Deion Sanders apologizes after Colorado loses to Arizona: 'We just can't get over that hump'

BOULDER, Colo. – Colorado football coach Deion Sanders issued a couple of apologies Saturday after his team lost another game, this time against No. 24 Arizona, 34-31.

He apologized to the Colorado players, who were playing their last game here at Folsom Field.

“I apologize … that we didn’t send them out right, in which we wanted to because they deserve it,” Sanders said.

He also apologized to Colorado fans, who sold out every game at home this season only to watch the Buffaloes finish with a 2-4 home record in Sanders’ first season.

“They’ve been supporting the heck out of us and they’ve been showing up and showing out — another sellout crowd that ended in disappointment,” Sanders said. “We’re so close. It’s what I told the team. But yet so far. We just simply, truly don’t know how to win yet.”

After capturing the nation’s attention with a 3-0 start, the Buffaloes (4-6) now have lost six of their last seven, including the last four. All but two of those losses have come by seven points or fewer, including Saturday. The Buffs never trailed all game until Arizona kicker Tyler Loop booted a 24-yard, game-winning field goal as time expired. His kick ended a drive by the No. 24 Wildcats (7-3) that went 67 yards in 11 plays, running down the clock to keep the ball away from Colorado on a sunny but chilly day in front of 52,788.

“We just can’t get over that hump,” Sanders said in his postgame news conference.

Colorado now has two games remaining in the regular season, both on the road, and will need to win both to be eligible for a postseason bowl game.

What else did Deion Sanders say?

He lamented all the close games his team has lost but also compared this year’s team to last year, when the Buffs were blown out of nearly every game and finished 1-11. Less than 10 scholarship players from that team remain after Sanders overhauled the roster with transfer players after his hiring in December.

“I feel as though every time these fans come in the stadium there’s an expectation of us to win,” Sanders said. "I think that’s progress. I wasn’t here last year, but I’m pretty sure. … I think there’s tremendous progress. We have consistency in several positions that are phenomenal, and I truly feel that there’s progress. We have inconsistency in some positions that we can fix.”

He then asked a reporter, “Is the team better?”

“The team’s definitely better,” the reporter replied.

“Good," Sanders said. “Let’s rest it right there with an exclamation mark.”

Sanders even said that “it seemed like we were the better team (Saturday), and we just couldn’t get it done.”

“The best thing about it is that in our first year — we haven’t even been here a year, but we were right there,” he said. “I mean, we’re right there in all these dern games, except for one when we got our butts slaughtered at Oregon (Sept. 23).”

What happened in the game?

The Buffs showed sustained signs of life in the first half, unlike in large stretches of previous games. They scored touchdowns on three of their first six possessions before ending the half with a 39-yard field goal from Alejandro Mata to take a 24-17 halftime lead. They also only gave up one sack in the first half as Shedeur Sanders ran for a 16-yard touchdown to open the scoring and threw another for 20 yards in front of the team's 10^th straight sellout crowd of the season.

At halftime, Deion Sanders even told the Pac-12 Network that it was one of the few times his team had come together on offense, defense and special teams.  

Sanders then gave his assessment of what would be necessary to prevail in the end. The Buffs need to “want this a lot more than they do,” he said.

As it turned out, they did not. They got outscored after halftime 17-7, starting with Arizona’s first drive in the second half, when the Wildcats had the ball at their own 34-yard line on third-and-1.

That’s when running back Jonah Coleman burst upfield for a 54-yard gain before Colorado two-way star Travis Hunter chased him down. Two plays later, Arizona quarterback Noah Fifita lofted a pass to the left corner of the end zone, which receiver Tetairoa McMillan brought in with his right hand for a 2-yard touchdown, helping tie the game 24-24.

Coleman finished with 179 yards rushing on 11 carries to propel the Wildcats as the Buffs whiffed on several chances. Shedeur Sanders completed 22 of 35 passes for 262 yards and two touchdowns with no interceptions in the second game with former NFL head coach Pat Shurmur calling the plays.

“I think he called a phenomenal game,” Deion Sanders said.

Shedeur Sanders was sacked only three times after needing painkilling injections to finish his previous two games.

“You can’t go into a dark tunnel when you’re having a season like this, because nothing will ever be perfect in life,” Shedeur Sanders said.

What happened at the end?

Colorado’s final three possessions ended with two punts and a 44-yard missed field goal attempt by Mata with 4:57 remining. Mata's kick sailed right of the uprights by only a few feet, setting up Arizona’s final drive. Colorado never got the ball back.

Arizona receiver Montana Lemonious-Craig, who transferred from Colorado earlier this year, helped twist the knife in at the end, when he caught a 5-yard pass to bring the ball to the Colorado 1-yard line with about a minute left. He almost scored, which would have given Colorado the ball back for another chance.

“I thought we did score,” Arizona coach Jedd Fisch said. “And then when we didn’t score, now you’re on the 1 and now you’re doing quick math. And you’re trying to figure out exactly what to do. I mean, I think if we scored it went up 38-31. That gives them a chance to have the ball… They would have had a timeout and now it’s a whole different ball game. Clearly we were fortunate that we went down at the 1.”

Fifita sat on the ball for three straight plays after that to set up the winning kick.

How Colorado handled a couple critical plays in the fourth quarter

Should Colorado have allowed Lemonious-Craig to score a touchdown, allowing the Buffaloes to get the ball back before time expired?

“At that point, we’re still fighting,” Deion Sanders said. “We’re not thinking about letting them score a touchdown at that point because now you’re thinking 'hold them to a field goal' because you go down there and get a field goal and you’re back in the game, you tie the game. So you’re not thinking that at that point.”

Earlier in the fourth quarter, Colorado faced third-and-1 on its own 44-yard line with the score tied at 31-31. Instead of running the ball to gain the first down, Shedeur Sanders threw an incomplete pass under pressure.

A reporter asked Deion Sanders why the Buffs didn’t run the ball there.

“You’ve been watching us all season, right” Sanders asked, apparently referring to his team’s anemic running game. “Thank you. Next question.”

The Buffs next play Friday night at Washington State (on FS1).

“We could have won,” Deion Sanders said. “We could have won the dern game, and I like that. We should have won. I’m tired of, 'We could have won.'"

Arizona vs. Colorado highlights

Follow reporter Brent Schrotenboer @Schrotenboer. Email: bschrotenb@usatoday.com