Deion Sanders sends strong message to recruits worried about Colorado's downturn

For the second week in a row, Colorado got embarrassed. Following up a 53-7 loss to Utah last week on the road, the Buffs lost 52-17 at home to Arizona on Saturday night. That's a cumulative score of 105-24 over the last two weeks, including 81-7 in the first half of the two games.

Any optimism that Colorado fans felt following an upset win over Iowa State three weeks ago has been replaced with immediate despair. Colorado has found a landing spot somewhere beneath rock bottom. They landed there last week after the shellacking in Salt Lake, but they brought a shovel with them and dug deeper.

Colorado is now 3-6. Last season's nine-win breakthrough season feels like ages ago. The forward momentum hasn't just been halted; the Buffs have taken a substantial step backward in Coach Prime's third season in charge.

Colorado's performance this season - particularly over the last two weeks - has raised uncomfortable questions about the direction of the program.

Those questions are undoubtedly filtering down to recruits, those committed to Colorado and the uncommitted prospects Sanders is still targeting in the 2026 cycle. The Buffaloes can ill-afford to lose any momentum on the trail. They rank 68th in the composite rankings with just 13 committed prospects in the 2026 class.

So when approached in the postgame about what his message would be to recruits to reassure them following back-to-back embarrassing defeats, Coach Prime was blunt.

"I don't have to explain it; they saw it," Sanders said. "See, you got to understand, if you're a dawg, you want to come here and right the wrongs. If you're a cat, you look at the scoreboard and you run. Which one are you? A dawg or a cat?"

Coach Prime's message immediately resonated with one Colorado commit

It remains to be seen how well Coach Prime's message is received overall, but it did immediately resonate with one Colorado commitment.

4-star safety Preston Ashley, one of the longest-standing commitments in Colorado's 2026 class, responded on X to Sanders' message:

Sanders will need that message to reach more than just one commit. Colorado has a lot of work to do to close out this cycle strong, and the recent performance on the field certainly won't help it build momentum with just a little over a month before the early signing period.

Coach Prime hoped on-field results would lead to a big recruiting push in the fall. Now, he'll have to hope he can sell recruits on a future that looks a lot murkier than it did yesterday.