Sports
Deion Sanders and Colorado Still Have More Questions Than Answers

I’ve watched more college football previously 4 seasons than I did within the previous 10. There’s one reason: Deion Sanders, first at Jackson State, where he played HBCU football, and now on the University of Colorado, where he’s revived a struggling football program.
Colorado opened its season on Thursday with a nail-biting 31-26 home opener over North Dakota State, the Buffaloes’ first win since Oct. 7, 2023, once they defeated Arizona State. I watched every minute of Thursday’s game, and I’ll watch every minute of several more Colorado games, and I’ll be there in person for greater than a couple of.
What are we trying to find out and what questions are we attempting to answer? Is Coach Prime an excellent college football coach? Is he a greater promoter than a coach? Will Colorado have a winning season? Will Colorado play within the playoffs? Finally, will Sanders stay in Colorado after this season, since his son Shedeur Sanders and potential Heisman candidate Travis Hunter are set to enter the NFL Draft in 2025?
Some of my colleagues called Thursday’s season opener an important game of Coach Prime’s coaching profession.
With all due respect, no.
Thursday’s game was an important game until the subsequent game. Then the subsequent. Then the subsequent.
Ron Chenoy-USA TODAY Sports
All Colorado proved Thursday was that it has two more NFL-ready superstars than North Dakota State: Hunter and quarterback Shedeur Sanders — Hunter, a spectacular two-way player, and Sanders, a legitimate top-five quarterback prospect. Hunter caught seven passes for 132 yards and three touchdowns. On defense, he played greater than 40 snaps as a cornerback.
Shedeur continued where he left off last season, which is each good and bad news. Sanders plays a novel brand of hero ball, and it largely works. He has thrown 100 touchdowns in his profession and finished last season with 27 and a formidable 69% completion percentage. But that comes at a price.
Last season, he was essentially the most sacked quarterback in major league college football and threw so over and over attempting to make plays that he had to take a seat out the ultimate game of the season. On Thursday against North Dakota State, Sanders was sacked only once and kept the sport alive. He also made several throws right after the ball was released. Can he last a full season playing his swashbuckling quarterback style? And can Colorado win if Shedeur plays in a different way?
“We have a long season ahead of us at this point, and Prime, Shedeur and Hunter share the burden of proof.”
After the sport, Shedeur was criticized by his father, Coach Prime, for throwing a protracted pass to LaJohntay Wester within the fourth quarter when the offense must have been using a timeout. Sanders, nevertheless, rationalized that his son was simply attempting to be an excellent teammate by letting Wester get entangled on an evening when Hunter and Jimmy Horn Jr. were having great nights.
“Shedeur is such a good kid that sometimes it takes a toll on him because at the end of the game we just want to run with the ball,” Sanders said, rationalizing his son’s poor judgment.
The relationship between Sanders and his sons, Shedeur and Shilo, has been essentially the most fascinating aspect of the Coach Prime phenomenon at Jackson State and now at Colorado. Sanders has coached his sons at every level of football, and in his candid moments, Sanders admits the road between father and coach has often been blurred.
That’s why I’d like Prime to remain on as a coach after Shedeur and Hunter — his adopted son — leave for the NFL. Only then will we get an accurate picture of who Sanders really is as a coach, although I’m undecided that’s high on Prime’s list of priorities. Coaching his sons was such a special experience that life after they’re gone might be disappointing.
But there will likely be time for such speculations yet.
Now, with a protracted season to go, Prime, Shedeur and Hunter share the burden of proof. Hunter wants to point out he’s a legitimate Heisman candidate. Shedeur desires to prove he ought to be considered one of the primary three quarterbacks taken within the 2025 NFL Draft.
Of course, Sanders has the potential to prove he’s greater than just the football equivalent of a snake-oil salesman whose primary job is to advertise his program. He can show he’s a tactician who can match the intellect of the most effective coaches within the country.
You will achieve this by winning.
Kevin Langley/Icon Sportswire
Coach Prime can also be in a position to prove that his scorched-earth approach to constructing rosters can also be effective. Sanders isn’t the sort to plant seeds and watch them grow. He prefers to plant mature trees.
Last 12 months, it made a splash and hurt feelings by drastically changing its roster. It brought in 68 latest scholarship players, 47 of whom transferred from other four-year programs.
He has done it again this season, bringing in 50 latest scholarship players, including 39 latest signings. Will it work? We’ll see.
Evaluating Deion Sanders solely on football criteria is complicated by the undeniable fact that he does greater than just coach football. He does other things, and I take his word for it that he cares concerning the well-being of the young men he coaches. Not necessarily those he runs out of, however the ones he coaches.
Last week, for instance, we learned that Sanders had partnered with a bank to open “529 accounts” for eight dads and fathers-to-be on his team. Each account will start at $2,121 (in honor of Sanders’s NFL-era number). A 529 is a tax-advantaged savings account designed for use for the beneficiary’s educational expenses. The idea is that if players can repeatedly deposit $200 of their very own money into the account, they will eventually pay for his or her child’s college education.
The larger issue surrounding the University of Colorado and its football program is how free the press is in covering Coach Prime’s tenure.
Closely related to this is whether or not the media buys what Deion is selling. Sanders, like many college coaches — HBCU, FBS, FCS — tends to be, or at the least aspire to be, dictators. Sanders has a thorny relationship with the media and has cleverly created his own media machine to present his story the best way he wants it presented.
In Colorado, he handles the press by picking and selecting who he considers too harsh and critical. That includes banning a Denver Post columnist whose criticism Sanders considered too personal. With the university’s permission, the reporter was barred from asking questions.
In an ideal world of one-for-all, one-for-all, if a Denver Post columnist were banned, your entire press corps would revolt and respond by boycotting Sanders. Imagine: Prime walks right into a news conference without cameras, reporters, or microphones. Colorado is riding a renaissance wave precisely since the football coach brought in cameras and microphones. Imagine suddenly having none.
In reality, Colorado doesn’t need to imagine it. The university knows what it’s like since it experienced it within the years leading as much as Prime: lethargy, indifference, darkness.
In any case, a media boycott won’t ever occur, and that is the crux of the matter: the media cannot afford to boycott Coach Prime. He’s a rankings bonanza. He’s news now, and we’re within the news business.
We all have our standards. Sanders and the university have set standards for what they consider “crossing the line” coverage. I even have my standards for what I consider interesting news.
Coach Prime won at Jackson State. He talked about black empowerment and constructing institutions, but he won. The news in college football is whether or not Coach Prime can lead Colorado to a winning record and a bowl game. The Buffaloes will likely be compelling in the event that they win, average and boring in the event that they lose. Pure and easy.
One match down, 11 left.
Sports
Jalen Milroe can follow the Jalen path in NFL

Star Black playmakers aren’t any longer an exception – they’re the rule. Throughout the entire football season, this series will discover the importance and influence of black QB from bottom -up to NFL.
Indianapolis-keep me, should you heard it earlier: playmaker Alabama born in Texas, who’s a stronger runner than a passerby, will probably be called outside the first round of the NFL Draft.
The playmaker was undefeated in Sec as a primary -year starter.
The playmaker never played for the same offensive coordinator.
The name of the playmaker is even Jalen.
But it isn’t clear that Jalen hurts. This winter he was busy winning the Super Bowl MVP, and he didn’t play Iron Bowl or against Michigan.
Instead, it’s a former playmaker of Crimson Tide Jalen Milroewho last week Combine Combine tried to convey the case to the trainers and evaluators that he – like his namesake – is price being their playmaker franchise in the future despite questions on his ability.
“I went through adversity. I saw everything as a quarterback, “Milroe said on Friday. “I played at the most difficult conference in the country. It would be easier to play at other conferences, but what I could see in Sec catapulted me that I was ready to play NFL. “
Justin Casterline/Getty Images
Departing from Katy in Texas, she originally got involved in Texas in 2019, but a 12 months later she fell to Alabama. After he was sitting behind the Crimson Tide Starter Bryung for 2 seasons, Milroe took his reins in the 2023 season. He helped Alabama survive Sec (8-0) this 12 months, won by the conference rival and two-time defender Georgia in the SEC championship, which caused Crimson Tide to the play-off collection.
But while Milroe had a big arm (his 10 yards for the test took third place in Sec in 2023), the pass was not his strong suit. For two seasons as a starter Milroe never achieved 3000 yards in one season, the first starter of Alabama, who did it because it … hurts.
Hurts, from Houston, led Crimson Tide to the National National Championships in 2016–17, but during these two seasons were lower than 5,000 yards. While Hurts was a singular Rusher (1,809 yards and 21 sticks) at the moment, his weakness as a passerby is known for led to the spare Tua Tavailoa during the break of the national championships in 2017.
In the mix, Milroe decided that despite his pedestrian passes, he was still worthy of being a start at NFL.
He is aware of his weaknesses and swore that he worked in the ass to enhance outside being “one dimension.” He could move when his legendary trainer, Nick Saban, retired after the 2023 season, but decided to not fall off. He traveled six miles a day to ensure that that something was left in the fourth quarter in the fourth quarter. He studied progression and reads after I-SNAP to lift his IQ in football.
Unlike the forecast sorts of the first round, Cam Ward and Shedeur Sanders, Milroe threw a mix on Saturday, hoping that he would show the bands that he has mechanics to do that to the playmaker NFL. It turned out to be a mixed bag. Milroe showed strong arm strength and a very good location of sail routes, curls and it while throwing exercises, but fought accuracy on intermediate and on the routes.
“That’s so many things that I can learn more where I am today and where I will be when it comes to day 1, starting with NFL,” said Milroe before Saturday exercises. “Always be a game student, at all times attempt to develop, because it would be so many opportunities in which I can look back and say that it was the moment after I grew up as a playmaker.
“That’s right now, I’m just trying to grow as much as possible, put my best foot forward and just look for development.”
Derick E. Hingle/Getty Images
Milroe was asked that he was one other playmaker in Alabama to succeed in the mix, following in the footsteps of the role (who moved to Oklahoma in 2019), Tavailoa, Mac Jones and Bryce Young. Milroe said he appreciates being in the company of others, but he added that it’s difficult to check him with others.
“We had different bands, we had different players around us, we had a different system,” he said.
But when he specifically asked what he could study the journey of Hurts-from the first manager of the game after the super Bowl-Milroe master said he inspired him his companion Alabam.
“The most important thing I learned from J. Hurts is how he kept his head (I) always continued to work,” said Milroe. “He at all times raised his game, he has never been self -deserved, and all the pieces you see is great progress from him.
“And I have to applaud him as a person, he as a man, because he is definitely inspiring for many playmakers of my image, as well as many playmakers throughout the country. He leads to all of us. “
The couple isn’t completely similar. Hurts had about 20 kilos on Milroe when he was in college. Milroe has a stronger arm, while Hurts played more and not using a mistake of football: Milroe threw 17 interceptions and ate 67 bags for 2 seasons as a starter in comparison with 10 captures Hurts and 43 bags.
But they can each be changing the game when their teams need them. In a highly publicized match against Georgia at the starting of the last season, Milroe finished almost 82% of his passes on 374 yards and two appointments, adding 117 yards to the ground for the next two results.
Milroe can also match the wounds in the so -called “Jalen-ISMS. “
“Climbing upstairs is not easy, but when you reach the top of this mountain, you will learn so many things when it comes to adversity when it comes to difficulties, things along the way,” said Milroe in a mix.
Sports
Like Tommie Smith and John Carlos from 1968. Black Power Salute inspired me to find my goal

I’d say that I grew up within the household to be sure that that me and my siblings were aware of the black history. My parents invested in the gathering of black encyclopedias. On the duvet we had a version of the Bible with Black Jesus. Our house was stuffed with books of black novelists and thinkers, and if a black document appeared, we watched it. I watched all movies made on television about Dr. King, each “Roots” and “Alex Haley’s Queen” and I sat for all 14 hours “Eyes on the reward”-as a toddler. Bless my heart.
Having said this, there have been pockets of black history, and more likely that I had no opportunity to delve into once I was a toddler. The college was where all the will for information and understanding of the combined. I attended Morehouse College in Atlanta, Ga., One of a very powerful historically black universities within the country. It was there that I met people from around the globe whose knowledge about black history differed (often depending on the colleges and the communities by which we lived), but everyone had hunger to learn more.
One day, through the first yr, I remember one among my friends in a T -shirt by which I had definitely seen before, but I never paid attention to. There was a black and white screen printing on the shirt (what I do know now) the enduring moment on the Olympic Games in Mexico in 1968, where on the rostrum for 200-meter medals, Tommie Smith, John Carlos (races 1. And 3. Place Finaners) Everyone gathered a black fist in gloves while he played “Star Spangled Banner”. Peter Norman, the second place from Australia, wore a human rights badge, like Smith and Carlos.
Not only did they raise the fist of black power (although they each said it was for human rights), they received medals in black socks to represent poverty within the black community, and Smith wore a black scarf for black pride. Carlos showed solidarity with blue-wheeled employees, unpacking the jacket and wore a necklace from the beads for individuals who were lynched. Due to the state of Black America in 1968 and a continuing struggle for equality and civil rights, there have been calls to a boycott of the Games. Martin Luther King, Jr. He was also killed in April this yr – and all three athletes were inspired enough to find a way to do it on the rostrum, which led to one of the crucial durable images of public protest.
I remember how I learned history and realized that on the most important scene these brave men used their moment of triumph and victory to quietly protest against the conditions of underrated communities in America. I felt strengthened; We often discuss standing on the arms of giants, however the more I got into the history of black in America, the more I spotted what number of giants there have been. In college I used to be very bad and for a while ready to burn every part that represented the establishment or any obstacle to black liberation. I felt like all those individuals who even saw their space on the planet in reference to individuals who could never give you the option to speak as heroes whose lives were to be modeled later. Especially since it was also fastidiously that putting people in front of him can often bring an enormous personal loss.
When Smith and Carlos took their position, they were booed on the stadium and ordered to be sent home by the International Olympic Committee. The athletes returned home, but they weren’t welcomed by the hero, but as a substitute of rough sleds, and even in some cases the specter of death. They were also not beloved by athletes. Two men, associated eternally in history, even have a good relationship –Carlos even claims that he let Smith go within the race Because “Tommie Smith would never put his fist in the sky if I won this race,” the claim that Smith denies.
History ultimately has a way of rights, but it surely took a few years and realizations on the front of social policy, in order that the actions of those persons are perceived as brave and needed, not only selfish and smug.
The lessons that I learned from College and continuous reading and education I gained (my head remained within the book about black history) were one among the best advantages in HBCU. The very variety of books I learned about about which I actually have never heard of – I actually have upheld me all my life.
That is why I remember sooner or later I used to be walking around Washington, the eastern Washington market and a street seller was selling different photos of moments in black history, and he had a 40 -inch photo within the Tommie Smith and John Carlos frame. I paid for it in money and spent it across the capital of the country until I returned home. I do know that it happened in 2005 (I finished Morehouse College in 2001) because I just moved to my first apartment with no roommate and it was the very first thing that I actually have ever suspended on the wall. This picture within the frame still hangs on the wall in my home in 2025 and I used it to teach my children about sacrifice and privilege and how you may have to discuss individuals who cannot.

The query that my youngest children often ask: “How do I know who can’t speak for herself?” Which is an incredible query. For this I answered an easy fact, pointing to the photo:
“These men have made a gesture that gave people whose most of us, including them, would never see or never know them, but on which life negatively affects the alternatives of the wealthy and the federal government. Sometimes you may have to take this chance to say something because you do not know in the event you’ll ever have such a big platform.
Son, there may be at all times someone who cannot speak for himself, and you may have to use it in a voice, because perhaps the thing you say or a stand that can help someone you understand, live a greater life. ”
I take advantage of words that may understand a little bit higher, but I can inform you that my children have a look at this photo on a regular basis, and once one among my sons said: “These guys are heroes, right?”
I say yes, they’re. They are the heroes of the Black History.
They will live eternally for speaking, and even quietly, in solidarity with those that couldn’t.

(Tagstranslate) @Ap
Sports
Main Treasury Official Morgan State University, Sterling Steward, died

Morgan State University announced that his older associate athletics director and tax director, Sterling Steward, died.
No reason for death was disclosed, but the college has confirmed his contribution since he was employed in December 2022.
Morgan State University Athletics mourns Sterling Steward’s departure https://t.co/avjzilxhja
– Grizzly Life (@grizzlylife22) February 26, 2025
Steward died on February 26. In Morgan State he was accountable for the event of university programs, supporting partnerships and strengthening the financial and operational success of the Faculty.
“Sterling was more than a colleague-he was a respected leader, mentor and friend,” said in a written statement by Den Freeman-Patton, vice chairman and director of inter-university athletes. “His passion for athletics and commitment to raising Morgan programs were visible in everything he did. He worked tirelessly to ensure that our sports students had resources and the possibilities of distinction, and its impact will be felt for many years. We expand our deepest condolences to his family and loved ones, especially his three sons and sister when we mourn this huge loss. “
While the steward worked in Morgan, strategic growth and cooperation occurred. His work with the institutional development department helped to offer more opportunities and created lasting relationships to support sports programs.
Steward earlier he worked At the University of New Orleans (UNO) as an assistant to the college athletics director for strategic income generation. He also made stays on the University of Alaska Fairbanks, Savannah State University, Mississippi Valley State University, Alabama State University, Kentucky State University, Eastern Oregon University and Xavier University in various roles, including for a senior consultant athletics director and sports director.
He was from New Orleans, who received the title of bachelor and master’s degree on the University of Southern Mississippi. He won a bachelor’s degree in the sphere of coaching and administration/history of sport and his master’s degree in the sphere of sport management.
(Tagstransate) Morgan State Universiry
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