Colorado football enters Saturday's Big 12 opener at Baylor with a connection to a game played nearly 40 years ago in Houston.
The Bears defeated Colorado, 21-9, in the 1986 Bluebonnet Bowl at Rice Stadium. It was a disappointing finish for Bill McCartney's Buffaloes, but the season itself marked a turning point for the program and was the start of his climb toward national relevance.
Baylor is leaning into that period Saturday as the Bears will wear throwback uniforms honoring coach Grant Teaff's era, featuring the return of "bear-paw" on the shoulders and 10 stars on the helmet.
A season that began a turnaround
Colorado reached the Bluebonnet Bowl after one of the most important turnarounds in program history. McCartney's team opened 0-4, then won six of its final seven regular-season
games and finished 6-1 in Big Eight play.
The stretch included Colorado's first victory against Nebraska since 1967, and the Buffaloes finished second in the conference. Their momentum stopped in Houston, where Baylor entered ranked No. 14 and controlled the game in front of 40,470 fans.
Colorado gained 194 yards but turned the ball over four times, converting only four of 14 third-down tries. Quarterback Mark Hatcher's 31-yard touchdown run with 2:38 left in the third quarter pulled CU within 21-9, but the Buffaloes did not score again.
A familiar historical setting
The defeat left Colorado at 6-6 and extended the program's bowl-losing streak to five games. McCartney's ability to rally the 1986 team, however, gave the administration and fans confidence in him after the Buffaloes went 1-10 just two years earlier in 1984.
Colorado returned to bowl play in 1988 and grew into one of college football's best programs by the end of the decade. Saturday's game at McLane Stadium is a fresh chapter, but Baylor's throwback setting reminds us of one early step in McCartney's rise.
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This article originally appeared on Buffaloes Wire: Colorado vs. Baylor brings back memories of the 1986 Bluebonnet Bowl
