Hawkins a Gary Busey Look-a-Like?

-I don't know about the Gary Busey look-a-like comment but the Coloradoan.com has put out a great article on Dan Hawkins and his recruiting success. It is still amazing to me that he was able to lure Ryan Miller, Gatorade Player of the Year, two years ago, Darrell Scott from Texas, Lynn Katoa from LSU and Jon Major from Oklahoma plus many others whom seemed unattainable after 2 - 10 and 6 - 7 seasons. This quote is awesome from WR Josh Smith during his recruiting process with Hawkins:

"When Hawkins first came through the door and blew the roof off when he first recruited me, Darrell knew what he was all about," Smith said. "He just came in screaming and yelling. The neighbors were like: 'what's going on?' I felt his energy when he came into my living room and sat down. I just knew that something about me and my game was going to explode as well.

"He's just cool, and that's the point. You want to play for a guy like that."

-Check out Josh Smith and Darrell Scott do a little on camera interview for 9news. "Uncle Josh" interviews "Nephew Darrell." A little comedy going on between the family members. Josh should keep his day job, though! Here is an article from sportingnews.com that looks at all the attention Mr. Scott is bring to Boulder on a national level.


-The Wizard of Odds, a great college football blog, is previewing the 25 worst college football teams and what do you know, Colorado State is on the list at #23. Buffs need to blow the top off in the first game and make a statement...35 - 10 sounds about right. Take care of business against Eastern Washington who will be coming off a game against Texas Tech (brutal back to back for EWU) and then have 11 days to prepare for the Thursday night showdown with West Virginia. Speaking of West Virginia, looks like they are trying to get the entire state to come out to Boulder for the Thursday night game. Buff fans, buy tickets and don't sell them to WV fans!

-Neil Woelk of the Daily Camera reports on something we have been saying since we say the Day 1 training camp pictures...the Buffs are big. They look bigger than past teams and the freshmen look like they are ready to play. Early big boy awards go to LB Doug Rippy, LB Shaun Mohler, OL Curtis Cunningham, RB Darrell Scott, LB Lynn Katoa and OT Nate Solder.

-No Mason Crosby, no Kevin Eberhart...kicker is something that the Buffs haven't had to worry about in the past few years. There might be a little worry this year as two unproven kickers are battling for the position.

-Check out some Daily Camera video feed from media day yesterday interviewing D.J. Dykes and Ray Polk.



-Sports Illustrated has ranked the Buffs #36 in the country, a similar ranking to what rivals.com gave the Buffs. At that standing, the Buffs would be the #6 team in the Big 12 which would be a great move up into the upper echelon of the Big 12. And we are ranked ahead of the Huskers so that is always a good thing.

Ranking the Players

Rivals.com is concluding their top 15 returning Buffaloes for the 2008 season with the #1 spot being revealed tomorrow. Since we already know who will be the #1 player, we decided to release it early (see below) and have a little discussion about it. First off, I think the list is pretty good. I mean there are 22 starters so you know that you can narrow down a list of 15 pretty easily especially for the Buffs where you can't put any CB's on the list. So right there you are down to 19 players to choose from. Although this list calls for returning Buffs, you could tell how bad rivals.com wanted to put Darrell Scott on this list and validate there #1 RB ranking recruit by not placing a single RB on the list. I would have thrown Sumler on the list as he has a strong possibility to start or at least see a good number of carries in the early going.

The 10 - 15 players aren't worth arguing about too much as most of them are unproven or slotted. I would have moved Williams to #15 or have him replaced by Sumler, Dykes up to #12 and Smart to #13. I think Dykes will be critical this year to aiding the CB's. There is a reason there are no CB's on this list so an emphasis will need to be placed on the safeties for the success of the defense. Williams is the wild card. If he plays to his potential, he has top 5 ability and could make the offense even more dynamic.

Slots 5 - 10 get me excited. A strong mix of experience mixed with an influx of youth and potential playmakers. Ryan Miller is hands down going to be an All American candidate within the next couple of years. A first team freshman All American last year, look for him to continue his maturity and we look forward to the next 3 years with Miller. He probably should be in the top 5 but I will address that next. We love the Smith/McKnight combination at the WR position. With Simas being ineligible for the year, the youthful duo will need to step up even more to solidify the outside and the success of Cody Hawkins. Smith has big play ability and McKnight will be the possession guy that the Hawkins offense needs. Similar to Miller, the next 3 years with these guys could be very fun. Ryan Walters and Riar Geer could be the two players we look towards at the end of the year as integral parts in the success or lack thereof for the 2008 season. Both are seasoned veterans on offense and defense, Geer will bring experience to a offense full of young skill players. I always believe that a talented DL is the most important part of a defense (I am a Broncos, see how bad our defense is, see how bad our DL is) but, as I said above in regards to Dykes, Walters will need to be the anchor of the defense.

The top 5 could use some re-organization in my opinion. I wouldn't include Brandon Nicolas in my top 5. He is a strong player but to be in the top 5 you need to have more than 3 sacks and 37 tackles from a year ago. The trio of Nicolas, Lucas and Hypolite should be a strong point for the Buffs this year but only Hypolite is worthy of a top 5 ranking. I would move Ryan Miller up to the # 4 spot, put the potential Rimington award winner, Daniel Sanders, at the #3 spot, the potential Nagurski award winner, George Hypolite, at #2 and Cody Hawkins at #1.

As you can tell from our recent poll, Hawkins is looked at as the most crucial player to the Buffs success this year. He was a honorable mention freshman All American last year and playing in the QB 12, I mean the Big 12, with all of the high flying offenses, Hawkins will need to keep the train rolling, keeping the defense off the field and playing with a lead. If Hawkins can get his touchdown to interception ratio improved to a 3:1 level, we could be in for a treat in Boulder. He will be tested early with speed defenses in West Virginia, Florida State and Texas. No doubt the Scott, Sumler, Ray Polk trio with a little bit of Brian Lockridge sprinkled in will take the pressure off Hawkins. I also think that Hawkins will thrive in a no huddle, high intensity offense that the Buffs have implemented. The key for Hawkins success will be his ability to remain poised, go through his progression & reads and remember his technique. A year of experience will be instrumental in his improvement in all of these categories.

15 S Daniel Dykes

14 LB Michael Sipili

13 WR Patrick Williams

12 LB Jeff Smart

11 LB Brad Jones

10 WR Scotty McKnight

9 DL Maurice Lucas

8 WR Josh Smith

7 OL Ryan Miller

6 TE Riar Geer

5 S Ryan Walters

4 QB Cody Hawkins

3 OL Daniel Sanders

2 Brandon Nicolas

1 *(George Hypolite)

*Not released on rivals.com yet

Why does the Big 12 World Revolve Around Kansas City?

I am not going to harp on it but there are other cities in the world than Kansas City but the Big 12 does not know that (see my previous rant on Kansas City). Media day should be fun in the 90 degree weather with 70% humidity tomorrow when the Buffs take the podium to answer questions about the upcoming season. The Buffs will be represented by Dan Hawkins, S Ryan Walters, DL George Hypolite and C Daniel Sanders. I think we might want to rethink who we are sending especially the big fellas...don't want them to lose weight for the upcoming season do we?

Or maybe the Buffs should just send freshman RB Darrell Scott and no one else seeing how much attention he is getting recently. Already being talked about as being the savior of CU football to being name the Big 12 Newcomer of the Year to this blog already naming him the #27th ranked RB in college football. I just hope that Scott can shoulder all of the attention he is getting. He will have a huge target on him this season.

Anyway, stay tuned tomorrow for some good info on how the Buffs handled the media.

Early Over/Under Odds for Wins

At The Ralphie Report, we love to look at the odds and if the deal seems sweet enough, we will throw down some coin...all legally of course in Vegas. Lets just say Kansas against the spread was very friendly to one of us last year. Throughout the year, we will definitely have our Friday odds analysis for the Buffs and other teams. With that being said, if any of you listened to the Herd on ESPN Radio yesterday, he was stoked, like us, about the release of win over/unders and a bunch of other gambling related material. Now we get to see what the experts in the casinos think!

I was excited until I saw that Vegas Insider predicts the Buffs to be 10th in the Big 12 and winning only 5 1/2 games. Only Baylor and Iowa State have lower expectations. Even Kansas State is picked to be better than the Buffs. Looking at Kansas State's schedule, they are only guaranteed 4 wins in my opinion - North Texas, Montana State, Louisiana-Lafayette and Iowa State but they are slated to win 6 1/2 games? Vegas must be very worried about the Buffs schedule. We will still predict seven wins with some light at the end of the tunnel towards the end of the year. I think the Kansas and/or Florida State games are going to be pivotal in getting to that 7 or 8 win season. Oklahoma is picked to win 10 games behind only USC with 10 1/2 and tied with Florida and Ohio State. Vegas is holding Georgia at 9 wins which is most people's National Champion. Below is the wrap up of the win expectations for the Big 12.

Team	Expected 2008 victories
Oklahoma	10
Missouri	9 1/2
Texas	9
Texas Tech	9
Kansas	8
Texas A&M	7
Oklahoma State	7
Nebraska	7
Kansas State	6 1/2
Colorado	5 1/2
Baylor	3 1/2
Iowa State	3 1/2

In terms of favorites to win the National Title, USC is the top choice at 3:1, Florida is 5:1 and Oklahoma is 6:1. Colorado is 100:1 along with Kansas State and Oklahoma State. Baylor and Iowa State were not on the board.

Team	Odds
Oklahoma	6:1
Missouri	10:1
Texas	10:1
Kansas	25:1
Texas Tech	50:1
Texas A&M	75:1
Nebraska	75:1
Colorado	100:1
Kansas State	100:1
Oklahoma State	100:1

If I were a betting man and I am, I would take the over on the Buffs. I am guessing that the line will move to 6 1/2 due to all of the optimistic press the Buffs have been getting over the past 6 months. I would take the under on Kansas State at 6 1/2 games (see above), under on Baylor at 3 1/2 (probably a harder schedule than the Buffs), over 9 for Texas Teach (nice cupcake non- conference and home vs. Texas), Kansas on the under 8 (I have a hunch), under on Oklahoma State winning 7 games and I would probably layoff Oklahoma, Texas, Nebraska and Texas A&M as those look pretty legitimate. Most confident picks would probably be Baylor, Kansas State and Colorado in that order. And at 50:1, don't you have to put down a hundo on Texas Tech? I was just talking to a work buddy and said, "Tech always finds a way to blow a couple of games that they shouldn't (see CU and OSU last year)" but they also beat...I mean manhandled Oklahoma last year (the game was never close as the score seems to show). It will probably come down to the game in Norman next year but still at 50:1 and that spread offense, thats a good value.

Barringer Qualifies for Olympics, Other Buff News

--Jenny Barringer, the star of the CU Track & Field time, has qualified for the Olympics and will be off to Beijing. Last night at Hayward Field on the University of Oregon campus, Barringer finished third in the 3,000 meter steeplechase. Barringer was expected to win the event as she set the fastest time in America this year during her collegiate season and won the World Championships two years ago. Expect Barringer to compete for a medal next month. The good thing for the Buffs is that Barringer is back next year to dominate the Big 12.

--The West Virginia Charleston Gazette has previewed the Colorado and West Virginia game coming up in Boulder. It seems to me that West Virginia is a little worried about this game. Whether it be new coach Bill Stewart, the Colorado recruiting class, the Boulder altitude or the thought of Oklahoma last year at Folsom field getting upset, the Mountaineers are very cautious of this game. This is a CU Blog and I am 100% pulling for the Buffs but if the Mountaineers return the same speed I saw them live put on the field versus OU in the Fiesta Bowl, the Buffs are going to be in for a very long day.

--Note to Bruce Feldman, Toledo and Miami of Ohio are not powerhouses! How in the world does CU not get on the top 10 list for the hardest non-conference schedule. I am not so much disappointed on the Buffs missing the list, its teams like Michigan making the list. Look at the adjectives he uses to describe the opponents for the Wolverines. "A very underrated Utah team, Miami of Ohio "a team projected to be in the hunt for a MAC title," Notre Dame (come on, I love the Irish but they sucked last year and they will be really young) and then he says Toledo and tries to validate it with "they beat Iowa State last year." Ridiculous. I can't even laugh at this. How does CU not beat this! So they play Eastern Washington but FSU and West Virginia run circles around all of these teams and probably beat Notre Dame handedly. Also on the list include Troy, East Carolina and Marshall

The Last Day of June News

--Derek Tolan, the ace of the CU Golf team, won the Colorado Golf Association State Public Links Championship on Sunday at Fox Hollow Golf Course. Tolan, who represented the Buffs in the NCAA Golf Championships earlier this month, beat out Pat Grady, a fellow senior Buffalo and defending champion.

--In football news, 2008 recruit Paul Vigo, a 6’ 1”, 205 lb. athlete from New Jersey will not be on the field August 4^th when the full team is supposed to report to Boulder for the upcoming season. Vigo will enroll in January and will grey shirt his first year on campus. Details are hazy on this but an article at the Camera said it was not academically related. Vigo was one of those last second recruits to commit to the Buffs on signing day. He would have most likely red shirted anyway but hopefully Hawkins can get him in earlier than January to start getting him entrenched in the playbook.

--Check out all the Track & Field Buffs who are trying to or have already qualified for Beijing. Very impressive.

Rivals.com Ranks the Buffs, High Rollers Buying Up Folsom Suites

Rivals.com's annual Preseason Countdown cracked the top 40 last week and we were ecstatic and a bit apprehensive that the Buffs were rated this high. Last year, Rivals season ending rankings had the Buffs as the 56th team in the nation. With the recruiting class coming in and an extra year of experience for the current roster and coaching staff, Rivals feels that the Buffs are now the #34 ranked team in the nation. We were ecstatic because, once again, we see the Buffs on the up and up. Recruiting has been solid and youth is starting to turn into experience. We are a little apprehensive about seeing the Buffs crack the top 40 for a few reasons, though. First off, the Buffs had 20 freshman play last year meaning that we will have around 20 sophomores playing this year which is better than freshman but this is still a very young team. Second, as Rivals says, the schedule is like a "tough steak sandwich, its reasonably soft on the top and bottom but darn tough in the middle." Third, the Buffs lost two All-Americans on defense and as Rivals successfully notes, the secondary is a major concern for the Buffs. There is a lot of expectation for this team with a top 15 recruiting class coming in and a bowl appearance season last year. That bowl season was only attained by two major upsets against OU and Tech with embarrassing losses versus Iowa State and Kansas State. We just think the Buffs are still one year away. Hopefully we are surprised.

Rivals.com really likes the Buffs line on both sides of the ball with potential All-American George Hypolite anchoring the defense and Ryan Miller, Daniel Sanders and Nate Solder being solid offensive lineman. Darrell Scott has to like that. My favorite part of the piece was the bit highlighting WR Patrick Williams and DL Brandon Nicolas, two talented players with high expectations year in and year out who have consistently disappointed. Check out this blog by the Columbia Tribune detailing the best WR's and TE's in the Big 12. Williams in on the list but he has had 3 years of experience and he is consistently below players with less experience in terms of productivity. Williams has all of the physical tools to be a great player but I look for WR's Scotty McKnight and Josh Smith, both Sophomores, to be the go to guys. Also, look for Shaun Mohler, a JUCO transfer and stud, to make a big impact at LB. And they also mentioned that Darrell Scott guy a few times too!

In other news...

--The High Rollers in Boulder want to watch the Buffs next year. All of the suites and a large chunk of the club level seats have sold out. Mike Bohn continues to go out and meet across the nation with alumni and donors. Hopefully the money keeps rolling in. Especially since this article shows that Texas has an athletic budget of $150 million, about 3 times the Buffs.

--Many of the Track & Field athletes are competing for a chance to represent the U.S.A in the Olympics. Former Buff Kara Goucher has already clinched a spot in the 10,000 meters.

Wednesday Buffalo Bites

--Looks like the Ex-Buffs armed robbery duo will be charged today. Its a sad story but at the same time, very embarrassing for the program especially since it happened in Boulder near the campus. The team has a lot to prove to the CU administration and staff to gain its credibility back in terms of being thought of as "good citizens." I know its not fair but once again, that is the expectations around playing Division 1 football.

--On a funny note, if anyone listened to the Herd this morning on ESPN radio, he was commenting on college football players committing crimes and the success level of their respective teams after the dismissal of Alabama LB Jimmy Johns for selling drugs. The Herd jokingly said something to the effect of "Bama is now a national title contender. Just look at all of the championship contenders like FSU, Florida, Ohio State, LSU...they all have off the field issues. Duke and Vanderbilt no off the field incidents and they aren't competing for anything." Under this logic, Colorado is a couple more arrests away from making it to the big time.

--Former Colorado Basketball star, Richard Roby is highlighted in a rivals.com article, if you have access, discussing his desire to play in the NBA. Roby, since getting injured in the NBA pre-draft camp, has fallen off of many draft boards and looks to be heading for Europe. The NBA draft is coming up Thursday night.

--Speaking of rivals.com, they are counting down the 2008 College Football pre-season rankings from the bottom up. They are currently on #37 with Florida State taking that spot. No sign of the Buffs yet which is a good thing as they continue to get respect on a National level. I probably jinxed them with the post and they will show up as #36. They can't go much longer with that ridiculous schedule.

--Former Buffs WR, Dusty Sprague has been added to the Colorado Crush (AFL) practice squad in preparation for the upcoming playoffs.

--We need football so this blog doesn't turn into a CU blog about Track & Field. On that note, two Buffs on the Track & Field team are going to compete in the U.S. Trials.

--67 days until kickoff at Mile High Stadium

The Ralphie Report Presents...The 1st Annual SBNation Preseason Big 12 Team Selection

While we anxiously await the 2008 - 2009 college football season, we at the Ralphie Report have decided that since everyone with a PC is predicting the outcome of the upcoming football season, that we should get some fellow big 12 bloggers at SBNation to join us in selecting the 1st Annual Big 12 Team. The selection process is two-part. First, we ask the representative blogs of each team in the Big 12 to submit from each of their respective rosters the following number of players at each position whom they wish to nominate- (1) QB (2) RB (2) WR (1) TE (3) OL (3) DL (2) LB (3) DB (1) K (1) P. Most of the sites have posted their selections on their blog so go and check them out as they come up. Here are the rosters which the sites will be choosing their team from. Instructions for the next phase of the process are included on the first page. What we need from you, CU fans, is to help us pick our team or offer us any insight before we submit and go to round 2 of the process which all representatives will be choosing from the master list to hammer out our first ever Big 12 team. The catch...no site can pick players from their own team in phase 2. Should be interesting.

Here is how our team shapes up right now -

• DB - Gardner McKay, Daniel Dykes, Ryan Walters
• DL - George Hypolite, Maurice Lucas, Brandon Nicolas
• K - Jameson Davis
• LB - Michael Sipilli, Brad Jones
• OL - Ryan Miller, Daniel Sanders, Nate Solder
• P - Matt DiLallo
• QB - Cody Hawkins
• RB - Demetrius Sumler, Brian Lockridge
• TE - Patrick Devenny (would have picked Geer here but his season is in jeopardy)
• WR - Josh Smith, Scotty McKnight

You agree...disagree? Let us know.

Preseason Magazines Everywhere

Here is a little excerpt from Phil Steele's Magazine. More to come from Athlon, Lindy's and Steele's Magazines. Colorado continues to get mentioned in the top 10 most difficult schedules coming in at #8 in Steele's Rankings.
Looking at the other 7 teams ahead of Colorado, Washington has two national non-conference contenders in BYU and Oklahoma on their schedule along with Notre Dame and USC. In a pressure filled year for Ty Willingham, this is not a great season opening schedule with an 0 -3 start likely. They do have most of their tough games at home. I still think most of the PAC 10 teams are overrated like Oregon after losing Dixon, California is coming off a down year and UCLA with newly acquired Slick Rick and no QB (who knows what will happen their). Arizona State should be a contender but do they have a defense and will Carpenter continue to be a hot head? Washington State, Arizona, Oregon State and Stanford will still be mediocre to bottom tiered teams in the conference. But there is no denying the USC, OU and BYU will be difficult. No one should have to play OU and USC in the same year.

Its pretty close between Baylor and Colorado as the #1 Big 12 schedule...Steele must put a lot of stock in Oklahoma. Everyone on Baylor's conference schedule is on CU schedule with the exception of OU and Texas Tech and adds Wake Forest, Wash St and UConn to the non conference schedule. Colorado has West Virginia, Colorado State and Florida State plus Orange Bowl Champion Kansas. I think Kansas and Tech is a push. West Virginia beat an OU team last year, I know it is last year but it is still a close match-up. The battle is between Wake Forest and Florida State and the edge might go to FSU because it is in Florida and Wake is in Waco but CU does have Eastern Washington the schedule. Either way, both schedules are very hard.

The First of Many Season Previews...

Sunday Morning Quarterback has posted their season preview for the Buffaloes. It's a good write-up but I think he underestimates CU quite a bit. I especially think our run defense will be better than just slightly "above average". I just keep coming back to that schedule though, it's going to be a killer.

Buffs Lighten Football Schedule

What do the following teams have in common: West Virginia, California, Hawaii, Georgia, Oregon, Washington and LSU? These are just some of the home and home non-conference games that the Buffs had in the next decade...enough big time BCS schools to make every Buff fan cringe. And when you add the Big 12 schedule on top of these games you start to question the sanity of the athletic department. Here is a glimpse into 2010 and some of the notable opponents...Colorado State, @ California, Hawaii, Georgia, @ Missouri, Texas Tech, @ OU, @ Kansas, @ Nebraska. The next year they were supposed to swap LSU for Georgia but in a great move based on the teams the Buffs are already lined up to play, the University announced that Fresno State would be taking the LSU spot for the 2011 - 2013 season in which the Buffs were able to get a 2 for 1 home scenario. I know Fresno is not a pushover because I was sitting in the endzone when David Carr torched the Buffs at Folsom in the first game of the year in 2001. Buffs win that game, they are probably in the National Championship. But lets face it - Fresno State or LSU? All in all, this was a great move for the Buffs. Yes, every Buff fan would love to see the Bayou Bengals roll into Boulder but its about taking a page from the Big 10's book of success...don't kill yourself in non-conference.

Other Friday Morning News -

Rivals.com list Colorado along with North Carolina, Pittsburgh, Michigan State, Washington and Alabama as teams who could rise to new heights within their respective conferences.

Derek Tolan moved down the leader board yesterday from 10th to 44th after shooting a 5 over 77 in the second round of the NCAA Championships in Indiana yesterday. Only the top 6 individuals not on a team will make the cut for the final round Saturday and as it stands now, Tolan is 15th of individuals not on a team. He is three shots off the pace to make the cut.

The Track & Field NCAA Championships get underway today. The Buffs Men's Team is fresh off a Big 12 Championship win and hope to have similar success in Lincoln, Nebraska this weekend.