The opening weekend of the college football season includes the Rocky Mountain Showdown between the Colorado Buffaloes and Colorado State Rams. Kickoff is at 10:00 EST on Friday, August 30, on neutral ground at Broncos Stadium in Denver. The game is being broadcast on ESPN.
Oddsmakers list Colorado as 12.5-point favorites with the over/under set at 58.5 points. Be sure to check out all of the Week 1 college football odds.
For the Buffaloes, this game marks the beginning of a new era with Mel Tucker taking over as head coach. Outside of five games as the interim coach of the Jacksonville Jaguars in 2011, this will be Tucker’s first game as a head coach. However, his resume is quite impressive. He was a defensive coordinator in the NFL from 2008 to 2014, spent a year on Nick Saban’s staff at Alabama in 2015, and spent the last three seasons as the defensive coordinator at Georgia.
As for Colorado, they are coming off a 5-6 season under now departed coach Mike MacIntyre. The Buffs had a magical season in 2016 when they won the Pac-12 South and ended up 10-4. However, that season is nothing more than an aberration. That was the only time Colorado has been to a bowl game in the last 11 years, so Tucker has his work cut out for him if he hopes to lead the Buffs to the postseason this year.
Ironically, Colorado State has a former Georgia assistant in Mike Bobo as their head coach as well. Bobo and the Rams struggled to a 3-9 finish in 2018. CSU ended the season on a five-game losing streak, so it’s been a while since the Rams tasted victory.
On the bright side, Bobo led Colorado State to a 7-6 record and a bowl appearance in each of his first three seasons at the school, so last year’s season could be just a bump in the road. Nevertheless, Bobo is on the hot seat entering the season and probably needs to get the Rams to a bowl game in order to save his job. Naturally, an upset win over Colorado would help immensely.
The Rocky Mountain Showdown between the two Colorado schools dates back to 1893 and has been played almost every year since then. The Buffaloes have dominated the series, winning four in a row, including a 45-13 win last August.
To be honest, I’m a little reluctant to swallow this many points in favor of the Buffaloes. But Tucker has talked the talk during the preseason, expressing confidence that this won’t be a massive rebuilding process. The Colorado offense also has a great deal of talent, so I don’t think scoring points will be an issue. The Buffaloes won this game by 32 points last year, and I don’t think CSU has improved by 20 points since then. I’ll trust Colorado to cover.
The return of quarterback Steven Montez is what makes me comfortable that Colorado will be able to cover the spread. With a new head coach, there will be changes made to the Colorado offense. The Buffs are expected to run the ball more, which isn’t expected to be a strength this season. But Montez is talented enough to overcome a lackluster running game, especially against a lesser opponent. Montez has thrown for over 2,800 yards in two straight seasons, combining for 37 touchdown passes. He’s capable of throwing for 300-plus yards and multiple touchdowns against a Colorado State defense that’s young and rebuilding.
Playing alongside Montez will be a great set of skill players. The name to know is Laviska Shenault Jr., who came out of the gates flying last year until an injury hindered him the second half of the season. Despite being limited to nine games, Shenault still had over 1,000 yards receiving and has genuine NFL potential. The Buffs also welcome back K.D. Nixon, who quietly had over 600 yards receiving in 2018. Those two have a chance to give the Rams problems all night.
On the flip side, Colorado State will have to replace their top playmakers from a year ago in wide receivers Preston Williams and Olabisi Johnson. Those two combined for over 2,000 receiving yards last year, which is a lot of production to replace. Leading rusher Izzy Matthews has also moved on, so the CSU rushing attack could struggle to get going.
The good news for the Rams is they have some experience at quarterback with Collin Hill, who took over the second half of the 2018 season. But he was nothing special with seven touchdown passes and seven interceptions. As mentioned, he won’t have much of a running game or established stars at wide receiver. The Colorado State offensive line is also in shambles, which could prevent the Rams from taking advantage of a Colorado defense that could be vulnerable early in the year.
I expect both teams to have some level of success on offense in this game. But Colorado has genuine star power on that side of the ball. Once Montez and company get rolling, I don’t think the CSU defense will be able to stop them. Ultimately, that makes me confident that the Buffaloes will be able to cover the 12.5-point spread and extend their Rocky Mountain Showdown winning streak to five games.