Five Things I Think We Learned About CU After Weber State

Colorado beat Weber State 52-21 on Saturday.

That’s what was supposed to happen. Weber State is an FCS team that gave up 47 points to Southern Utah the week before, and it came to Folsom with a true freshman quarterback making his first career start. CU was supposed to win big, get the backups some snaps, and go home early.

But if you’ve followed this program for any length of time, you know that “supposed to” and “did” are two very different things in Boulder.

Deion Sanders has now coached 39 games at Colorado. CU has won exactly two of them by 30 or more points: 52-0 over Oklahoma State to close the 2024 regular season, and Saturday. This is the same program that led Stanford 29-0 at halftime in 2023 and lost in double overtime. The same program that needed two overtimes to beat Colorado State at home that year.

So yes, CU did what it was supposed to do.

But for this program, that’s news.

Why did it happen this time? I think it may have something to do with leadership.

In July, safety Ben Finneseth was blunt about last year’s 3-9 team. “We just didn’t have the players that wanted to lead and were willing to lead.” That’s a rough thing to hear a player say out loud. It also explains a lot about how 2025 went off the rails.

Last November I wrote that CU needed “more climbers, fewer down-transfers”. Players who were dominating at lower levels and chasing a bigger stage, instead of blue-chip kids escaping a depth chart at a blue blood. This roster is full of climbers. Lamont Lester Jr. came from Monmouth. Tyler Martinez and Naeten Mitchell came from New Mexico State. Gideon Lampron came from Bowling Green. Ernest Campbell came from Sacramento State. Lampron, Mitchell and Vanderbilt transfer Randon Fontenette were team captains at their last stops.

That kind of leadership has been missing in the CU football program.

And it’s why we’re seeing players like Boo Carter have success. Tennessee dismissed Carter last season after a string of behavioral issues. Talent was never the question. In Boulder, surrounded by guys who have led locker rooms before, he’s been a different player. Deion Sanders gave him an “A+” for his attitude in camp, and two weeks ago Carter won CU the game by blocking Georgia Tech’s field goal attempt on the final play in Atlanta.

This locker room expects more. And we’re seeing the results on the field.

On to the five things.

1. Julian Lewis played much better, and nothing else on this list matters as much

Last week I wrote that Lewis was bad against Georgia Tech. I also set a bar for Saturday: “If the Buffs win 38-7 and Lewis throws for 300+ yards, that’s a good day.”

CU won 52-21. Lewis threw for 366.

It was a good day.

His stat line was fantastic. 17 of 23, 366 yards, four touchdown passes, a rushing touchdown and no interceptions. He did nearly all of it before halftime, going 15 of 18 for 331 yards and all four passing scores. He threw for more than 200 yards in the first quarter alone, a school record, and he still hasn’t thrown an interception in his college career.

Now the number I actually care about. Last week I told you yards per attempt is the most predictive stat for an offense’s success, and Lewis averaged 4.59 at Georgia Tech. Against Weber State he averaged 15.9.

15.9 (!)

The advanced numbers moved just as much. ESPN’s QBR had him at 32.6 against Georgia Tech, 105th nationally. This week he posted an 85.2, 14th in the country. His points above average went from -3 to +8.9, so in one week he went from costing CU about three points to adding about nine. He was named the Big 12 Freshman of the Week for his efforts.

I can hear some readers already. “John, it was Weber State.” I know. Two things.

First, QBR already adjusts for the opponent. Lewis’s raw QBR was 97.0. After ESPN docked him for playing an FCS defense, he landed at 85.2. The model accounted for Weber State and still thinks he was excellent.

Second, the big plays didn’t manufacture the average. Three throws went for 66, 63 and 48 yards. Take all three away and Lewis was 14 of 20 for 189 yards. That’s 9.5 yards per attempt, which is still a very good day.

My readers know, however, that there’s always a but. Just ask Jennifer Lopez.

So here we go.

Per DNVR, 348 of Lewis’s 366 yards came off play action. That leaves 18 yards on straight dropbacks. I still want to see Lewis have success when the defense knows CU needs to throw the ball. Also, Weber State sacked him three times, and the first one knocked the ball loose at CU’s 36 and set up Weber State’s first touchdown.

I’m not panicking about this, however, because play action is the plan. Brennan Marion called 15 straight runs at Georgia Tech. On Saturday, Micah Welch ran for 106 yards on 11 carries and became the first 100-yard rusher of the Deion Sanders era. When a defense has to respect the run, play action opens up, and Lewis took everything it gave him.

Northwestern is the next test. Can Lewis win on third-and-8 when everybody knows he’s throwing? That’s the biggest question Lewis still needs to answer.

But last week I said CU wouldn’t win six games if Lewis didn’t play better. He played better. That’s the most important thing we learned on Saturday, and it isn’t particularly close.

2. Fernando Lovo deserves credit for the revamping of CU’s gameday experience

Credit where it’s due. Fernando Lovo tried a lot of new things on Saturday. Not all of them will stick, but the overall experience was a big step forward.

When CU hired Lovo last December, I wrote about the gameday changes he made at New Mexico and guessed he’d bring a version of them to Boulder. The biggest was “Louie Lane,” his free pregame fan zone with a DJ, big screens showing other games and food trucks. I also suggested that CU’s players walk through the fan fest on their way in.

Meet Ralphie’s Road. It’s a free street party on Colorado Avenue at the south end of the stadium, with a big screen showing college football, a DJ, food trucks, games for the kids, and a chance to watch the team arrive and get a first look at Ralphie. It went well. Do yourself a favor and get there early for the next home game.

After our post with gameday suggestions this past March, Lovo reached out, encouraged readers to keep the ideas coming, and told me he was focusing on some of them. A lot of those ideas showed up on Saturday. I’m not going to pretend BuffsBlog redesigned gameday at Folsom. But the AD reads the comments, and that’s worth something.

The new in-game host, Gianna Girardi, is a CU grad who also hosts at Rockies games. She was fine for her first time out and will get more comfortable. [Not that I’m TMZ or anything, but the “kids” tell me Riley Moss and Ms. Girardi are dating, so she’s got good taste in NFL teams if nothing else.]

Bands in the Stands put local musicians on the sixth-floor roof of the Champions Center before kickoff and during breaks. It was fun. For the record, when I wrote about Lovo’s in-stadium approach at New Mexico (fewer straight PA reads, more music worked into the game), my one-word review was “Eh.” I was wrong. It worked.

And the new north end zone video board was long overdue. It replaces a board that, while still better than the scoreboard at Dick’s Sporting Goods Park (come on, Stan Kroenke!!!), was more than ready for a replacement.

49,363 people showed up for an FCS home opener after a 3-9 season. Kudos, Fernando Lovo.

3. The bad: a team that spread CU out found the cracks

After Georgia Tech, I wrote that the real test for CU’s front seven would be “a team that spreads them out and makes them cover.” Weber State was such a team.

Look at how differently the two opponents played. Georgia Tech ran 54 plays and dropped back to pass on half of them. It wanted to run straight at CU’s defensive line. Weber State ran 81 plays and dropped back on 55 of them, 68 percent. It wanted CU’s defenders in space.

	Georgia Tech	Weber State
Plays	54	81
Dropbacks	27 (50%)	55 (68%)
Rushing	30 for 51 (1.7 a carry)	29 for 127 (4.4 a carry)

An FCS offense averaged more than two and a half times as many yards per carry as Georgia Tech did, and finished with 23 first downs. CU had 24.

Pro Football Network’s grades tell the same story. After Week 1, PFN graded CU’s defensive line at 95.5, the best in the country. After Week 2, CU’s line sits at 84.0, 13th.

Some of that Week 1 grade was reflective of Georgia Tech’s surprisingly bad offensive line. This week, Tennessee’s defensive line posted PFN’s fourth-best grade in the country, a 91.5, against the same Georgia Tech offensive line. When two different defensive lines grade out as elite against the same blockers in back-to-back weeks, the blockers are a big part of the story. Georgia Tech’s offensive line isn’t very good.

To be fair to CU, Weber State’s line is very good for an FCS team. It graded at 86.8 against Southern Utah, sixth among FCS offensive lines. But the Big 12 is full of offenses that spread you out and make you cover, and very few of them will line up and run into CU’s strength the way Georgia Tech did.

The secondary was the other problem. Nickel corner Makari Vickers struggled for the second straight week. Per DNVR, Vickers was targeted four times and gave up 90 yards and a touchdown. Weber State receiver Noah Kjar finished with seven catches for 121 yards and two touchdowns, including a 70-yard catch that set up a score.

Last November, I listed Vickers among the Power 4 transfers who hadn’t lived up to the billing. I’m rooting for him. He’s come back from heart surgery, and that deserves real respect. But CU has to put its best cover guys on the field.

Which brings me to Jason Stokes Jr. The Utah transfer played three snaps against Georgia Tech. Against Weber State he broke up three passes, including a fourth-and-5 throw that ended a Weber State drive near midfield. Stokes Jr. was PFN’s seventh-highest-graded cornerback in Week 2 in all of college football.

There’s always a but. Just ask Kim Kardashian.

All three of Stokes Jr.’s pass breakups came in the third quarter with CU up 45-14, against a freshman quarterback. It’s a small sample. But when a guy makes plays, you play him. I think we see a lot more of him in Evanston.

4. Jah Jah Boyd and Toby Anene made the most of every snap

The good news on defense came from two guys.

Jah Jah Boyd played 31 snaps and made eight tackles. That’s a tackle every 3.9 snaps (!), up from the 17 snaps he played at Georgia Tech. The Indiana transfer also forced a fourth-quarter fumble that Carson Crawford recovered. PFF graded him at 92.6, the best mark on the team, and put him on its national Team of the Week.

On a second-quarter drive that ended in a missed 57-yard field goal, Boyd was in on three straight tackles. In the fourth quarter he made three straight tackles again, then forced the fumble two plays later.

Toby Anene was just as good. PFF graded him at 92.0, second on the team, and named him to its Big 12 Team of the Week. His biggest play came right after CU’s worst one. With 13 seconds left in the first half, Boo Carter muffed a punt and Weber State recovered at CU’s 20. On the very next snap, Anene sacked Nate Dahle and forced a fumble, and the half ended before Weber State could try a field goal.

That play was worth three points.

Two honorable mentions on offense. Joseph Williams was targeted four times, caught all four, and turned them into 123 yards and two touchdowns. And Chauncey Gooden, CU’s 380-pound two-way left guard, graded at 86.3 per PFN, the seventh-best left guard in the country in Week 2. Welch’s 106 yards didn’t happen by accident.

5. CU is still the only Big 12 team without a special teams coordinator, and it showed

In March, I wrote that Colorado was the only team in the Big 12 without a designated special teams coordinator, and explained why that worried me:

“Special teams involve a unique alchemy of offensive and defensive personnel, requiring a coordinator who can manage complex substitutions under a 40-second clock. Without a point person, the “bystander approach” can creep in, which leads to alignment errors or wasted timeouts.”

Here’s what CU’s special teams did against an FCS opponent on Saturday:

• Two delay-of-game penalties on the punt team.
• An unsportsmanlike conduct penalty on a kickoff return that started a drive at CU’s 10.
• A holding penalty on the opening kickoff of the second half that started a drive at CU’s 8.
• An illegal formation on a kickoff. It only went away because Weber State was flagged for holding on the same play, which also wiped out a 43-yard Weber State return.
• A muffed punt at CU’s 18 with 13 seconds left in the first half.
• A missed 47-yard field goal.

That’s four accepted penalties for 27 yards, a quarter of CU’s 107 penalty yards on the day, plus a turnover. Delays of game and illegal formations aren’t talent problems. They’re organization problems, and they’re exactly the kind of thing a coordinator owns.

In fairness, there were good moments. Elliot Arnold drilled a 52-yarder. It was the longest field goal by a CU kicker in five years and a program record for the longest made field goal on a first career attempt. He also put seven of his nine kickoffs into the end zone for touchbacks. Punter Damon Greaves averaged 51 yards a punt. And Boo Carter’s block beat Georgia Tech.

But that’s the problem with counting on talent to cover for structure. Week 1 was decided by a blocked kick that went CU’s way. In a conference where games are won at the margins, the next one might not.

Somebody needs to own this. Right now, nobody does.

The CU media industrial complex is (sometimes fairly) scared of asking hard questions to Deion Sanders. It’s time to start asking him why special teams isn’t being prioritized with a special teams coordinator.

In any case, CU is 2-0 heading to Northwestern. The quarterback got better, which is the thing that mattered most. The defense has a matchup problem to solve before Big 12 play, and special teams need someone in charge.

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How to Watch CU Athletics This Week, Sponsored by SportsDeck

Football: Colorado at Northwestern

Saturday, 5:30 p.m. Mountain on FOX

After a week on ESPN+, the Buffs are back on regular television. FOX is a broadcast network, so a digital antenna gets you this one for free (in the Denver area, that’s KDVR FOX31). It’s also on every cable and satellite package.

If you’ve cut the cord, FOX comes with YouTube TV, Hulu + Live TV, Fubo and DirecTV Stream, and FOX One streams it live on its own. One warning for Sling users: Sling Blue only carries FOX in some markets, so check before Saturday. Kickoff is 5:30 p.m. mountain time at Northwestern’s lakefront “stadium” in Evanston (and a shout out to Silver Creek High School’s brand new stadium, which is nicer than Northwestern’s temporary stadium — at least for those of us that have waited for the high school to get a stadium for a long time). The radio call is on KHOW 630 AM.

Volleyball: Colorado vs. Colorado State, twice

Thursday, 7:00 p.m. MT at the CU Events Center on ESPN+
Friday, 6:00 p.m. MT at Moby Arena in Fort Collins, free on YouTube

No. 17 Colorado and Colorado State play a home-and-home rivalry series on back-to-back nights, and the two matches are on two completely different services. Thursday’s match in Boulder streams on ESPN+, like most Buffs home events. Friday’s match in Fort Collins is a CSU home match, and the Pac-12 streams its schools’ home volleyball matches for free on its YouTube channel. No subscription and no login.

Soccer: Colorado at Iowa State

Thursday, 5:00 p.m. MT on ESPN+

The Buffs are in Ames on Thursday. If you have ESPN+, Thursday night is a Buffs doubleheader: soccer at 5:00, then Colorado State at Colorado volleyball at 7:00.

Also this week

• Men’s golf: Vuori Invitational in Rancho Santa Fe, Calif. (Monday and Tuesday), then the Gene Miranda Falcon Invitational at the Air Force Academy (Saturday and Sunday)
• Women’s golf: Leadership and Golf Invitational in University Place, Wash. (Monday and Tuesday)
• Cross country: Roadrunners Invitational in Denver (Saturday)
• Tennis: ITA All-American Championship in Cary, N.C. (Saturday and Sunday)

None of those are televised. Live stats are on CUBuffs.com.

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This section is sponsored by SportsDeck, an app I built after getting tired of finding out my team had played yesterday, on a channel I already had.

Here’s how it works:

You tell it which teams you follow (there are 3,220 teams on SportsDeck across 47 sports leagues) and which streaming and TV services you already pay for. SportsDeck tells you every game your teams play, what time it starts, what channel or app it’s on, and whether you can actually watch it with what you’ve got. It can even show you whether there’s a cheaper way to watch more of your teams’ games.

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You can also get a morning email with your games, viewing information, and biggest team stories before your coffee. There are game alerts and an iPhone widget, too.

Your first month of Pro is free. Get the iPhone app or start at mysportsdeck.com.

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OTITWI (Other Things I Thought Were Interesting)

• Steve Rosenberg’s videos offer a window into Russia from the BBC’s reporter in Moscow. He looks through Russian newspapers, talks to people, and explains what the headlines and everyday encounters reveal about the country. His style is calm, conversational, and often quietly witty (and quintessentially British), making complicated politics easy to follow. They’re especially useful for understanding how events are presented inside Russia and how that compares with what he observes. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XP83oXI_TNE&t=666s
• “I decimated my entire life for clicks.” Why online influencers push shock content. https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/12/us/influencers-social-media-algorithm.html?unlocked_article_code=1.BFE.MoFv.c0Ch5cGTbrZP&smid=url-share
• On Friday night, I played the “guess the 80s and 90s TV show theme song” game with friends while celebrating my friend Jed’s 50th birthday (shout out to Jed!). I have had this song stuck in my head ever since. I’m not happy about it….. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zkD9wzrrhiA
• Holy smokes Siri is (finally!) smart. https://www.wsj.com/tech/personal-tech/ios27-new-siri-sept-14-85416093?st=aTLx6e&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink
• Feather preserved in dinosaur crap provides clues on how birds survived mass extinction. The dinosaur thought it was having a personal moment and now it’s shit is in a peer reviewed journal. Life comes at you fast. https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/feather-preserved-in-dinosaur-dung-could-explain-why-birds-survived-mass-extinction/
• One of my favorite follows on YouTube has been “The Road to the Kenyan Premier League,” which follows a 5th division Kenyan soccer team both on and off the field as it struggles for success in Kenya’s grassroots soccer world. Here’s the latest about a team from a refugee camp that has turned some heads. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVkI8RC3V-4

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More BuffsBlog You Might Have Missed

• CU Football 2027 Recruiting Class: The Front Seven: the defensive line, edge and linebacker commits in Colorado’s 2027 class, including a flip out of Alabama and a Glenville linebacker Ohio State wanted.