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Colorado Buffaloes beat Baylor in thrilling overtime after Hail Mary touchdown in final seconds
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Colorado Buffaloes beat Baylor in thrilling overtime after Hail Mary touchdown in final seconds



CNN

Colorado defeated the Baylor Bears 38-31 on Saturday in a thrilling game after the Buffaloes scored a 43-yard Hail Mary touchdown in the final seconds of regulation to force overtime.

Colorado received the ball with just over two minutes left in the fourth quarter and trailed Baylor 31-24 after a heated confrontation at Folsom Field.

The Buffaloes reached the Bears’ 43-yard line with just two seconds left on the clock before quarterback Shedeur Sanders – son of head coach and NFL Hall of Famer Deion “Coach Prime” Sanders – completed a Hail Mary touchdown pass to LaJohntay Wester as time expired, tying the score on the extra point and sending the game into overtime.

Colorado scored first in overtime to take the lead, with Micah Welch running the ball in from a yard out. And Baylor needed a touchdown to even the score, so it looked like they were going to score their own, before Colorado’s Travis Hunter knocked the ball loose from Bears’ running back Dominic Richardson on the goal line.

“Shedeur told me to go out there and get the ball,” Hunter, 21, said afterward. “So I told him, ‘I got you,’ and I kept my word. I knew I had to tackle. I knew they were coming at me. They don’t think I can tackle, so I had to show them.”

Fans rushed the field to celebrate the victory, but a review by the officials was needed to determine if the game-signing fumble was the correct call. After the review, the call stood and the celebration began in earnest.

Colorado fans storm the court after the Buffaloes' overtime win over Baylor.

It’s probably Sanders’ most dramatic win in Colorado – he’s in his second season with the Buffaloes – and moves them to 3-1 on the season.

“Great, great, great, great win,” Coach Prime said in his post-game press conference. “Young men were resilient. They never gave up. They never surrendered. The coaches were still inspired.

“I mean, right up until the end, they just kept coming up with stuff and yelling stuff… I don’t like how it turned out, but I think the results are great. I think we’re so much better than what we show you sometimes. We keep showing you glimpses of the running game. We show you glimpses of how we play strong defensive football. We show you that we can throw the ball everywhere, and then we just sit there for a series or two and just give something up. But I’m happy.”

It was a thrilling end to a thrilling game in Boulder, Colorado, after the Buffaloes fell behind 24-10 midway through the second quarter.

But a 58-yard touchdown pass from Sanders to Omarion Miller just before halftime cut the Bears’ lead, and Colorado tied it in the third quarter.

Baylor regained a seven-point lead midway through the fourth quarter on a 24-yard touchdown pass from quarterback Hal Presley.

And the outcome seemed decided when two sacks on Sanders forced Colorado to punt from their own end zone, a punt that brought Baylor back to the Buffaloes’ 26-yard line. They were set up for a 46-yard field goal that would have made it a two-score game with just two minutes left, but the kick sailed to the right and Colorado remained in the fight.

With 2:16 left on the clock, Sanders helped orchestrate a magical drive that eventually went into overtime on a Hail Mary touchdown by Wester.

Colorado's Wester catches the Hail Mary touchdown pass to tie the score with Baylor.

“I knew I was going to get a lot of pressure,” Sanders, 22, said afterward. “So I was like, ‘Okay, cool. Let’s go ahead and roll.’ We put Travis (Hunter) on his butt because he was going to get all that attention and LaJohntay was standing there on the outside.

“They’re not going to think we’re going to throw him the ball. So I roll to my left, everybody went to the middle of the end zone and I just trusted God. I just threw it to God and God answered the prayer.”

Sanders finished 25-for-41 passing for 341 yards and two touchdowns while also being sacked eight times. Hunter, meanwhile, had seven catches for 130 yards — his fifth straight 100-yard receiving game — and the game-clinching forced fumble in overtime.