BOULDER, Colo. – Colorado’s third spring football season under head coach Deion Sanders comes to an end on Saturday, spotlighting what may have been the most important spring of his entire tenure in Boulder so far.
Yet another national audience will tune in for it – the annual spring intrasquad game at Folsom Field, this time on ESPN2 at 4:30 p.m. ET.
It’s different this time, though. Sanders is no longer the novelty that attracted a sellout crowd in his first spring game here in 2023. He also doesn’t have the star-studded supporting cast he did in last year’s spring game, including two-way star Travis Hunter.
What Colorado does have is a plan. It’s different than the rest. And the foundation was laid for it this spring. Here are five reasons why it was so momentous.
1. Colorado’s strategic investment in Deion Sanders
College sports soon will enter an expensive and cutthroat new era if a legal settlement is approved to allow schools to start paying players directly at around $20 million per school per year.
To compete in this new world, CU went all-in on Sanders, giving him a new five-year contract on March 28 that pays him $10 million per year and more through 2029 and makes him one of only nine public-school head football coaches paid that much.
Before Sanders, CU never paid a coach more than $3.6 million in guaranteed pay. Where will it get the money to pay him and players in 2025 and 2026?
CU’s unspoken answer: You’ve got to spend money to make money. In ticket sales alone, Colorado’s football revenue increased to $31.2 million in 2023-24, up from $13 million in 2022-23, which includes the last season before Sanders’ hiring in December 2022.
Or consider the alternative: What would happen if CU didn’t invest in Sanders and soon had to navigate these choppy new waters without him and the national spotlight he brings? The program would have risked losing relevance, like it did before Sanders in 2022, when the Buffaloes went 1-11.
“He has infused new life and passion into the university on so many levels outside of football, including but not limited to increased applications, diversity in both applications and in attendance at home games and higher GPAs for student-athletes,” said Jeff Crawford, a Colorado donor and graduate. “The future is bright.”
2. More cameras, more money
Sanders has attracted national cable networks to campus twice this spring, in addition to getting legendary actor Denzel Washington to address his team via online video. The NFL Network televised his pro-day event in Boulder on April 4, an event that also attracted more than 150 media members to watch Hunter and Sanders’ quarterback son, Shedeur, work out before the NFL draft. Now the spring game on ESPN2 will be the only college spring game televised by a major national network, not including streaming services or conference networks.
This is the kind of marketing and exposure that only Sanders can bring. And that’s especially important when players are looking for more money to earn from their names, images and likenesses (NIL). National exposure makes his players’ NIL potential more valuable and helps make up for the fact that Colorado doesn’t have the same resources as teams in the Big Ten or Southeastern Conferences.
Sanders is also taking advantage of the national spotlight in the spring at a time when other college coaches have canceled their spring games for various reasons, including the notion that too much exposure leads to roster tampering or unwanted surveillance by opponents.
“We do a good job of exposing our program, so I don’t think we have to sell anything (to recruits),” said Deion Sanders, who also commended reporters Thursday for their coverage of the recent pro day.
3. The Colorado quarterback situation
The Buffs broke in two new quarterbacks to replace Shedeur, who arguably was the best quarterback in school history. One is the celebrated freshman pocket passer, Julian Lewis. The other is a dual-threat veteran with one year of college eligibility left − Kaidon Salter, a transfer from Liberty.
How will Sanders keep both of them happy in an era where players sometimes transfer to a new school in January and then leave for another school by the following May?
The spring game will provide a glimpse.
“I’d like to see them both be doing things where at the end of it, it would be a flip-a-coin who plays,” CU offensive coordinator Pat Shurmur said this week. “That’s what I’m looking for. And I see them challenging each other.”
The Buffs also got two big commitments from transfer players this spring who will aim to help those quarterbacks: speedster receiver Sincere Brown (from Campbell) and Memphis offensive lineman Xavier Hill, who weighs around 320 pounds.
4. Building a pro model at Colorado
As the college game grows more professionalized, Sanders recently got the school to invest in his assistant coaches and built his organizational strategy around an NFL model. Last year, CU had one main offensive line coach – Phil Loadholt, who made $325,000 last year. This year, CU has three offensive line coaches making a combined $775,000. Two of them are former Dallas Cowboys linemen.
Sanders also recently hired Pro Football Hall of Famer Marshall Faulk as the team’s running backs coach and former NFL nose tackle Domata Peko as defensive line coach. In February, Colorado nearly doubled the pay of defensive coordinator Robert Livingston, a former Cincinnati Bengals assistant who will earn $1.5 million this year after earning $800,000 last year.
This is part of how Colorado is marketing itself to recruits: Not only do you get the national exposure that comes with Sanders, but you will learn from the pros. That includes Warren Sapp, a Pro Football Hall of Famer, and Shurmur, a former NFL head coach.
Sanders told USA TODAY Sports this week that “our kids come out here to play for me and this staff. They don’t come out here for a bag (money) because they understand the real finances are garnished in the NFL, not with the NIL.”
5. The transition after Deion Sanders’ sons
Sanders coached his two youngest sons, Shedeur and Shilo, in youth football, high school and at Jackson State before they moved to Colorado. Now both are preparing for the NFL draft on April 24. The transition without them and Hunter at Colorado will test how good Sanders is as a recruiter and coach in new ways.
Earlier this week, he shut down practice and made his players do conditioning runs after noticing lackluster effort.
“That’s the worst practice I’ve been in as a part of this school,” Sanders told the team, as documented by his oldest son Deion Jr.
Now he’s on the hunt for more players in the transfer portal, which opened Wednesday and will stay open through April 25. He could use some running backs after his team finished last in the nation in rushing yards per game in 2023 and 2024.
“We’re gonna run the heck out of the ball,” Sanders said Thursday.
How to watch Colorado’s spring game
Colorado’s intrasquad spring game will be Saturday at 4:30 p.m. ET on ESPN2. The telecast is scheduled to last 90 minutes. Colorado will retire the jersey numbers of Hunter and Shedeur Sanders at the start.
How many tickets have been sold to Colorado’s spring football game?
As of Thursday, Colorado reported 15,100 tickets sold, including more than 5,000 tickets since Monday. That’s a good crowd for a glorified practice in April even if it’s down from 47,277 for Sanders’ first spring game in 2023. It also looks to be a cold and damp spring game for the third straight year under Sanders.
Follow reporter Brent Schrotenboer @Schrotenboer. Email: bschrotenb@usatoday.com