I don’t know if this is simply leverage to get the game moved from a neutral site in Denver to a home-and-home basis, but Colorado’s athletic director says he’s had enough of the rivalry series with Colorado State (h/t Doc Saturday).
Colorado athletic director Rick George said Wednesday that it is in the “best interests” of CU to not renew its annual football series with intrastate rival Colorado State after the current contract concludes with the 2020 game...
“After the current contract, playing the game in Denver is dead,” George said. “And I’m not sure where our series with CSU goes after that either. Today, we would not extend our agreement (for CU to play CSU in football) past 2020.”
Officially, it’s a matter of priorities. Having a sixth home game trumps playing your in state rival.
Every other year, Colorado will play only four home conference games, so it can be difficult to schedule six home games and still play a representative schedule if one of the nonconference games is played in Denver against CSU.
“My job is to do what’s best for CU, the athletic department, our teams, our student-athletes,” George said. “I think our best interest is to move games under the contract to campus sites and then, after 2020, I’m not sure (the series) is in our best interest, and that’s why at this point I wouldn’t extend it.”
Except that’s only a problem every other season, and… hmmm, you only play a road game against CSU every other season.
George sounds like he’s a masterful negotiator. Asking Colorado State to move the series away from Denver while at the same time marking the end of the rivalry is kind of screwy. Then again, complaining about the size of the crowds in Denver while offering your season-ticket holders the option of declining the CSU game and using that dollar credit to buy more single-game seats for CU games played in Boulder seems a bit counter-intuitive, as well.
Unless you really, really want out.
Rivalries ain’t what they used to be.
Get The Picture 
I see where Bobo signed a 6’5″ 200 lbs QB yesterday who only had one other offer. I hope the kid turns pro in 5 years.
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Can’t you just see friendly freckle-faced Joe looking up while tutoring him? Of course he could coach toward strengthening his arm by having him throw while kneeling. Then he can look down and even appear fierce….well…more serious, anyway.
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Sometimes I’d like to quit giving the Nerds of North Ave. the benefit of playing Georgia…maybe replace them with Clemson as a permanent opponent. But that would be mean…and probably politicians would get involved.
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And Dabo would say ‘hellll no’ lol
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Dabo would say move it to spring, which is really smart. It helps recruiting but doesn’t hurt the W/L record.
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Colorado/CSU is a weird one…. they had a 25 year gap from 58-83? and another 2year gap 90-91. IMO they have been hitting the bong a little heavy given this and CSU’s hiring decision…..
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And another rivalry bites the dust. I’m sure the pageantry and importance of the Colorado-Washington State game will one day render the memory of the CSU rivalry meaningless.
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In truth most of the Colorado natives would rather see Nebraska back, and the West Coast transplants want to see the PAC games. Colorado St. has been pretty much a mid major and a foot notes like LSU playing one of the other D1 schools in their state. It really does not add up to play a program that is rising thanks to west coast people moving in, and their program has been at all time lows. If I were AD I had rather schedule Cali mid majors, even if you don’t win you get to be in front of California talent.
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And the Nebraska-Colorado game is another rivalry that is dead that shouldn’t be. Jeez, if CU drops CSU, they won’t have any true rivalries left. To me that’s very sad and not good for college football.
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This is assuming they view CSU as a rival which it really hasn’t been Colorado wins something like 66% of the time. Nebraska was dead the moment they jumped to the B1G. Sad but the entire culture of the Big12 and Texas ego and greed is at the root but not only cause. In my opinion CU has been without a rival since leaving the Big12. The number of California transplants in the state should change that assuming they can hire a staff that can win everyone once in a while. They have won 3 PAC games in 4 seasons.
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BTW despite CU going 3 and 33 in the PAC, they are still at 2-2 against CSU.
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C’mon. Sixty miles up the road and both schools fill the seats? It would be the most profitable game of the year for them. They can always schedule oocs with Ca teams. There’s lots of’em. Texas, with their limitless buckaroos, is as valuable for recruiting as Ca.
Could it be that Bobo’s machine-building rep preceeds him? Next year Bobo will gut the recruiting player pile in Co and build from there. Sparse populations hasn’t kept CU from excelling in the past.
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Amen Brother! With the defeatist attitude CU appears to have, Bobo is going to kick ass and take names. What a great opportunity for Bobo!
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Go CMB GO–we are pulling for you -GATA
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FEAR THE CRAYON.
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Giggle. 🙂
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Actually, can’t really blame CU for their actions. The neutral field game takes away a home opportunity. Plus they play 9 conference games and normally PAC 12 teams try to play at least one Power 5 team as well, home and home.
I know most on here love the WLOCP, but the fact we play it at a so called neutral site every year does impact our flexibility with scheduling OOC games. We have managed to work around it for the most part and still scheduled better than any other SEC team…especially those whimps from the SEC West…but if we ever go to 9 conference games it will totally handcuff us as well. Football should be played on campus during the regular season.
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Then make the CU-CSU game a home and home series. It works with us and Tech. Why not them?
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Cuz they’re tired of losing to CSU. CSU is very quickly becoming the program that people talk about in the Centennial State, not CU. The sports news lead last night was Bobo’s class, not MacIntyre’s.
CU needs to be front of mind for Jere Moorehead on how quickly a football program can go to shit when you have piss poor athletics leadership.
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Exactly it would be like GT and Ga. Southern playing in the Dome yearly and then Southern owning the series. CSU stands to gain much more and CU very little. Colorado was traditionally the 3rd strongest program in the Big 8 behind Nebraska, and Oklahoma. CSU was not on the radar for them.
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Boo, hiss, no way…. that game stays in Jax. period.
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Agreed, it is a neutral site, and an atmosphere only OU and Texas have an atmosphere that can compare to the WLOCP.
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You knew it was coming from someone, right ? haha
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Forgetting the factors of if this is a traditional game or not and the scheduling ramifications I still do not understand the CU AD. He is asking for the contract to be modified to a home and home now and promising that when the contract runs out he will not renew it under any circumstances. Maybe it is just me, but I am not seeing the carrot for CSU to move the games to home and home under the existing contract.
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Check out CU’s attendance: http://www.cubuffs.com/fls/600/gameday/2014/custats.pdf?DB_OEM_ID=600
They are consistently between 35k and 40k for home games, but the CSU game in Denver is 63k. The AD wants to give up the biggest game of their season because they have bigger fish to fry. This is the same AD who is adding seats to Folsom Field even though they haven’t sold it out since 2008.
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They’re going to need the extra capacity once they upgrade the sound system and have internet toilets.
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Adding a cannabis cafe too. No one will care about the game, but they’ll feel good about it.
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Both campuses are about an hour (give or take 10 minutes) from Denver. They should be playing in Grand Junction to give their fans in the western part of the state a chance to go to a game closer to home.
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Maybe the Ga/GT game could be played in Jacksonville, too? Give the South Georgia folks something to cheer about.
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Fort Collins (CSU) is about that time, but you can spit from Boulder (CU) and hit downtown Denver and Mile High Stadium. Both going to Grand Junction would be like UGA and GT playing in Albany – why? Last time I was there they had a perfectly good freeway all the way from GG to Denver.
No, methinks that the stadium additions and the money swirl may have something to do with this Brer Rabbit put-on. I would really question this guy if I lived or went to school in Co. He’s nuttier than I am on a sweet tooth binge with hay-flavored cookies.
Ricky George had better lay off the ganja before he gives it a bad name.
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27 miles from CU-Boulder to Mile High Stadium.
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Let Denver pick up the tab to make up the difference, huge new revenue stream for them to use and the local businesses that benefit could pitch in. Shame to lose that game when they both play in front of a bigger crowd and the game is competitive.
I feel UGA should make GT play us at home if they want to keep the game, no reason for us going to that ghetto in front of the smallest crowd we see all year. If not, I am good to cut them loose, or play them every four years like Ga Southern. Realize some of you look at them differently but when they left the SEC they took a huge nose dive in terms of importance.
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GSU and the House that Erk built deserves the respect it’s earned. The Eagles should no longer be considered a warm up, nor should their successor be so frequently disparaged proprietarily. They were a top 25 team this year. DYODD. Times change.
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First of all, I am not disparaging GSU at all, saying they should be treated like GT and Clemson. But they were not a Top 25 team this season, not even close to that. The thing that has cost GSU for so long is the defense, haven’t ever had a decent one but their offense has kept things close in many games they didn’t win. A little DD might be in order from you, especially your Top 25 statement.
I follow GSU, and have ever since Erk went to Statesboro. I still feel GSU made a mistake adding football, but they have been outstanding on the field. They were once a small school power in 3 different sports,, now they aren’t anywhere near the top in anything,, including football. Really hated to see the defense collapse against NCST and GT this past season, on the heels of the FU win in 2013 it would have really helped them get more respect.
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But…but…but they left in protest of the SEC not letting them play ND.
Years later UGA can’t play ND because ND doesn’t want to play us. Oh. Now that’s been corrected? But first they have to tune up on the ACC? Gotcha!
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I think Bobo just won the recruiting in Colorado just by saying ” they won’t play us”! They are going to learn that Bobo has the 64 color set of crayons in his offense.
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With the sharpener in the back?
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By 2020, they can meet in the regional playoff to make the 64 team field.
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