BOULDER — Down 17-6, with his offense knocking at the TCU 41 late in the third quarter, coach Karl Dorrell went for the throat.
Unfortunately, that throat was his own.
“I think the part that disappointed me the most was in (third) quarter, when we were down 13-6, 14-6, and then especially once it was 17-6, I just saw way too many heads drop,” CU tight end and captain Brady Russell grumbled early Saturday morning after TCU handed his Buffs a 38-13 season-opening humiliation at Folsom Field.
“I saw way too much defeat, when we were still very, very much part of the game. “
Meet the new Buffs. Same as the old Buffs.
Surrender is not a good look for CU. And yet it permeated the home sidelines at Folsom Field late Friday night, a loser’s stench seeping from the top down.
And never moreso than with 18 seconds left in the third stanza as CU trailed by 11, at home, clinging to a winnowing game by the pinkie-tips.
On fourth-and-5 at the Horned Frogs 41, rather than go for it, with 47,868 screaming Buffs fans at his back, Dorrell elected to punt. Naturally, it resulted in a touchback.
Once CU raised the white flag, TCU ran wild. The Horned Frogs scored 21 straight points, outrushing the hosts in the fourth quarter by a margin of 168 to minus-6. A tilt that was expected to be competitive morphed into Gophers, Part II: Hey, At Least The Stadium Didn’t Fall Apart This Time.
“If we started executing like we did in the first half, then we could have made it a game very easily,” Russell continued. “But I saw way too many heads drop. That’s why I’m so mad right now — it’s just that we had too many people give up. And that’s not the team we formed this offseason.”
Meet the new Buffs. Same as the old Buffs.
Players accusing other players of quitting on them. Shoddy tackling. Kick-coverage comedy.
Quarterback J.T. Shrout on the bench to open the second half when he should have been out there, leading the offense, while the outcome was still in doubt. Fans booing QB Brendon Lewis when he comes onto the field. Fans booing Brendon Lewis three plays later when he trots right back off again.
Are you trying to get fired, Karl? Seriously. Because that’s how you get fired.
“There’s a lot of work that needs to be done,” Dorrell said after his Buffs opened a season 0-1 for the first time in seven years. “And that starts with me. I’m not pointing the fingers at any of our players. Our coaches and me, we’ve got to get this thing done. And I’m very confident that this group of coaches will do that.”
The rest of us, though? Not so much. If Shrout isn’t starting at Air Force on Saturday, coach, you’re not trying to win. You’re trying to win an argument. You’re trying to prove a point when you should be worried about actually scoring them.
“I mean, it’s not like it’s just on (Lewis),” Russell said. “I don’t know why everybody feels like the quarterback gets all the blame all the time.”
To be fair, the kid had all kinds of help. Kick coverage? Lost. Defense? Gassed. Fundamentals? All over the place. On TCU’s second back-breaking run on its opening third-quarter drive, Buffs safety Jaylen Striker summed up where CU’s heads are at the moment, in all the worst ways.
Frogs tailback Emari Demercado took a handoff on first-and-20 from the CU 43, streaking clear out of the box when Striker closed. Only with no one behind him, the defensive back took the kind of open-field angle only Teddy Bridgewater could love, ole-ing the ball-carrier in the process. Demercado made one quick cut to his right and jogged untouched into the end zone.
From start to finish, the Buffs’ blocking and tackling looked eerily reminiscent of what we saw last September. So did the adjustments, or lack thereof, coming out of halftime. Once first-year Frogs coach Sonny Dykes and his staff figured out they owned the edges, that the jet sweep was good for about eight yards a pop, the Buffs’ defense collapsed like a 3-foot Jenga tower.
Six new assistants. Same CU.
Lewis is a nice kid. A stand-up kid. He’s not a Pac-12 quarterback. Not yet.
All the stuff offensive coordinator Mike Sanford was brought in to fix came roaring back. The strange pre-snap reads. The checkdowns. The inconsistent throws. If Lewis didn’t miss an open man with his eyes early in the play, he was missing the guy with his arm later.
The sophomore from Texas came out of the blocks with promise, completing six of his first seven throws for 45 yards. It didn’t take long for 2021 Lewis to return, though, all hesitation and confusion. No. 12 completed seven of 11 passes the rest of the way for just 33 yards — or 3.0 yards per attempt.
When your passing game’s mantra is Three Yards And A Cloud Of Dust, that’s the express lane to 2-10. Or 1-11.
“I mean, I think he’s different and better,” Dorrell said of Lewis. “You know, we didn’t have an idea of what he would look like (Friday) … but I didn’t think Brendon played poorly.
“Maybe it was too much pressure on him, who knows? But I’m confident that he’s a better player — I still feel that he’s a better player than last year. So I still will tell that to my fans. Or lack of fans.”
As Dorrell uttered those words, off in the distance, you could almost hear former offensive coordinator Darrin Chiaverini laughing. Laughing and shaking his head.
“I think there’s some stuff ingrained in guys from the past and what this program has been,” Russell said. “And we’ve got to find a way to take that out of their mind.”
You can fool the public, Karl. You can fool the boosters. You can fool the media. But you can only fool a locker room for so long before it revolts. Or bails.
