A familiar opponent cannot simplify the decision
Isaac Wilson started seven games for Utah as a freshman in 2024. On Saturday, he faces the Utes from Colorado’s side of the matchup. The connection supplies an obvious storyline. His first start for the Buffaloes supplies a more urgent football question.
Wilson completed a career-high 26 passes for 290 yards and added 42 rushing yards against Texas Tech on October 3. He also threw three interceptions in the 29–7 defeat. Joseph Williams threw another, making four for Colorado as a team. The passing production and the lost possessions belong in the same evaluation rather than separate arguments about whether the debut was encouraging.
Do not let the last mistake call the next play
Colorado’s Texas Tech afternoon included an interception returned for a touchdown after a punt pinned the offense near its own goal line. A missed 29-yard field goal and an unsuccessful fake punt also reduced the return on its possessions. The Buffaloes found ways to gain yards without consistently preserving the opportunity to turn them into points.
That makes decision-making the useful focus for Wilson’s next start. Familiarity with Utah does not reveal every coverage or excuse a throw into a picture that has changed. A safe completion or a discarded pass can protect the next down. The goal is not to remove ambition from a quarterback who showed he could move the ball. It is preventing the need to answer one setback from creating another one immediately.
Utah can make an early deficit expensive
Colorado is 2–3 overall and 0–2 in the Big 12 before hosting No. 11 Utah, 5–0 and 2–0, on October 17. Kickoff is 8:15 p.m. Mountain on ESPN. Colorado’s preview notes that Utah has outscored opponents 68–3 in first quarters and scored a touchdown on every opening drive this season.
An opponent with that beginning makes empty or surrendered possessions especially costly. Wilson does not need to win his personal reunion in the opening series. He needs to give Colorado a sequence of usable decisions that keeps the next series from becoming desperate. Knowing the opponent’s history is interesting. Keeping the ball long enough to challenge its current defense is the part that can change the game.
Sources & reporting
- Colorado Athletics: the road ahead against Utah, October 15 ↗
- Colorado Athletics: Texas Tech recap, October 3 ↗
This article adds independent analysis to publicly available reporting. We did not conduct the interviews or report the game firsthand. Report a factual error.