2013 UCLA Football Preview

There's no doubt about it, last weekend's loss to Arizona hurt.  It was a prime opportunity for the program to grab a statement win - homecoming, Folsom at night, blackout game - but a series of poorly executed possessions squandered too many first half opportunities.  Once momentum flipped, there was no coming back, and the Buffs had to stand and watch as the Wildcats dominated the second half of the game.

It would be understandable, in the wake of that letdown, for the team to fracture.  We've certainly seen it in the past, as many a CU team disintegrated from within over the last few years. Coach Mike MacIntyre, however, swears that isn't the case under his watch:

"I really think we're a together team, and I really think they're trying hard and playing hard [...] We've just got to play a little better. We've got to do a few more things [...] I don't see factions, I don't see people pointing fingers at each other, I don't see guys not coming to work, I don't see guys not going to class. I see them all doing the things that you see a good football team maturing doing. Now, it takes a process to get it done against good teams." -link

In that vein, I've generally viewed this team as being more together than those from the previous regime.  To this point, I've seen them be genuinely excited when positive things happen, and quick to pick a teammate up - rather than point fingers - when the run of play goes the other way.  You know, like a team who actually cares about sharing the field with one another.

With bowl hopes brain-dead and on life support, however, we'll just have to see if that impression, and MikeMac's comments, stay true over the final weeks of 2013.

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This week, the Buffs travel to sunny southern California to take on a reeling UCLA squad.  Over all team sports, CU only has one win against the Bruins since the start of the Pac-12 era - coming just over a month ago on the hardwood of the CEC, as the women's volleyball team upset the then-#11 Lady Bruins on September 27th.  To get a second win in 2013, this time in football, would take an upset of a nearly unfathomable nature.

Kickoff from the historic Rose Bowl is set for 5:30pm MT on Saturday.  Those of you who have struggled to find the Pac-12 Network on your television package are in luck!  The game will be shown on FOX Sports 1 this weekend, marking the first time since the RMS that the Buffs have been on anything other than P12N.  For those still left in the dark by the new channel, the radio call can be heard on 850 KOA.

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Monday Grab Bag: Bowl hopes dashed

Late in the third quarter, with the game against Arizona quickly slipping away, CU faced a must-convert fourth-and-goal from the Wildcat four yard line.  Down 14 at the time, the Buffs needed the conversion just to stay within reach.

True freshman QB Sefo Liufau walked up to the line to survey his options before the critical play, announcing to the crowd CU's intention to forego the field goal try.  Suddenly, out of the stands in the south end of the stadium, came an obnoxious blare - the band had started playing.  Somehow, wires had been crossed, and the drum major had called a tune prior to this critical play.  Now, CU had a freshman QB trying to bark out signals to his teammates through a wall of unnecessary noise.  It was a major breach of band protocol.

After a frantic series of cutoff signals, the band eventually stopped playing before the snap.  The resulting play, an incomplete pass from Liufau to D.D. Goodson, put the Buffs only further behind the eightball, and CU soon fell apart in the final quarter.

Now, did the band playing cause the resulting incompletion?  No, it did not.  In all honestly, the team was probably so focused they didn't even notice, but the band needs to be smarter than that.  There was no reason to even have something called, let alone actually start playing. As a band nerd, sitting amongst other band nerds, it was probably the most heated I got all game. 

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Today in the bag, I'm talking the football loss against Arizona, the volleyball team's weekend sweep, and the walk-off obstruction.

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Friday Beer Post: 2013 Gameday Beer-o-the-week - Arizona Edition

Each week throughout the football season I'm going to suggest a good beer for the ubiquitous pre-game tailgate. Let's be honest, with tailgates it's not always top quality that you're looking for. To steal a phrase from the heinous beer terrorists at Budweiser, you want "drinkability." (or what a real beer connoisseur calls "a session beer") So, be warned, these may not be "the best" beers around. But, in the words of Dave Chappelle as Samuel L. Jackson "IT'LL GET YOU DRUNK!"

In honor of Homecoming Week, when every alum turns their eyes back to Boulder and their beloved alma mater, I'm looking within City of Boulder proper for my inspiration.  Of all the breweries in town, there is none more esteemed than Avery Brewing.  They take more chances, and produce more quality then any other brewery inside the city limits. 

For this week, I'm tabbing one of their limited releases that gets my goat every time I try it.  That beer, Rumpkin, is this week's gameday beer-o-the-week.

Aged in rum barrels, and loaded with natural pumpkin flavor, Rumpkin packs a seasonal punch for the adventurous beer drinker.  It's brewed with, of course, local-sourced organic pumpkins (apparently from the same source as Upslope's Pumpkin Ale), and spiced with nutmeg, cinnamon, and ginger.  The taste is sweet, with notes of rum left over from the aging.  It comes in at over 18% ABV, and can knock you over after only one bottle.

For those who can still find one of the rare 12oz bottles still floating around Colorado liquor stores and the Avery taproom, give it a try, you won't be sorry.


Happy Friday!  Go Buffs, beat the Wildcats!

2013 Arizona Football Preview

After a solid win over substandard FCS squad Charleston Southern last weekend, the Buffs enter the final weekend of October at a very satisfying 3-3.  To be .500 this late in the season has been unheard of in recent years; in fact you have to go all the way back to 2008 to find a season where the Buffs could claim an even record on October 26th or later.  Dilly bars all around.

Of course, it's a soft .500.  The Buffs have beaten two lower division teams and a below average CSU squad, while being blown out by all three Pac-12 teams they've played.  But that's actually an improvement!  Under the previous regime, even beating the soft underbelly of the schedule was a struggle.  Now with some wins in the back pocket, CU just needs to prove that they can beat a team that can fight back.  Picking on someone their own size, so to speak.

This week offers one of the few reasonable opportunities to do just that.  Arizona, while featuring some national-caliber talent, is not nearly as strong as, say, Oregon St, Oregon, and Arizona St.  What's more, Colorado has looked capable against the Wildcats the last two seasons, including last year's competitive effort in Tucson.  How many other 2012 games could you say the Buffs looked competitive in?  Two?  Three?  In that light alone, Arizona offers a winnable opportunity - the gap between them and CU is thinner than in most other intra-conference matchups. Add in the leverage of a homecoming crowd under the lights of a night kickoff, and this weekend's game is a very seductive pickup opportunitiy. 

If there is any hope - faint and fantastic as it was to begin with - that CU can still become bowl eligible, it is centered on a win in this game.  It's up to the Buffs to keep that hope alive with a strong performance Saturday night.

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It's Homecoming Week!  Welcome back to all the wayward alums who are returning to their old haunting grounds. Kickoff from BLACKED OUT Folsom Field is set for 5:30 PM MT on Saturday.  Coverage is back on Pac-12 Networks, with the radio broadcast, as ever, to be found on 850 KOA.

Click below for the preview...

Monday Grab Bag: Big Saturday on Campus

After an extra day of expectation, I finally received my basketball tickets Saturday afternoon.  What is usually a day of celebration was marred, however, by the spartan design of the stubs this year.

Previously, the tickets had been basic, but functional, at the very least going so far as to put opponent logos somewhere on the face.  Recent season have seen flashier designs, with more risks taken outside of the old template. You can see the design progression in this sample of stubs from each of the preceding six seasons:

Note the use of gray and space in '11-'12 and '12-'13, improve on the the stoic style of the Bzdelik years.  Across the seasons, you can also note that the tickets look printed for a purpose, with each game getting the special treatment of the opponent and permanent inking.

Unfortunately, when you look at a ticket sheet for this season, you're greeted by this bland slosh of muted tones and hastily applied ribbon toner from the 1980s:

What happened?  Where's the color?  Where's the opponent logos?  These look they were printed up on short notice at a high school. 

My only guess is that this is a result of the awkwardly announced 10% cuts requested by interim AD Ceal Barry over the summer.  I suppose it's better to have shitty tickets than a slash in the recruiting budget, but it doesn't change the fact that I'll have to look at these ugly things every time I head up to the stadium this winter.

Now, are the look of season tickets a big issue?  Of course not, but, damn it, I thought after selling out season ticket packages for the first time ever that the basketball nuts of BuffNation had proven that they deserved better than this.  I expect something flashier in 2014-15.

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Today in the bag, I'm wrapping up a strong weekend from CU athletics by talking the win over Charleston Southern, the basketball scrimmage, and the latest recruiting coup for the basketball program.

Click below for the bag...

Friday Beer Post: 2013 Gameday Beer-o-the-week - Charleston Southern Edition

Each week throughout the football season I'm going to suggest a good beer for the ubiquitous pre-game tailgate. Let's be honest, with tailgates it's not always top quality that you're looking for. To steal a phrase from the heinous beer terrorists at Budweiser, you want "drinkability." (or what a real beer connoisseur calls "a session beer") So, be warned, these may not be "the best" beers around. But, in the words of Dave Chappelle as Samuel L. Jackson "IT'LL GET YOU DRUNK!"

I really like the beer that I had picked for the Fresno St game. So much so that I'm going to run it back, and select it again for this week.  A second take at a great beer, if you will.

Eddyline Brewing in Buena Vista brews a fantastic pale ale that all of Colorado can be proud of.  That beer, River Runners Pale Ale, is my gameday beer-o-the-week.

Named after a local raft guiding company, River Runners Pale Ale is exactly what you would expect from an international style pale ale.  You get a lot of hops on the palette, but there's enough balancing malt to assure you they know what they're doing.  It's not as bitter as many in the pale ale family, so don't immediately dismiss it if you're wary of hoppy beasts.

Only available in man-cans (16oz), Eddyline just started wider distribution of the brew after it was awarded a gold medal at the 2012 Great American Beer Festival.  Fair enough, I know I'd try to capitalize on that sort of coup.

A six-pack of these among friends will make for a fantastic football Saturday.  Grab some of both, and come up to Boulder to watch the Buffs get back on their feet.


Happy Friday! Go Buffs, beat the Buccaneers!

2013 Charleston Southern Football Preview

Before the game Saturday, please remember to check out the open-door scrimmage the CU basketball programs are hosting at the CEC.  With the men hitting the court from 9-10:30, and the women from 10:30-11:30, it's an excellent opportunity to check out a pair of top-25 programs before the bright lights of the season are turned on.

I look at this as an attempt to replace Buffs Madness by capitalizing on the mass of people already on campus for football.  CU's version of a midnight madness event was well intentioned, but poorly advertised last fall, leaving whole swaths of the Events Center empty for the performance.  Despite a clarion call from Coach Boyle, a similar problem seems to be plaguing the scrimmage this go-around, leaving me to wonder why they don't plan these things father in advance.

Regardless, I'll be there bright and early Saturday morning.  Admission is free, though, since it's a football gameday, parking on campus is anything but.  For those who can't attend, I'll be live-tweeting the event, so be sure to follow me @Rumblinbuffalo.

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The first attempt to play the 3rd and final non-conference game of the year was washed away with much of Boulder in last month's devastating flood. 

Replacing a canceled football game, which are often scheduled decades in advance, is not an easy thing to do, and the CU athletic department was put into scramble mode to replace it on the schedule.  To their credit, they managed the feat, first plowing through all available FBS options before finally settling on a tiny FCS school.  Bye-bye Fresno State, hello Charleston Southern.

That the Buffs were able to find anyone willing to shoehorn the game into their schedule on short notice in close to miracle.  That they got it done for the relatively paltry sum of $400,000 is a strong opening salvo fired from the Rick George regime.  Strong work from the fellow Son of Illinois.

Now, however, we come to the awkward point of actually playing that tiny FCS school smack-dab in the middle of a grueling Pac-12 campaign.  I'm sure the Buffs are eagerly anticipating a respite from 40-point in-conference drubbings, but I can't help but feel... underwhelmed by the challenge this week.  It's just hard to focus on #2 Oregon one week, only to turn around and see, of all things, the Charleston Southern Buccaneers rolling into town.  Hopefully, the team is more focused than I on the task at hand.

Kickoff from beautiful Folsom Field is set for high-noon on Saturday.  Television coverage can be found on Pac-12 Networks, with the radio call on 850 KOA.

Click below for the preview...