BOULDER — Saturday night was a first for Colorado in the Deion Sanders era.

The Buffaloes have been beaten at home over the two and a half seasons. They entered this week with a 10-7 record at Folsom Field since the start of the 2023 season. But none of those seven losses were blowouts. In fact, they were all by 7 points or fewer.

That’s what made the 52-14 loss to Arizona on Saturday so jarring. Sure, the Buffs have even blown out before during the Coach Prime era. They suffered their biggest defeat (53-7 at Utah) of his tenure just last week.

But this felt different. 

Not only was Sanders boosted by a surprise visit from his son, Shedeur, who had a bye week with the Cleveland Browns in his rookie season. It was also homecoming weekend and over 48,000 people came to watch a three-win football team.

By the time halftime arrived, many had left. After Ralphie ran before the start of the third quarter, even more got up and headed for the exits.

Afterward, Sanders decided he was going to be the only person to answer for a second straight embarrassing performance.

“No one will be available tonight. It’s on me. Don’t attack coordinators, come at me. Don’t attack the players, come at me. This is me,” Coach Prime said. “This has nothing to do with none of them. It has everything to do with me.”

On the one hand, that’s true. Sanders is the one that hired the coaching staff, offensive coordinator Pat Shurmur included, and signed off on all of the disappointing transfers that joined the program in the offseason.

But there was a lot of contradiction in Sanders’ words after his team’s sixth loss of the season.

On one hand, he said for a second straight week he was dumbfounded by his team’s performance and that the week of practice leading up to the game gave no indication a performance like that was coming.

“If I knew (what was wrong), I wouldn’t have allowed it to happen,” he said. “If I knew, I would tell you. You know I’m transparent.”

But later in his press conference, Coach Prime indicated he did know what the issue was.

“I’m not gonna say I don’t have the answer. I have the answer,” Sanders said. “I’m trying my best not to say what I want to say. I’m trying to be transparent because you all deserve that. It’s on me, but I know what the situation is. I know the problem is and I’ll fix it.”

Maybe it’s a poor coaching staff and an underwhelming roster that Sanders plans on overhauling once the season likely comes to an end later this month without a second straight bowl appearance. Maybe he just doesn’t want to say what changes are coming because there are three games left and, in his opinion, his team hasn’t quit yet.

“I know this team personally. I know this team intimately,” Coach Prime said. “They haven’t done that. I know when a player quits. I haven’t seen that (yet).”

But the fact this season has gone off the rails — with the Buffs being outscored 105-24 by Utah and Arizona — isn’t something that concerns Sanders. He isn’t worried it’ll scare off potential recruits ahead of another roster rebuild in early January.

“I don’t have to explain it; they saw it,” Sanders said. “You gotta understand, if you’re a dawg, you want to come here and right the wrong. If you’re a cat, you look at the scoreboard and you run.”

At least for now, Coach Prime hasn’t given any indication he’s running either.

“I never doubt me,” he said. “The confidence level of me doing this job? I’m built for this. I don’t doubt me.”