Three Ways Deion Sanders' Buffaloes Should Be Better Next Year

Heading into the 2026 season, the Colorado Buffaloes are looking for a much-improved showing from the last year. With lots of additions from the transfer portal and high school recruiting, Colorado’s eyes are not just set on an improvement from 2025, but hoping to compete for a Big 12 title.

In the spring, there seems to be significant improvement and competition at every position, which is a great sign from Colorado coach Deion Sanders. Based on the new additions and development of the Buffaloes young talent, this should be a much better team next season. So, here are three reasons why Colorado should be much better in 2026.

Three Ways Colorado Buffaloes Football Should Improve 2026 Coach Deion Sanders Tackle Experience Julian Lewis Safety Tandem — Dec 26, 2024; Phoenix, AZ, USA; Rutgers Scarlet Knights offensive lineman Taj White (63) against the Kansas State Wildcats during the Rate Bowl at Chase Field. Mandatory Credit: Mark J. Rebilas-Imagn Images | Mark J. Rebilas-Imagn Images

1. Experience at Both Tackle Positions

To be successful at the highest level of college football requires a great offensive line, but especially dominant players at both tackle positions. In the last few years, Colorado has not been able to find two dominant tackles; at times, they found one good one with Jordan Seaton, who now plays for LSU.

Coach Prime saw the need to find experienced and productive players for his offensive line and was able to recruit the experience and consistency that Colorado needed.

In the transfer portal, Sanders was able to add Georgia transfer Bo Hughley (10 games and two starts during 2025), Missouri transfer Jayven Richardson (11 games and two starts across for 2025), Leon Bell who transferred from Cal (11 games and eight starts in 2025), and Taj White the Rutgers transfer (11 games and 11 starts in 2025).

Offensive linemen have to be physical by nature, and the more experienced ones are. A team can add to the better off. The offense will be. Sanders was able to find Hughley, Richardson, Bell, and White from very physical conferences in the Big Ten, SEC, and ACC.

The Buffaloes also have Larry Johnson III returning to Boulder for 2026 to compete for one of the tackle spots. Johnson brings significant experience playing in nine games during 2025 with Colorado and 15 and two seasons with the Tennessee Volunteers.

Sanders was able to get a significant amount of experience added to what Colorado already had for both tackle positions. It will be a fierce competition to decide who starts in the fall, but regardless of the outcome, the tackle tandem should be much better than what Colorado had last season.

2. Julian Lewis’ Fit in Brennan Marion’s Offense

Redshirt freshman quarterback Julian Lewis comes off his first collegiate season, where he was not the starter to begin the year, but throughout the year was able to earn the trust of the team and appeared in four games while starting in two. In his game reps, Lewis recorded 589 passing yards, four touchdowns, and zero interceptions.

Heading into next season, Coach Prime brought in a face at offensive coordinator with Brennan Marion. Marion brings a much different style of offense to Boulder, prioritizing getting the ball in space to playmakers, in addition to a physical rush attack to help keep the offense on schedule.

Marion’s offense is known as a go-go, and it seems best run by a point guard-type quarterback, which is exactly what Lewis brings to the table.

Lewis should be able to succeed in this offense as he gets the ball out quickly to his playmakers to create explosive plays. Colorado has added several great receivers on the outside to help create those big plays, including Danny Scudero and DeAndre Moore Jr.

Lewis has an opportunity to experience great success in Marion‘s offense, and if the two can work well together, Colorado’s offense should be much better in 2026, but also be one of the more efficient offenses in the Big 12 and potentially in the country.

3. Elite Safety Tandem

During the 2025 season, the Buffaloes struggled to create consistent stops on defense, which was partly due to miscommunication in the secondary and struggles to stop opposing rushing attacks.

That is why Colorado brought in two new safeties with Vanderbilt transfer Randon Fontenette and New Mexico State transfer Naeten Mitchell. Fontenette and Mitchell give the Buffaloes two experienced players to communicate in the back end, but also have the versatility to play the run and pass equally well.

Both Fontenette and Mitchell were very productive during the 2025 season. Fontenette totaled 52 tackles, 6.5 tackles for loss, six pass breakups, and one forced fumble. Mitchell was just as productive with a final tally of 93 tackles, 1.5 tackles for loss, seven pass breakups, four forced fumbles, and three interceptions.

Fontenette and Mitchell complement each other well with their versatility at the safety position. At their best, it seems that Fontenette could function as more of a box safety to shut down the run game and be physical near the line of scrimmage. Then Mitchell could be more of a deep safety to make plays on the ball over the top against opposing quarterbacks.

This versatility lines up with new defensive coordinator Chris Marve, who likes to be aggressive with an emphasis on speed and physicality, but also changes up coverages to give quarterbacks a lot more to process after the snap.

Every defense needs solid safeties on the backend to communicate and provide support in both the run game and the pass game. Coach Sanders was able to find just that, and this safety tandem of Mitchell and Fontenette could help the Buffaloes have one of the better secondaries in the conference.

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