When the University of Colorado announced its decision to hire Deion Sanders as its next head football coach, there was no shortage of critics. Sanders’ only college coaching experience was a three-year stop at Jackson State University. His loud, no-nonsense approach led to an unprecedented 50+ players leaving the program within his first few months on the job. And Colorado was on the hook for his five-year, $29.5 million contract — the richest contract in school history — no matter how he performed.

In fact, the move was such a risk that Colorado didn’t even have the money to pay Sanders, with the school’s athletic director telling reporters he “wasn’t worried about it” but now needed to go out and raise the money from alumni and boosters.

However, they did exactly that, and less than two years after Sanders’ introductory news conference, everything has changed. There are still critics, of course. But Sanders has taken a team that won just one game the year before his arrival and turned it into a legitimate Big 12 title contender this season.

Colorado is 6-2 on the season, making the Buffs bowl eligible for the first time in nearly a decade. The team is also ranked No. 21 in the latest AP Top 25 college football poll, and wide receiver and defensive back extraordinaire Travis Hunter is one of the favorites to win this year’s Heisman Trophy.

The combination of this success intertwined with Deion’s personality has brought the school more attention than it could have ever imagined. Colorado’s online team store sales were up 2,544% last year. The school’s social media accounts have added more than a million followers over the past two years, and the Buffaloes played in five of college football’s top 25 most-watched games last year, selling out every single home game.

This alone justifies Sanders’ five-year, $29.5 million contract — and the deal even starts to look like a bargain when you consider the downstream impact.

You’ve probably heard that athletics are the front door to a university. The idea behind that phrase is that athletic success drives everything else, with increased exposure leading to more interest, more interest leading to more applications, more applications leading to more students, more students leading to higher tuition costs and, eventually, higher academic standards and an increase in revenue for the school.

This is known as the “Flutie Effect.” It started in 1984 when Boston College quarterback Doug Flutie successfully threw a Hail Mary on national television to beat the University of Miami. Boston College then saw a 20% jump in applications over the subsequent years, and there have been countless examples since.

Butler, for instance, saw a 40% increase in applications after their men’s basketball team reached the national championship game in 2010. Applications at Florida Gulf Coast jumped 27% after advancing to the NCAA Sweet 16 as a No. 15 seed in 2013, and the University of Alabama’s enrollment increased from 25,000 to 60,000 while Nick Saban was coach.

The Flutie Effect often takes a few years to play out. However, Colorado has expedited this process by averaging 7.2 million viewers during its prime-time games last year.

As a result, the Boulder-based school received a record 68,000 applicants for fall 2024, a 20% increase from 2023. The school ended up extending offers to 51,000 students, and enrollment increased 3.4% year-over-year, from 37,153 in 2023 to 38,428 in 2024.

The typical counterargument to the Flutie Effect is that the impact is minor because schools have a limit on how many students they can accept. That’s technically true, but the problem with that thought process is that it discounts other things, like how heightened demand enables the school to raise academic standards, and, more importantly, the fact that some students are more financially valuable than others.

Take the University of Alabama, for example. Not only did enrollment increase from 25,000 students when Nick Saban arrived to 60,000 students when he retired, but the Crimson Tide have also fundamentally changed the composition of their student body.

Before Saban, the University of Alabama had three times more in-state students than out-of-state students. But today, that ratio has flipped, and Alabama’s student body now consists primarily of out-of-state students. It is an important distinction because those out-of-state students pay three times more in tuition than in-state students — $34,000 vs. $12,000 annually — which has helped Alabama collect billions in additional tuition.

Colorado still has a long way to go before it can be included in the same conversation as Alabama, but the same rules apply. Colorado’s out-of-state students pay $43,600 in tuition compared to $14,000 for in-state students. And given that the school doesn’t have the infrastructure to add an additional 20,000 students, you can almost guarantee that Colorado’s admissions staff will start placing a premium on out-of-state students.

That will eventually make Deion Sanders’ expensive contract look like one of the biggest bargains in sports. Now, the school needs to ensure Sanders doesn’t leave for a bigger program by giving him all the resources he needs to compete at the highest level.

It’s Election Day in Colorado. That means time is running out for voters to make their voices heard in the 2024 presidential election, in congressional and state legislative races, and on a bevy of statewide and local ballot measures.

The deadline to cast a vote is 7 p.m. That includes dropping off a ballot at a 24-hour drop box.

For voters still intending to vote using a ballot that was mailed to them, it’s too late to ship them back through the mail. All mail ballots must now be delivered to drop boxes or voting centers. Alternatively, voters may cast a ballot in person at voting centers that will be open across the state between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m.

The Colorado secretary of state’s website — sos.state.co.us — provides a link to a tool that allows voters to find their nearest polling locations and ballot drop boxes by inputting their addresses.

Voters can also visit their local county clerk’s website to obtain more information about where they can vote. And Colorado still allows new voter registration on Election Day in person at a county voting center.

There will be 39 voter service and polling centers open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. in Denver alone. That’s on top of dozens of drop boxes. The Denver Clerk and Recorder’s Office offers an online map of all drop box and in-person voting locations in the city on its website.

FORT COLLINS, Colo. — The UND men’s basketball season started off on the wrong foot late Monday night in Colorado.

The Fighting Hawks turned the ball over 15 times in the first half, fell behind by 17 at halftime and were routed 82-56 by Colorado State.

Treysen Eaglestaff hit on a drive with 7 minutes, 42 seconds left in the first half to cut the Rams’ lead to 23-17. The Fighting Hawks then didn’t hit another shot from the field the rest of the first half.

The Rams pulled away in the second half, ballooning the lead to 30 points by the middle of the second half.

The Fighting Hawks never led in the game and trailed by as many as 34.

UND ended with 21 turnovers, including five from transfer guard Reggie Thomas.

Eli King chipped in five points but played just 18 minutes and fouled out.

Eaglestaff led UND with 12 points on 5-for-9 shooting. Mier Panoam had 10 points, while Amar Kuljuhovic had nine points and Dariyus Woodson had seven.

UND was 5-for-16 from 3-point range.

Colorado State was led by Nique Clifford with 20 points on 9-for-12 shooting. He also had 14 rebounds.

The Rams struggled from the free-throw line at 8-for-19 but dominated points in the paint 52-18.

UND’s frontcourt struggled as Mambouro Mara ended with no points on three shots and a minus-22 plus-minus in 21 minutes. Deng Mayar was 1-for-5 with five points and minus-16 in 15 minutes of play.

Grand Forks Red River’s Zach Kraft, a redshirt freshman guard, played his first minutes for UND but didn’t put up a shot in six minutes of action.

Colorado State, led by coach Niko Medved, was 25-11 last season and 15-2 at home. The Rams were an NCAA Tournament qualifier last year, losing to Texas in the first round.

UND will now play at Texas-San Antonio at 6 p.m. Saturday in Texas.

The Fighting Hawks will host Dickinson State in Bismarck on Nov. 12, with the first true home game at the Betty Engelstad Sioux Center coming Nov. 14 at noon against Utah Valley.

Staff reports and local scoreboards from the Grand Forks Herald Sports desk.