BOULDER — Julian Lewis couldn’t cross the Delaware.
Not the Delaware 35-yard line, at any rate.
Kaidon Salter couldn’t throw on the run.
Or past the sticks.
CU’s Big 12 opener is Friday night. Dink and dunk in Houston, under the lights, and the Cougars will have you for brisket.
Which means the best option head coach Deion Sanders has at QB1, right now, is the guy nobody had on their bingo cards on Saturday morning.
Welcome to the party, Ryan Staub.
Sorry.
“Martin Luther Staub,” Coach Prime called him during a postgame chat with FOX Sports after the sophomore powered CU to a 31-7 rout of Delaware at Folsom Field.
Staub is one of those O.B.s — “Original Buffs,” Karl Dorrell holdovers who stuck it out while Deion portaled in people to push them off the roster.
If Saturday afternoon was any indication, the 6-foot-1 Californian’s a tough S.O.B., too.
Thrust into a 10-7 game that saw Salter get wild and Lewis get smushed, Staub led the Buffs to touchdowns — 21 points — on three of his four drives.
Salter, the senior transfer from Liberty making his second start, accounted for 10 points on four drives, with all of those points in the first quarter-and-a-half. Lewis, the five-star recruit and the people’s choice, looked good handing off and terrified on obvious passing downs. The Georgia native got three drives in that didn’t amount to a single point.
“I saw,” Sanders said, “what everybody else saw (Saturday).”
The eyes don’t lie. On one hand, it’s Delaware, the softest cupcake on CU’s non-conference fight card. With their blue-winged helmets, from a distance, the Blue Hens looked like Michigan — until they snapped the ball.
On the other hand, do you want a passing game more diverse than ‘Screen Left’ and ‘Screen Right?’ Only one of the three QBs Coach Prime tested seems truly comfortable dialing up whatever offensive coordinator Pat Shurmur is running.
Only one guy reminded you of Shedeur Sanders a year ago. And not just because Staub celebrated by flashing an imaginary watch for the cameras.
Only one guy was seriously looking downfield in the pocket. Only one guy made linebackers and safeties creep back a little when they saw him behind center — which, in turn, opened up a little more room in the box for the Buffs’ run game.
Only one guy — Staub — averaged more than six yards per pass per attempt (7 for 10, 157 yards) against the Blue Hens. Only one guy turned the Buffs’ wideouts, most notably 6-foot-5 transfer Sincere Brown (four catches, 120 yards), into legitimate home-run threats.
“Those plays, he wasn’t supposed to run a ‘Go’ (route) and I told him to run a ‘Go’ route,” Staub explained later. “If they press Sincere, it’s going up.”
If you press Coach Prime, there’s really only one guy who reminded you of 2024. Only one guy who reminded you of The Shedeur and Travis Show.
“Staub don’t trip, man,” Sanders said. “Some guys just have that thing about them that you want to help them become successful. And he’s that kid.”
He is. No. 16, lest we forget, was also the kid who gave Utah all it could handle at Salt Lake in November 2023, deputizing for an injured Shedeur Sanders in a 23-17 loss. The same fearlessness, the same confidence, the same trust in his arm and his weapons, were all back after a 22-month absence.
CU fans were bracing for a semi-healthy debate between Salter and Lewis when Staub stole the show. Coach Prime said after the game he’d decided a few days ago to give all three QBs snaps. That he would give them each two series apiece to start, regardless of the score, in the mode of an NFL preseason game.
Whether Sanders meant well or not, he also just made a messy CU QB situation messier.
In a pre-portal world, you’d sprinkle in some “Ju Ju” Lewis and ultimately shut the 17-year-old down for a redshirt year. Only super prospects with three cars and a business portfolio don’t really redshirt anymore. Will Lewis, one of the most ballyhooed recruits ever to land in Boulder, accept being passed over for a starting role twice?
Would you simply flip Staub and Salter on the CU depth chart — moving your Week 1 starter, who was 13-for-16 passing on Saturday, to QB3, simply to keep a teenager happy?
“I wanted (the competition) to tell its own story instead of me telling the story,” Coach Prime explained.
Shurmur had a story, too. After the game, he recalled this exchange with thhe Buffs coach as CU got the ball back coming off Delaware’s only score.
That made it 10-7 in the dying embers of the first half, and the crowd was getting squirrelly. How was this a game?
“Let’s go,” Shumur said.
“Well, Staub’s in,” Sanders told him.
“Let’s go,” Shurmur replied.
He went, all right. He went 75 yards on six plays. And in just 36 seconds.
“Now these people are going to salute you,” Shurmur told Staub as the latter walked into the news conference room. Then he almost winked at the assembled reporters. “Don’t let (Ryan) get a big head.”
Staub? No way. Dude kept grinding — and listening — while Shedeur took the Big 12 by storm. While social media screamed for more Ju Ju.
Like Coach Prime said, some guys just have that thing about them. Ryan stuck around.
“To be honest, I don’t know (why I stayed),” Staub said. “I kind of feel (that) I love the process. I really enjoyed being in this building under our coach. I didn’t really know where I was. I stuck my head down and tried to keep working. And I got rewarded for that.”
Staub didn’t trip.
And this next trip is huge.
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