SAN ANTONIO − Tonight’s game between Colorado and BYU in the Alamo Bowl might be the most attractive college football bowl game that is not part of the College Football Playoff.
Count the reasons:
It’s a prime-time Saturday night game on ABC.
It features the reigning Heisman Trophy winner from Colorado, Travis Hunter.
It also features flamboyant Colorado coach Deion Sanders and his son Shedeur, who might be the top quarterback selected in the NFL draft in April.
This will be their last game together in college − the Buffaloes (9-3) vs. the Cougars (10-2), two Big 12 Conference teams on opposite sides of the Rocky Mountains who haven’t played each other since the Freedom Bowl in 1988.
Shedeur Sanders, Colorado’s quarterback, ranks first nationally in completion percentage (74.2%) and will face a BYU defense that finished the regular season tied for first nationally in passes intercepted (20).
Like Shedeur, Hunter also will play the game under a massive insurance policy to protect him in case he’s injured. Because he plays on offense and defense, Hunter’s injury risk is essentially doubled, adding to the drama tonight after so many other top NFL prospects opted not to play in bowl games to avoid any injury risk that could hurt their future earnings.
Will this bowl game be worth it for Hunter and Shedeur Sanders?
We’re about to find out.
Follow along here for live updates, highlights and news:
BYU kicker Will Ferrin kicked a 54-yard field goal as time expired in the first half, extending the Cougars’ lead to 20-0 as Colorado got off to a terrible start in the Alamo Bowl.
Colorado has committed seven penalties for 50 yards, gave up three quarterback sacks for 49 yards and even had an interception from safety Shilo Sanders nullified by an offside penalty. The Buffs also have minus-9 yards rushing, mostly because of those sacks.
Quarterback Shedeur Sanders has completed seven of 10 passes for 70 yards. Heisman Trophy winner Travis Hunter has two catches for 60 yards.
Coach Deion Sanders told ABC at halftime that the Buffaloes will make adjustments to “make it like a new team.”
BYU is playing like it really wants to win this game. Colorado is not. This time, BYU’s Parker Kingston returned a punt 64 yards for a touchdown to help lift the Cougars to a 17-0 lead with 5:32 left before halftime.
Colorado has suffered more quarterback sacks (three) and penalties (four) combined than quarterback Shedeur Sanders has completions (six). The Buffs are scoreless after four possessions.
Colorado got a temporary spark from Heisman Trophy winner Travis Hunter, who caught a short pass near midfield before cutting back and turning on the jets for a 58-yard gain, his longest catch of the season. But then Colorado imploded again. Shedeur Sanders got sacked for a 23-yard loss after he failed to get rid of the ball. Then kicker Alejandro Mata missed on a 48-yard field goal. BYU still leads 10-0 with 11:12 left before halftime.
BYU is trying catch Colorado off guard and win this game early. After kicking a 51-yard field goal late in the first quarter, the Cougars surprised Colorado with an onside kick, which they recovered to give them possession at their own 46-yard line.
But after three plays, Colorado cornerback DJ McKinney intercepted a pass near the Colorado goal line to stop BYU’s uprising, for now.
“I think we’re in a good spot right now,” BYU head coach Kalani Sitake told ABC after the first quarter.
Colorado’s Alamo Bowl team suddenly looks like the Colorado team of 2023, which finished 4-8. On their second possession of the game, the Buffaloes committed two false start penalties and suffered a quarterback sack before punting. BYU still leads 7-0 with less than five minutes left in the first quarter.
Shedeur Sanders has completed four of five passes for only 10 yards on his first two possessions.
Colorado is off to another slow start and is down 7-0 to BYU with 7:10 left in the first quarter. BYU scored on its second possession of the game, capping a 52-yard scoring drive with a 1-yard touchdown run from running back LJ Martin. BYU needed only six plays to score on that possession as Colorado gave up big plays of 28 and 11 yards right before the touchdown.
Coach Deion Sanders put his arms on the shoulder of his two sons as he walked with them and between them shortly before the game. This is his last game coaching Shedeur and Shilo Sanders after coaching them since youth football in Texas. Both are playing in their final game with their college eligibility exhausted after following their father from Jackson State to Colorado.
His oldest son Deion Jr. filmed the walk for his YouTube channel, which chronicles the Colorado football program.
Colorado better hope this is not an omen. Ralphie VI, Colorado’s live bison mascot, made a slow charge out of the game for her pregame run on the field before the Alamo Bowl. She barely ran and then turned around near the 38-yard line before picking up her pace and running back into her stall to be trucked away.
This was her first run at a game outside Boulder since her debut in 2021. She has been tentative on runs even at home, often going slow and short before running back to her truck.
Colorado superfan Peggy Coppom, who turned 100 years old last month, has arrived in San Antonio for the game after Deion Sanders promised before the season that he would get her to a bowl game. She struck up a friendship with Sanders shortly after his hiring at Colorado in late 2022. She and her twin sister Betty are estimated to have attended more than 2,500 Colorado sporting events dating to the 1940s. Sadly, Betty died in 2020 after battling pancreatic cancer. Coppom sat next to Sanders at a team luncheon at a hotel on the Riverwalk Friday before the game.
This is Colorado’s first bowl game since the 2020 Alamo Bowl, when the crowd was capped at 11,000 because of the pandemic. Its last bowl game before that also was the Alamo Bowl in 2016.
Colorado’s live bison mascot made the trip and is expected to run on the field before the game, a rare trip away from home for her. Former pro wrestler Goldberg and former NFL receiver Terrell Owens also were spotted on the Colorado sideline. Both are frequent guests of CU. Goldberg, whose son plays on the team, wore alligator boots and greeted Colorado players as they ran out of the tunnel to the field before the game.
This is the first game trip away from home for Ralphie VI, the bison mascot, who debuted in 2021 and has been tentative on some of her pregame runs in Boulder. The last road game trip for any Ralphie was at the Alamo Bowl in 2016, by Ralphie V.
Colorado declined to disclose this information citing privacy laws. But Deion Sanders announced earlier this week that Hunter and Shedeur Sanders had received a record amount of insurance coverage to protect them in this college football game, paid for by Colorado. Colorado athletic director Rick George described it as disability insurance, though it’s unclear if other types of insurance are involved.
Both Hunter and Shedeur are projected as top-10 NFL draft picks in April and stand to sign multi-year contracts in the range of $20 million to $40 million. Despite the insurance coverage, it’s still a big risk for them to play in this game instead of just skipping it until they get NFL contracts.
Thirty years after the Miracle in Michigan, former Colorado quarterback Kordell Stewart and former Colorado wide receiver Michael Westbrook stood on the sidelines together chatting about two hours before kickoff at the Alamo Bowl.
They are arguably the best quarterback-receiver combo at Colorado to come before Shedeur Sanders and Travis Hunter. Westbrook caught the “Miracle” pass to beat Michigan as time expired in 1994. Westbrook was the No. 4 overall pick in the 1995 NFL draft. Stewart got picked at No. 60 the same year. Both Shedeur Sanders and Hunter are expected to be top-10 NFL draft picks in April.
It’s because of college football conference realignment. The Alamo Bowl had contracts to take the first non-playoff teams from the Big 12 and Pac-12 conferences. But then the Pac-12 collapsed this year with 10 teams leaving for other leagues, including Colorado, which left to return to the Big 12.
Instead of reworking those contracts to reflect the new realignment, the Alamo Bowl will still select opponents from the same two pools of 12 teams: the 12 teams from the former Pac-12 (Colorado) and the 12 teams from the Big 12 before realignment (BYU). It will work this way again in 2025.
BYU did not play Colorado this year but will play Colorado in Boulder in 2025.
Also, Big 12 Commissioner Brett Yormark was spotted on the field before the game Saturday night at this secondary Big 12 championship game of sorts.
The Colorado Buffaloes are favorites to defeat the BYU Cougars in Saturday’s college football matchup, according to the BetMGM college football odds. Looking to wager? Check out the top college football betting apps in 2024 offering the top NCAA football betting promos and bonuses in 2024.
Kickoff is at 7:30 ET Saturday from the Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas.
The game will be broadcast on ABC. Dave Pasch, Dusty Dvoracek and Taylor McGregor will call the game.
The Cougars-Buffaloes game can be streamed on Fubo.
