College Football

Deion Sanders' impact at Colorado: Sudden, remarkable and game-changing

Published Apr. 12, 2023 9:51 p.m. ET

In a little over a week's time, Colorado will hold its spring football game. And it will be a sellout.

It was clear as far back as February that the game would be a sellout. But that's not all.

It will also be a sellout that is shown in front of a national TV audience. It will be a sellout during a weekend when the Denver Nuggets are the Western Conference's No. 1 seed in NBA playoffs and will be hosting a home playoff game.

All of this just four months after the Buffaloes finished 1-11.

The Associated Press — the news service of record — chose to write about this moment in the zeitgeist because it is not just significant to college football fans, but to the nation.

More than 45,000 people are likely to descend on Folsom Field, which means more people will attend this Colorado spring game than the last nine Colorado spring games combined. It's likely to be the best attended "game" the Buffaloes will see since Oct. 5, 2019, when Folsom Field was sold out for a game against Arizona after a 3-1 start to the season.

Wildcats quarterback Khalil Tate returned from injury and threw for more than 400 yards in a 35-30 win. In 2017, Tate rushed for 327 yards against Colorado — an FBS record for a quarterback.

"Colorado holds a special place in my heart," said Tate after the 2019 victory.

The Buffaloes won just five games in 2019, and they haven't won more than that since 2016. They've won 10 games in a season just twice in the 21st century. The last time many folks thought of Colorado as nationally relevant, Kordell Stewart was playing quarterback and Rashaan Salaam was running away with the 1994 Heisman Memorial Trophy, rushing for more than 2,000 yards in an 11-win season.

Not long after Stewart and Salaam left the program, so did the Buffaloes' national relevance. But the hiring of Sanders has, remarkably, changed everything. Boulder has not only experienced a rising hope locally but has also become a source of national intrigue inside and outside the sport.

During the spring game on April 22, most folks will look for him — perhaps merely to get a glimpse of him in a cowboy hat and sunglasses. But he has flipped the Buffaloes into a team people care about not just because of who he is, but because of his coaching acumen and what he has accomplished in just three years as a head coach.

Sanders is a singular college football coach who won back-to-back SWAC titles, made back-to-back appearances in the Black college football national title game, and coached Jackson State to an undefeated regular season this past season.

College football aficionados know this, and they'll tune in to see what he does with this team. They'll tune in to watch his son, Shedeur Sanders, who was one of the best quarterbacks in the sport last season regardless of the level of competition.

They'll tune in to watch the top two cornerback recruits of the last two years — and the 2022 No. 1 overall recruit — out on the numbers.

They'll see former Alabama defensive backs coach and 247 Sports' National Recruiter of the Year, Charles Kelly, coordinating the defense.