Tucker aiming forward despite painful defeat
BOULDER» Mel Tucker is no stranger to being a part of struggling football teams, but it’s certainly been a while since he’s endured a stretch like the one he’s in now with the Colorado Buffaloes.
During his decade as an assistant coach in the NFL, from 2005-14, Tucker was part of one winning season. Prior to becoming Colorado’s head coach last December, however, Tucker had become quite used to not only winning, but dominating. From 2015-18, he coached at Alabama for one year and Georgia for three, with those teams going a combined 46-9. The longest losing streak in those years: two games.
Eight games into his first season with the Buffaloes (3-5, 1-4 Pac-12), Tucker is still trying to discover the right formula to turn the program around. CU has lost four in a row going into Saturday’s matchup at
UCLA (3-5, 3-2) at the Rose Bowl (7 p.m., Pac-12 Networks).
“I just deal with it day by day,” Tucker said Monday after the Buffaloes got back to work. “I’m always looking for solutions, looking for clarity, looking to be objective, neutral, non-emotional to the best I can be and lead the staff and lead the team. I’m looking for positives. And I’m very, very critical of myself and everyone involved to see how we can get better.”
While the results suggest the Buffs have a long way to go — and in some respects, they do — Tucker reviewed the film of Friday’s 35-31 loss to USC a handful of times and saw a team just inches away from turning the corner.
“Quite frankly it’s still very painful, even a couple days later,” Tucker said. “We see one play here, one play there, on both sides of ball and special teams. It’s still very disappointing.
“We’re extremely close. Take care of the football and take it away, score points in the red zone and we’re going to have a chance to win.”
Twice against the Trojans, the Buffs’ defense swarmed to the ball and delivered a hit that knocked the ball loose. Both times, CU had players around the loose ball, but couldn’t pull it in. Recovering one or both would have been massive, because USC wound up scoring touchdowns on both drives including the game-winner with 2:15 to play.
“Two weeks ago, we talked about having free runners at the quarterback and not being able to get them on the ground,” Tucker said. “We got one week better. Now, we have free runners and we are actually able to get to them and get the ball off.”
CU’s Nov. 9 game against Stanford is scheduled for a 1 p.m. kickoff at Folsom Field. The game will be broadcast on the Pac-12 Networks.