FORT COLLINS — Michael Gallup leapt from the turf, two-hand snatched the football over an outstretched defender, and suddenly, it seemed the rules of gravity need no longer apply. Through chilled October night air for a sold-out homecoming crowd at Sonny Lubick Field, Gallup did not fall — he floated forward five yards — and then crashed inside the boundary with a highlight-reel reception worthy of a national television audience on ESPN 2.
“You look at the defender’s face,” Gallup said, “and he’s just kind of looking real sad.”
Consider the college football world on notice.
Through the course of a roller-coaster 44-42 Colorado State victory Saturday against Nevada in which the Rams trailed by 11 late in the third quarter, Gallup neared a program record for single-game receiving yards (263) and three of his 13 receptions went for touchdowns to keep the Rams (5-2, 3-0 MW) perfect in their start to Mountain West play. And many of Gallup’s biggest catches were similar to that physics defying second-quarter grab — over a defender in one-on-one coverage.
“The rule is, give (Gallup) a chance to make a play,” Bobo said. “He wanted the ball all night and every time we threw it to him, he came up with the play.”
Gallup’s monster performance was also aided by the stellar production of his teammates. Quarterback Nick Stevens went without an interception for a third straight game and passed for 384 yards with four touchdowns. Tailback Dalyn Dawkins added 191 yards on 17 carries with a score. And CSU especially thrived on big-play production: 10 receptions of at least 15 yards and six rushes of 10 or more yards.
As dominating as the Rams’ offense performed Saturday, though, their defense was often equally as unimpressive. Nevada (1-6, 1-2) scored on three completions of 50 or more yards, converted a fake-field goal attempt that led to a touchdown and reached the end zone on three of four red zone trips.
But after CSU regained the lead with a pair of touchdowns from Dawkins and Gallup, its defense made the one stop that mattered most. Nevada faced first-and-10 at the Rams’ 35-yard line, needing only a field goal to win with less than two minutes left. CSU responded by stuffing a first-down run and forcing three-straight incompletions for a turnover on downs.
“I think I had a heart attack there at the end of the game,” Bobo said. “There were a lot of things that we didn’t do well, but I thought the fight was tremendous all night.”
None more impressive than Gallup, even if he mostly shrugged off the performance during a postgame interview.
“I don’t know if itap as good of a game that I could have,” he said — despite being three yards shy of breaking Olabisi Johnson’s single-game receiving record (265) from last year’s Famous Idaho Potato Bowl.
Gallup began the year in relative national anonymity. Not anymore. He now leads the nation in receiving yards (948) as the Rams travel to face New Mexico at 8:15 p.m. Friday.