Boulder, CU – The night prior to the Black and Gold game, the Colorado Buffaloes coaching staff took the entire team out to the new blockbuster Marvel movie Avengers: Endgame. Just like the movie title, April 27th’s Black and Gold game at Folsom field represented the end of spring football since NCAA rules only allow for 15 spring practices.
Led by first-year head coach Mel Tucker today’s game provided his coaching staff proper insight on where their team is at, and what the team needs to improve on for the 2019 season.
“The standard is high,” said Tucker, “We are not where we need to be, yet. But we will get there, and this was phase two. We had our winter conditioning program than we had spring ball, and now we will take them to our summer conditioning program.”
For the players, this game provided them with opportunities to stand out and to show coaches the full range of their abilities.
Freshman tailback Jaren Mangham is one player who stood out with over 149 rushing yards and three touchdowns to end the game.
Teams were divided by the Colorado coaching staff with the black team featuring the 1st team offense and second-team defense, and the gold team featuring the 1st team defense and second-team offense.
The gold team won 55-27, due in large part to four interceptions thrown by three different black team quarterbacks (including starting Quarterback Steven Montez).
Cornerback Mekhi Blackmon caught two those interceptions and returned one back for a touchdown.
According to Tucker, the least important factor in the game was the score.
“We keep the scores in more ways than one. Everything’s an evaluation,” Tucker said.
Overall Tucker said he was happy with the overall operation. He identified the number of penalties as the only problem that stood out and as something the team needs to decrease by the beginning of the season.
The Colorado Buffs first game of the season is versus their rival Colorado State on August 30th at Mile High Stadium in Denver.
