SAN JOSE, Calif. — The seeds of championship dreams were planted during a meeting in May.
Colorado coach Mike MacIntyre shuttered himself in a room full of his experienced players and spoke from the heart.
“That was our defining moment,” MacIntyre said. “It was just me and the players. Period. We gelled at that time, walking out of that meeting, and we were either going to get it done or we weren’t. They decided they were going to get it done. After that the work ethic, the attitude, the sacrifice, the team camaraderie — all the things you hear about, the cliches — they all came together.”
MacIntyre during the meeting didn’t yet mention pursuit of an appearance in the Pac-12 championship game — a mission that seems increasingly possible, if not probable after Saturday’s 10-5 victory at Stanford — and it wasn’t about setting goals. It was about letting his players know the time had come to “rise from the ashes.”
“I knew that’s where we were at in that process,” MacIntyre said.
That sixth sense MacIntyre has for the team he’s directed for four seasons has been one of the biggest factors in CU’s resurgence in 2016. Take the scene before the fourth quarter on the sideline at Stanford Stadium, when MacIntyre bellowed at his senior quarterback, Sefo Liufau, imploring him pick up the energy and rally his charges on offense.
You don’t get a response from that kind of exchange without the foundation of a deep relationship, one MacIntyre has cultivated with the quarterback through four seasons of ups and downs. CU won’t write home about Saturday’s offensive performance. But when Liufau found daylight and scampered for a 10-yard run late in the fourth quarter, bringing CU into the range of even the shakiest of kickers, the unit had done just enough to preserve a landmark victory.
“That’s just his way of trying to spark me,” Liufau said. “It’s all love in the game. Me and him have a good connection, and it’s heat of the moment. He told me to keep leading my guys.”