games between the schools in Denver have been plagued by rowdies throwing beer on a marching band or tear gas being fired into the stands.
On the Broncos’ home field, where the local NFL franchise has folks in a frenzy with fresh Super Bowl dreams, there will be a showdown for survival between two proud football schools now left to wonder where the glory years went. The loser will not only be hurt, but ignored.
Forget the statewide bragging rights between CU and CSU.
This time, the Rams and Buffs desperately need to win this game simply to remain relevant in Colorado.
Staff writer Mark Kiszla can be reached at 303-954-1053 or mkiszla@denverpost.
