Deion Sanders's Message to Players After Colorado's Loss to BYU

BOULDER — The distance between 4-1 and 2-3 feels razor-thin after the Colorado Buffaloes' squandered upset bid to the No. 25 BYU Cougars on Saturday. A 24-21 defeat felt less like a game BYU won and more like one the Buffs firmly lost. Colorado's offense surged out to a 14-0 lead but cooled down, and the defense let up 17 unanswered points. On both ends, the Buffaloes lost their initial intensity while flubbing one key chance after another.

Quarterback Kaidon Salter had his troops in order early but finished just 3-for-10 on third downs and threw a coffin-nailing interception on the game's final drive. Coach Deion Sanders wasn't incensed with the loss, but he clearly expressed discontent with penalties and missed opportunities. Here is what he said to reporters postgame.

Opening Statement:

Deion Sanders Colorado Buffaloes Football BYU Cougars Kalani Sitake Kaidon Salter quarterback LJ Martin Big 12 Damon Greaves — Sep 27, 2025; Boulder, Colorado, USA; Colorado Buffaloes head coach Deion Sanders reacts before the game against the Brigham Young Cougars at Folsom Field. | Ron Chenoy-Imagn Images

"Utmost respect for the coaching staff over there [at BYU], especially head coach [Kalani Sitake] and his wonderful father that I've had the pleasure to meet twice now. Disciplined team, fundamentally sound team, played their butts off. [Their] young quarterback is phenomenal. Proud of him. He did what he had to do to win the game. He made the plays that he was supposed to make to win the game."

"Tough-fought game, I can't say I'm highly upset, upset with a few things, but sometimes, when it seems like you had more talent, but you didn't quite win the game, it makes it feel somewhat awkward. We had opportunities, tremendous amount of opportunities, but nevertheless, we didn't cash in on it."

"Sometimes, it felt like the moment was just too big for some of our athletes, and they've got to do something about that. At halftime, we challenge certain positions to go out there and up their game, challenge their opponents, we didn't get that. We got the same thing that we had in the first half."

"We got to do better as a staff, as a team, and I got to do better."

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On The Offense's Struggles Post-First Quarter:

"We had opportunities. We just didn't make it happen. If you slow down and you watch the film, you're going to see tremendous opportunities. We just didn't make it happen. And that's unfortunate, because you go over and over those same situations at practice all darn week, and you see it happening in the same defense. It's not like you were tricked or anything. It was there. We just didn't make it happen."

On If The Number Of Miscues Is Fixable:

"We can try, but they got to step up. I'm not gonna go make excuses for them, they gotta step up. They gotta step up. I don't know what else I can say about it. They're prepared, studying film. Same thing that we saw in the scout team, the same plays that they ran tonight. It was a great scouting output for the staff. We just got to step up. We got to make the plays that were there. We had tremendous opportunities to make the plays, we just didn't."

On If Less Reliance On the Run Was Costly:

"I don't think we went away from that. I think the game sometimes dictates what you're going to do. We were okay with where we were at halftime, but we knew we were in for a fight in the second half. Going into the locker room at halftime, we wish we could have gotten another score tremendously... Both teams had six penalties, but ours was for 67 yards. Theirs for 34. we got to do better. We got to do much better, and we have been doing much better. We just got to stay consistent with that."

On If There's A Fix To Late-Game Struggles:

"No, I saw what I saw at practice, everything I saw today, I saw at practice, and that's where it starts, and then the preparation ... That's your prerequisite, that's your preparation for how you're going to perform. Rarely have I seen men in all levels practice bad and go out there and dominate in the game. I haven't seen that. That wasn't my recipe for success. Got to practice better, tremendously better at some positions."

On Kaidon Salter's Performance:

"He did some wonderful things."

On the Run Game's Success:

"We have a tremendously physical line, and guess what? They practiced their butts off last week. They had a great week of preparation, so we knew we were going to be able to do some tremendous things because of the way they worked last week. I mean, they worked, and you could see the results thereof. A lot of things that we saw that transpired in the game, running the ball-wise, we saw at practice. And it was no surprise."

"So even with Drelon [Miller], We worked on that, and we wanted situational football, when that gave us an opportunity, and we just hammered it, we hammered it, and it paid dividends for us."