Buffs Know What's At Stake Saturday In Utah
November 20, 2017 | Football, Neill Woelk
BOULDER — Derek McCartney has been playing football in Boulder since 2013 — but unlike the majority of his Colorado Buffaloes teammates, he has never played in a bowl game.
McCartney, a senior linebacker, missed most of last season — including the Alamo Bowl — because of a knee injury. Thus, while the rest of the Buffs were celebrating the end of the program's long bowl drought, McCartney watched from the sidelines.
Now, McCartney has one last chance to fulfill that bucket list item. If he and his Buffs teammates can produce a win Saturday at Utah (8 p.m., FS1), he will get that postseason experience.
"It's important in a lot of ways," McCartney said Monday evening, just after the Buffs finished a Folsom Field workout. "It's important for the program big time because a bowl game means so much and we need to take care of that as a team. Personally … it's big for me. I've been here for a while but I've never played in a bowl game and I'd like to finally get that chance."
Saturday's game will pit two teams with the same overall records (5-6) and the same Pac-12 records (2-6). The winner will play again; the loser will finish last in the Pac-12 South and be guaranteed to be home for the holidays.
McCartney is one of three remaining Buffs who actually signed with former head coach Jon Embree in the spring of 2012. McCartney and Gerrad Kough then "grayshirted" and enrolled in the spring of 2013; Jeromy Irwin practiced in the fall of 2012 and is now in his sixth season with the Buffs, thanks to an extra injury redshirt year. Kough and Irwin played in last season's Alamo bowl.
"We're all out here working to get to a bowl," said McCartney, who has been a team leader on and off the field throughout his time in Boulder (he has been a team captain two times). "We're trying to get better this week and we have one game left to reach our goal. It's pretty simple in that regard."
Irwin and the rest of the seniors would like to leave the legacy of back-to-back bowl games, something that hasn't happened at CU since 2004-05.
"It's not going to be my last game," said Irwin. "But right now, you can't get too far ahead of yourself. If you're thinking about Saturday, you can't focus on today. You have to win every day. If we come out and practice good today, we win that day. If we do that all week, we'll prepare ourselves just right to come out Saturday and hopefully get that win."
The Buffs, coming off a bye weekend, will have the benefit of basically two weeks to prepare for the regular season finale. The Utes, meanwhile, are coming off a heartbreaking 33-30 loss at Washington, a game that saw the Huskies rally to score 10 points in the final minute, including the game-winning field goal as time expired.
While bye weeks are often used as a midseason break, the Buffs last week put in four solid days of work, took the weekend off, then went back to work Monday.
"They've been really focused," head coach Mike MacIntyre said. "There's a lot at stake for them and for us. CU hasn't been to back-to-back bowl games in 14 years and our kids know that. They've had former players call them and tell them. It's a big deal to try to keep that tradition going. Utah goes to a bowl every year so they want to keep their tradition going. It's a big deal for both teams. I've seen our guys prepare."
While the Buffs have had an up-and-down season on Saturdays, MacIntyre said he hasn't seen his team lose focus or its work ethic.
"They've always been resilient," he said. "We've lost a couple close games, but I'd say if you watched us play, you would say every game this team is fighting as hard as they can fight. I definitely see that. That's their character. Hopefully we can get one more and have some more practices and another game."
If history is any guide, Saturday's game will be a close one. Since the two programs joined the Pac-12 in 2011, every game — six in a row — has been a one-score affair, with the largest margin of victory seven points.
Nobody expects Saturday to be any different.
"It really is like a playoff game," Irwin said. "I don't think I've been in this position before coming down to the end. But every year, either when they come here or we go there, it's always a battle. There's always something on the line and both teams always play really, really hard. You figure it's going to be the same way again Saturday."
BUFFS NOTES: Another Buffs upperclassman looking to play in his first bowl game is wide receiver Juwann Winfree. The CU junior missed all of last season with a knee injury. … MacIntyre said the Buffs were able to get some players healthy last week. "We still don't have everybody cleared yet, but everybody's making good progress," he said. … In a statistical rarity, the Buffs are exactly even in points scored and points yielded after 11 games — 304. … CU's Phillip Lindsay is still third in the conference in rushing yards per game (127.5) while quarterback Steven Montez is fifth in the conference in passing yards per game (252.7). Montez is also tied for fourth in the league in touchdown passes with 18. Buffs WR Bryce Bobo is ninth in receptions (5.3) and receiving yards per game (58.2).
Contact: Neill.Woelk@Colorado.edu
