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COLORADO AT KANSAS

10/11/08

2* Colorado +14 over Kansas - Sometimes as a handicapper you find yourself getting attached to certain teams. In most cases, it hopefully pays off. In some cases, you're simply wrong about the team all along. With Colorado, we're currently on the fence. We've used them twice and stand 1-1. We've seen some things we like about this team, this year and going back to last season. We've also seen something we haven't liked all that much, as recently as the last two weeks. So, we go to the well one more time with this Colorado squad to hopefully finally get the answer we're looking for.

Our main area of concern with the Buffs is their offensive line injuries. They have lost 3 linemen to season ending injuries and lost two more before the season ever started due to academic reasons. They do have back ups that were recruited last year as well as a couple of freshman which brings us to where we are going with this case for the Buffs in general.......talent.

Something we like to bring up from time to time is a teams ability to recruit talent. The recruiting game is changing in college ball to be sure. But the fact still remains, whatever changes they make to the recruiting game, certain teams will still always draw better talent than others. There's a pecking order and that order may change slightly, and a star player make choose a school nobody would expect from time to time but by and large that pecking order is still what is was many years ago.

When we look at Colorado and Kansas we see that Colorado rates the edge. They are 11-5 straight up against Kansas since 1992. 2 of those 5 losses came the last two years and both of those losses were by just 5 points. So even while the Buffs were down a notch and Kansas was on it's way to a 12-1 season, they still didn't blow out Colorado. Matter of fact the Buffs had more 1st downs, more total yards and more passing yards yet less on the ground.

To further our cause, we look to this years results. Kansas went to South Florida in week 3 and lost 37-34. Now, South Florida is a good football team but hardly the team many thought they would be this year. They (sfla) lost to Pitt at home in a good game a couple of weeks ago. We think Colorado is every bit as good as South Florida and Pitt. Even with the line troubles, we think the Buffs could beat either one of those teams. Yet they find themselves 14 point underdogs this week at Kansas.

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What makes the line stand out even more is that last week Kansas trailed Iowa State 20-0 at the half last week before coming back to win it. Sure, turnovers played a role, but Iowa State still had 365 total yards with 268 of those yards through the air.

Despite two losses in a row to two of the better teams in the country in Florida State and Texas, the Big 12 schedule is just getting started with Colorado at 0-1 and Kansas at 1-0. Lots of plots and sub plots will be written in the big 12 before the year is done. Colorado has faith in coach Dan Hawkins ability to get it done. They just gave him a new contract good through 2012 which takes affect starting this summer.

In our earlier write ups involving Colorado games we mentioned that we saw signs a year ago and that we felt this program was on the rise. We still believe that. It's a young team. Unfortunately, it just got even younger with the players they'll be using to fill holes on the offensive line. But after two weeks in a row of seeing a couple of the best pass rushes in college football, we think they'll be ready for Kansas this week who is certainly no Texas. Oh....and by the way, Kansas has Oklahoma next week........... 2* Colorado +14