Deion Sanders revolutionizes Colorado football with ‘Coach Prime’ hype | 60 minutes

Deion Sanders has revitalized the Colorado Buffaloes football program, bringing Prime Time excitement to a team that won just one game last season.

The team debuted this season with a 45-42 victory over TCU, last year’s national runner-up, and then dispatched Nebraska, 36-14. Sanders is credited with turning the Jackson State University The Tigers are there, and with their move to Colorado, they turned the program there into the unlikely epicenter of college football.

“God wouldn’t relocate me to something that was successful,” Sanders said. “That doesn’t make sense, right? I had to find the most disappointing, most difficult task. And this is what it was. And this is what it is. And I love that.”

Sanders, also known as Head coach, previously told 60 Minutes that God called him to Jackson State University. The Pro Football Hall of Fame coach stayed there for three seasons, but last December, the same night JSU won the Conference Championship, Sanders announced he was leaving for Colorado to climb another mountain.

The coach has hinted that JSU’s lack of resources may have influenced his decision to leave, but he has largely been elusive on the topic.

“Sooner or later in life, there will be opportunities that will knock on your door,” Sanders said. “And at this point in my life, I felt like the opportunity not only for me, but for my kids, was tremendous.”

The distance between Jackson and Boulder is a thousand miles, and culturally it is immensely greater. Sanders went from a city that is 83% black to one that is 1% black. The move took him from a place with a water crisis to some kind of hipster college town where there is a store dedicated to kites.

He brought with him his sons, new Colorado quarterback Shedeur Sanders and defensive back Shilo. Shedeur and Shilo knew they would get attention with that move.

“I mean, neither of us came here, nor did we have our father training just to lose,” Shilo Sanders said.

Shedeur Sanders put up big numbers at Jackson State. There were questions about whether he could do the same against tougher competition, but in his first two games in Colorado, he threw for nearly a thousand yards, without an interception.

Travis Hunter also followed Coach Sanders from Jackson to Colorado. He plays offense and defense, something virtually unheard of in the modern college game. Sanders has already spoken publicly about Hunter’s Heisman chances.

Hunter and Coach Sanders’ sons aren’t the only new members of the Buffaloes. At the team’s first meeting in December, Sanders encouraged players to enter the transfer portal, an open market for athletes to find new schools. More than 50 players were ultimately transferred as part of Sanders’ roster overhaul.

“You take a team that has won a game and you fire the entire coaching staff… So who did the coaching staff recruit? The kids. So the kids are as much to blame as the coaching staff,” he said. “And I came to the conclusion that a multitude of them couldn’t help us get to where we wanted to go.”

He said he was there to “train hard” and “train hard.” Sanders said he brought a team of old-school disciplinarians to Colorado.

“My kids who play for me,” he said, “didn’t choose a college. They chose me. That’s the difference.”

The change has been a lot of fun for Rick George, who hired Coach Sanders. George has been Colorado’s athletic director for a decade.

“It’s great for us to be able to bring relevance back to this program,” George said. “And we had failed in my previous nine or 10 years.”

It’s too early to quantify Sanders’ full effect, but merchandise sales for the team are already up 819% from last season. Instagram followers have multiplied tenfold and subscriptions are sold out.

Sanders’ sudden impact is indisputable.

“I make a difference. I really make a difference,” the coach said. “I make people nervous, man. I make people move in their seats. I make people twiddle their thumbs. I make them think and question themselves.”