Deion Sanders needs to make major changes to his coaching staff

The Deion Sanders honeymoon is over in Boulder.

With losses in five of their last six games, the CU Buffs are no longer the darlings of Colorado sports. In fact, they’re now taking more arrows than ever.

Once the toast of college football at 3-0, the Buffs have fallen off a cliff. Coach Prime’s latest decision, promoting Pat Shurmur and demoting Sean Lewis, played out in disastrous fashion. The Buffs offense was awful against Oregon State, only getting to a lousy 19 points thanks to 14 of them in the fourth quarter after the Beavers relaxed.

This is no longer fun.

And any Broncos fan could’ve told you the Shurmur thing wasn’t going to work. His stint as Denver’s offensive coordinator was extremely underwhelming, and he brought his same stale offense to Boulder. Sanders is a giant of the game, but he made his first major misstep and the sharks are circling.

The offense wasn’t the problem in losses to USC and Stanford, where the Buffs put up 41 and 43 points, respectively. And against UCLA, it wasn’t QB Shedeur Sanders fault. It was the offensive line playing like traffic cones at the Rose Bowl. Last time I checked, Shurmur isn’t an O-line guru like Mike Munchak, so if that was the reason for the switch, it was silly.

Did Coach Prime make this change for the Buffs or for his son? That’s a valid question. Yes, Shedeur needs better protection, but this one didn’t feel like it was in the best interest of the team. We all know how that played out last time, with the infamous Dan Hawkins and Cody Hawkins debacle.

Shurmur should be dismissed this week and Lewis promoted back to where he belongs. Admitting a mistake is the best way to fix it, and Prime needs to do that to try to salvage the season. CU has to win against Arizona this Saturday to have any realistic shot at a bowl game. Lewis is a much better option to call the plays than Shurmur.

And on defense, is anyone else sick of the Charles Kelly charade? His group constantly has too many man on the field, and all he can do is run around screaming like a mad man. Maybe the coach should, you know, coach, rather than think he’s a drill sergeant. The constant meltdowns instead of fixing the issues are getting old. The cameras captured him having two ugly ones against Oregon State.

Kelly doesn’t have the clout to be yelling at anyone. The Buffs could easily be 6-3 and already bowl eligible, or maybe even 7-2 if his group does its part. The collapse against Stanford in the second half was particularly painful, making a very mediocre Cardinal team look like they were Georgia.

This is where things get tough for Deion Sanders. He needs to make some hard decisions, and if not now, then immediately after the season. Coach Prime must relieve both Shurmur and Kelly of their duties and find better coordinators. Again, he could start by doing the right thing with Lewis this week.

Sanders wasn’t brought in for his “x’s and o’s” coaching, it was for the celebrity, recruitment ability and attention. He’s done all of those quite well. But the technical side of things has not been sharp for the Buffs. He needs to hire two coordinators who can make up for his deficiencies in those departments.

A season that once had promise has gone sideways in a hurry. Sure, it’s still a success overall, but fans won’t put up with these same kind of mistakes in 2024. That’s where Prime must make changes, and relatively big ones, or the Buffs will continue to stub their toe.