That didn’t take long. After taking over one of the worst college football programs in America, Deion Sanders has transformed Boulder, Colorado into the epicenter of college football. And it’s only mid September.
ESPN’s flagship college football show “College Gameday” is broadcasting live from the CU campus ahead of Saturday night’s matchup with Colorado State. Fox’s fledgling Saturday morning show is back in Boulder for the second week in a row after broadcasting CU’s first two games of the season in its “Big Noon” time slot. It seems that the conversation around college football begins and ends with Coach Prime.
The weekend marathon of Colorado football began on Friday with Coach Prime appearing live on First Take with Stephen A. Smith and Shannon Sharpe. The show was broadcasting live from the Colorado campus. Then on Friday night as an added bonus, Coach Prime and Colorado was mentioned at least twice on Fox’s Friday Night Smackdown. The professional wrestling broadcast was in Denver on Friday night and media personality Pat McAfee inserted Sanders into his “promo.” The announcers even made reference to the newfound popularity of the program during the broadcast. The WWE broadcast is always a trending topic on social media during its live shows, which simply adds to the growing “Q-Factor” of Colorado and Deion Sanders.
Fans, and even critics, of Sanders couldn’t escape the Colorado train once Saturday morning rolled around. He led the 11am hour of College Gameday with his on-set appearance. The WWE flavor continued with a special appearance by Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson at the end of the segment.
A little more than 30 minutes later he was on the set with Fox Sports. But only before enjoying an opening act of a mini-concert put on by friend and rap mogul Lil Wayne. Sanders presented Weezy with a personalized Colorado jersey on stage during his performance.
During his Fox appearance former coach and analyst Urban Meyers donned a pair of shades during his questioning. A play on the comments made by Colorado State head coach Jay Norvell. By the end of the interview Sanders was leading the crowd in a chant about Saturday night’s game being personal.
Yes there is a game to be played. Colorado faces off with blood rival Colorado State at 10pm EST on ESPN. Earlier in the week the game had the perception of a stepping stone into some of the tougher PAC-12 competition ahead. That was before Norvell opened the door of “making it personal” when he made his now infamous “sunglasses” hot take.
There is plenty of football to be played on Saturday, including places where we’ve been told “it matters more.” But the conversation across the world right now is being dominated by Colorado.
