By Dan Hawkins, CU-Boulder football coach

This fall will be my fourth at Colorado, and alumni support for the program has been growing every year. I’d like to thank you for that support and the rebirth of pride and interest in the Buffs. After rising to a national power for most of the 1990s, the 2000s have seen a few highs, one Big 12 Conference championship, several noteworthy individual accomplishments and a few lows. The lows have consisted of four losing years accompanied by four times staying at home during bowl season and the recruiting ordeal fueled by several elements that set the program back in the middle of the decade. It has taken a great deal of time and effort to rebuild a championship culture, but we are making progress.

“Will this be the season we are rewarded for being so patient?” you ask. I can tell you this-we are on the right path and we are very, very close to turning the corner; we all feel it.

At the heart of everything we do is “Excellence with Class,” which is our guiding philosophy of traits and actions for Buff football players. We are always going to keep the bar high and make excellence the standard, whether this is off the field, in the classroom or on the gridiron. Our goals are lofty for the season, and “Excellence with Class” is close at hand.

It’s interesting to examine the roller coaster ride that is part of our great history, not only in my three years here but for the entire program since the turn of the millennium. We want everything related to our program to have a solid, educationally sound foundation. Only then can consistency and growth be achieved. We’re pointed in the right direction.

At Colorado, Bill McCartney brought the program to the pinnacle of national prominence, so the expectation at CU is to compete for the conference title, be in position to compete for a national championship and to have a presence in the postseason, preferably around New Year’s Day. We embrace that great standard.

Our future has a tremendous amount of potential. We have worked hard to rebuild our foundation and that involves nearly every aspect of a collegiate football program, on and off the field. We are especially proud of having two straight semesters of setting single-semester and overall cumulative grade point average records. Now it’s time to transfer this to what you want to see on the field. One has to “be” a champion before one can “win” a championship on the field.

With 51 returning lettermen (we lost 19), and over three dozen others who have been in the program and understand how and what we are trying to accomplish, we have a great nucleus to start with. Our formula of “Talent, Depth, Experience” is starting to fill out. We have several juniors who have been in our program going on four years, and this leadership is essential.

We’re still going to be young as we have 115 players on our roster right now, 79 of whom are sophomores or freshmen. Some will be asked to grow up fast; you saw that last year with freshmen like Rodney Stewart who made an immediate impact for us at tailback and then later in the season when Patrick Mahnke and Andrew Perkins finished off the year as our starting safeties.

We had an aberration last year with a lot of lost games due to injury. Add some attrition that always happens with any coaching staff, and the result was a total of 95 freshmen (true or redshirt) who started games for Colorado in 2007 and 2008, which I have been informed is nearly double any previous two-year total in school history. We as coaches have to turn that into a positive, and the upside is that there are a lot of sophomores who have received extensive playing time they otherwise may not have seen.

Offensively, we have a great nucleus of offensive linemen. That is always the most important place to start. We will have some size, strength and experience to draw from and seven players will have had some starting experience. Our backfield will have talent, depth, and experience and will provide us with a variety of options. Two quarterbacks who have started and won, and a group of running backs featuring four very capable runners. Our tight end crew is starting to come together much the same way. Our wide receivers will be a bit young, and only one of the 10 returning has played in a game, but we like the mentality developing there. Those players know they have a tremendous opportunity to gain playing time the quicker they understand the system.

Defensively, we will be young up front and will need to be creative in what we do to be successful. On the back end, there is a nice group of defensive backs and linebackers who have made some plays for the Buffs in recent years. Inside linebacker in particular has been one of CU’s strongest positions through the years and that will hold true this fall as well.

On special teams our punter and kicker have experience and we have some quality returnees who need to gain some experience in the game but show potential. More importantly I like our team’s chemistry and attitude. They are growing and maturing into a fortified team. Their goals are lofty and the players are backing it up with leadership and a strong work ethic. The result is a strong will to succeed!

I know alumni want to be proud of our program, to cheer on a winning one and one that also does things the right way. We are doing the latter, and my belief is that this fall, you will see the Colorado Buffaloes begin that process of returning to national prominence. Everyone wants the glory days back that the school enjoyed from 1989-1996 when we were the third winningest program in all of college football. Go Buffs! The comprehensive CU-Boulder athletic website is at http://www.cubuffs.com/.

Dan Hawkins was hired in late 2005 as CU’s 23rd head football coach, coming to Boulder from Boise State, where he compiled the fifth best record in NCAA history for the first five years as a head coach (53-11). He is now in his fourth season at the reins of the Buffaloes. You are likely to find Dan watching a movie, reading a book or spending time with his family, which includes his wife Misti, and four children, including CU junior quarterback Cody. Dan and Misti recently became grandparents.