Now that his pair of star pupils in Travis Hunter and Shedeur Sanders have headed for the bright lights of the NFL, fans and pundits alike have been steadily anticipating a decrease in the hype surrounding the Colorado Buffaloes and their head coach, Deion Sanders.
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Nevertheless, the NFL Hall of Famer turned play caller is beginning to see wins via the transfer portal, suggesting that his surge in the rankings may be far from over. The program has now announced that it has already managed to sell out its season tickets for an unprecedented, consecutive season, putting any and all preconceived notions about a dip in popularity to rest.
According to the host of the Prime Time for College Football podcast, the community in Boulder, Colorado, certainly deserves its fair share of credit as well.
“The support in the community does nothing but lift everybody up. Prime coming in, you see the hundreds of millions of dollars that have been infused into the community, and then boom, you’re going to start seeing some production on the field. The players are feeling, the transfers are feeling it, the recruits are feeling it. They all feel it when they are coming here, they feel the energy that Colorado is producing.”
Thanks to a five-year, $54-million contract extension, the influence that Coach Prime carries with him is set to reside with the Buffaloes for the foreseeable future. Now that he’s become a permanent member of the herd, perhaps it’s time to start focusing on Sanders’ ceiling rather than his floor.
Deion Sanders’ impact on players in the classroom
While the former Atlanta Falcon has been able to resurrect what was once an afterthought of a program, his impact on his players’ performances extends well beyond the field. Well aware of the fact that not every one of his guys will make it to the NFL, Sanders is doing everything in his power to make sure that the young men around him are putting forth as much effort in the classroom as they are at practice.
In fact, the team just announced that its players maintained an average GPA of 2.957, the highest of any Spring Semester in the history of the program and their second-best overall GPA for any semester ever. The best average in program history came last year, when the team posted a Fall GPA of 3.011.
For all of the glitz and glamour that Sanders has brought to the program, the hype has been met with respectable results at every turn. Now that he’s proven himself capable of ensuring that his players are prepared for both Saturday afternoons and life after football, his next challenge will likely prove to be winning a playoff game.
Considering what he’s already been able to accomplish in the span of just two years, fans would be well advised to avoid writing Sanders and the Buffaloes off in 2025.
