Onward Buffaloes! MacIntyre on the job!

On the second full day of the new Mac era with Mike MacIntyre leading the Colorado Buffaloes, a lot is in motion.  First of all, season ticket holders received their “personal” recorded phone call from the coach thanking us for our support in the past and future.  On top of that, he has been formulating a coaching staff and evaluating the current roster as well as the recruiting situation.  He will not coach San Jose State in its bowl game to focus on his new project.

Assistant Coaches: It is still unclear who exactly will fill the staff as MacIntyre is still trying to meet with all his candidates here in Boulder, in San Jose and elsewhere.  One intriguing new name into the mix, suggested by radio personality Reed Marks, is Duke’s Matt Lubick for his offensive and recruiting knowledge and Pac-12 connections. The speculation runs wildly in every direction though, so we will just have to wait and see how the dominoes fall, which could actually be as soon as Wednesday or Thursday. 

San Jose DC Kent Baer will coach the team in its bowl game, but no word on his status for next year. It appears that he is also being considered for the head coaching position there. Since he also coaches LBs, f he does not come to Boulder, it increases the chance that Cabral would stay.

MacIntyre hired Stanford’s assistant strength and conditioning coach Dave Forman after his first season at 1-10 and saw immediate results in general team conditioning and fewer injuries. I wonder if Forman also comes east a little bit and if Malcolm Bracken, a total Embree guy, goes back to the NFL.

Recruiting and roster: This class was originally thought to be 14-16, but could grow with further attrition.  There will certainly be current guys who do leave, whether because they were staunch “Embree guys”, don’t think they will fit the new system, or who may even be asked or encouraged to go elsewhere.  

There have been some rumblings of CB Kenneth Crawley and TE Vincent Hobbs looking elsewhere, but nothing substantiated yet and they haven’t had their one-on-ones with MacIntyre yet.  At QB does Jordan Webb really stick around? Nick Hirschman is graduating in May and could go elsewhere with two year to play like Webb did this year. We’ll have to see how many that will be, and which position groupings would be affected.

Coach MacIntyre has stated that he has honored all of the 12 scholarship commitments to CU if they still want to come and has been reaching out to them.  Most of the response from them has been positive and it appears they will mostly come with tweets from at least WR Elijah Dunston, a few of the O-lineman, and QB Sefo Liufau.  The biggest question would be WR/DB Devin Ross.

Sure-fire starter and now former greyshirt DE Kisima Jagne has decided to enroll at ASU, whose coaches jumped on him as soon as Embree was fired.  His academic paperwork was very late getting “approved” and it was deep enough into fall practices that they decided to greyshirt him; and now because of letting Embree go, he is gone as well.  I have not read anything specifically about the other greyshirts, DE Derek McCartney, WRs Peyton Williams and Jeff Thomas, or OG Gerald Kough. 

San Jose State had 10 commits, including three receivers, some guys whom Colorado was also recruiting (some overlap I think in those two groups) and all-Arizona QB Darrell Garrestson, although he is only about 6’ flat.  I would expect some of those guys to follow MacIntyre to Colorado.

What about Colorado kids?  I already wrote that I hoped Chaparral TE Mitchell Parsons was one of MacIntyre’s first phone calls but I have not heard anything concrete in that regard.  Valor Christian QB Luke del Rio has de-committed from OSU since their OC left and is now being recruited by Alabama, Oregon St. and…Colorado State?  Dan Skipper, a highly ranked offensive lineman is committed to Tennessee, but they are also bringing in a new coach and his decision could be affected. Stuart from CUattheGame.com suggested the three in-state csu commits-Castle Rock’s OL Blake Nowland, Grand Junction DE Austin Berk, Lakewood’s OL Jake Bennett-could be targeted.

I would expect MacInytre to make a run at a few “name” players, not sure who, but many programs are changing a lot of coaches and many recruiting decisions could be changed.  He will want to make a splash if he can and might be able to flip a few or pick up some scraps from somewhere else. 

As luck would have it, Embree’s staff was saving most of its visits for December and January so MacIntyre’s guys will be able to host as many players as they want each weekend in January.  They also have a couple of weekends with some great basketball, including an already sold-out men’s game vs. UCLA on Jan. 12.

Buffscoop, a pay site I am too cheap to pay for, is teasing via twitter “a high –profile transfer from a high-profile program.  A four-star recruit CU barely missed on last year.”  I have no idea if it’s true or who it might be, but their info has been good in the past and if it is true, it will come out in a few days.  However, a transfer means he would have to sit out next year, and then have three years to play beginning in 2014.

Interesting Stats by posters on NetBuffs when discussing if any QB on roster is fast and mobile enough to run the pistol: Shane Dillon runs a 4.6 40, while Heisman winner Texas A&M’s Johnny Manziel a 4.55, Oregon’s Marcus Mariota 4.7, , Kansas State’s Collen Klein and UCLA’s Brent Hundley both 4.65 and Tyler Hansen and Tim Tebow 4.6. Dillon himself is excited for the pistol, and although he wasn’t asked to run a lot in high school, he likes to do it and loves the stats that QBs have put up in the offense.