Colorado football catches stray from college basketball coaching legend

St. John’s basketball head coach Rick Pitino sent a random stray the Colorado football roster’s way on October 26, saying that the Buffs roster Deion Sanders inherited was “not ready” for Pac-12 play; whereas his Red Storm will be.

“The difference between Deion [and I], Deion had a lot of players that weren’t ready to play at that level,” Pitino said during an interview on “SportsCenter” on Thursday live from St. John’s (h/t New York Post). “I had really good players at St. John’s. [Former coach] Mike Anderson did a tremendous job recruiting, I just wanted a whole different culture. But the guys that were here, they could play.”

As The New York Post’s Christian Arnold points out, the hope in the borough of Queens and New York City-wide is that there will be a Pitino version of the “Prime Effect” for St. John’s.

“The arrival of Coach Prime has pushed the football team to national prominence, and in Jamaica, Queens, St. John’s is hoping Pitino can do the same,” Arnold wrote.

Colorado football was ready for the Pac-12 but not always ready for the moment

Nearly defeating USC after coming within a touchdown of the Trojans in the fourth quarter after being down three scores and pulling out a win in Tempe against ASU via a game-winning field goal — even if the Sun Devils are postseason ineligible and banged up — showed that Colorado was ready for the Pac-12.

They just haven’t always been ready for the moment, as the 42-6 Oregon embarrassment and the blown 29-0 lead to Stanford showed us crystal-clearly.

With a 2023 schedule that featured one Group of Five opponent, Coach Prime’s Buffs didn’t have the warm-up opponents Pitino’s St. John’s squad will face early in the season like Stony Brook, Holy Cross, and Sacred Heart.

It’s a different equation entirely for Pitino and Prime — and mentioning the two situations in the same breath was somewhat of a bait question to begin with.