DENVER — It's easy to find the faults in a team that finished 4-8 in 2021 and was picked dead last in its conference preseason poll, but Colorado football head coach Karl Dorrell has never felt more confident with the group of men in his room.
"I'll grade our camp to start, I thought we had an outstanding camp, I would give it an 'A,'" Dorrell said. "We really looked sharp and it looked like they put a lot of work in and investment in over the summer to get us to that position."
A perfect score might sound generous to some on the outside, who saw the exodus of top players like Brenden Rice (USC), Christian Gonzalez (Oregon), Mark Perry (TCU), Mekhi Blackmon (USC), Jarek Broussard (Michigan State), and Dimitri Stanley (Iowa State), among others.
When players leave a program for their own needs and desires, it leaves openings for his team to ink incoming freshmen and other players in the portal who see the Buffs as their ideal destination.
"The ones that stayed, they felt like 'I'm here to get this place back and what do we need to do to do that?' and that started right in January. When they saw the exodus and they saw the ones who stayed, that actually galvanized the ones who stayed. Then, the ones we added along the way from the portal or from recruiting or the freshmen that came in this summer, they just came in and fell right in line with everything else," Dorrell said. "We've just got great continuity that's going on in our team right now where [the upperclassmen] have their arms around freshmen and they're saying, 'this is how we do things.'"
The good times keep rolling into an ongoing quarterback competition. Sophomore Brendon Lewis started every game last season, throwing for 1,540 yards, 10 touchdowns, and three interceptions. He was named the 2021 starter after transfer quarterback JT Shrout tore his ACL in a spring scrimmage, and remains the front-runner heading into 2022 as the incumbent.
"He had a great training camp, absolutely outstanding," Dorrell said. "His presence, the plays he's making, his confidence, he's playing like he was when he was in high school."
Shrout participated in all off-season and preseason camps, after rehabbing from his injury and is competing fully for the starting role.
"Equally outstanding was JT," Dorrell said. "JT's situation is different because he's coming off of his injury. His process of improvement is a lot different because he needs to build the confidence that he's ready to play because he's missed a year."
Dorrell, while complimentary of both quarterbacks, was not ready to name a quarterback on the spot.
"Both of them were outstanding," he said.
With only a little more than a week left to make that decision and make game adjustments, will the Buffs be ready to face the bright lights of Friday Night?
"We're excited, we really are, even right now," he said. "They're kind of on a need to prove every step of the way. Our attitude is that we're going to have to earn our respect about being the type of team that we want to be, but they're not going to give us that recognition, we're going to have to prove that that's what we are. But I believe this team has that fabric though. I believe they can get themselves ready to do some really unique things this year."
Colorado opens up its 2022 campaign hosting Big 12 opponent TCU on Friday September 2 at 8pm at Folsom Field.