Pick one: San Diego or San Antonio?
We tried our hardest, but our support wasn’t enough to power the Houston Cougars or Arizona Wildcats to upset victories this weekend. Instead, the BYU Cougars and Arizona State Sun Devils took care of business and will face each other in the Big 12 Championship this coming weekend.
All of ASU, BYU, Colorado and Iowa State finished 7-2 in the Big 12 standings. The first tiebreaker is head-to-head record, but only ASU and BYU played each other this season; otherwise, it was determined by record against common opponents. That favored the Devils and Cougs, although I haven’t dug into the matchups to figure how exactly it happened.
Colorado will be disappointed after the season they had. The Buffs tore through most of their conference schedule, including a 52-0 whomping of Oklahoma State, but they were undone by the two Kansas schools in similar fashion. Both K-State and KU tore apart the CU defensive line, their star running backs forced missed tackles, and they controlled the clock to keep Shedeur Sanders off the field.
Of course the Buffs would want a do-over for one or both of those games. It’s not often Colorado football contends for a conference championship. It’s even less common for us to be on the verge of the College Football Playoff, as the winner of ASU-BYU will likely earn a berth as the 12th seed.
As for Colorado, they’re waiting to find out where to go bowling. The Alamo Bowl is one option, but it’s the only place we’ve been in the last seventeen years and the Alamodome isn’t exactly filled with happy memories. The other likely option is the Holiday Bowl in San Diego, where the Buffs would face a representative from the ACC (possibly Miami?). But even that brings up bad times for the old heads, heartbroken the 2001 Buffs weren’t chosen for the BCS title game.
Deion Sanders has already confirmed that Shedeur and Travis Hunter, the Heisman favorite, will play in the bowl game. The Buffs should have a decent shot at their first bowl win since the (now-defunct) Houston Bowl in 2004. At the very least, it’s another chance to see these stars before they set off for the NFL.