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Rick George Update 12-29-15

Buffnik

Real name isn't Nik
Club Member
Junta Member
Dear Buffs Fan,

As the calendar year comes to a close, I wanted to reach out to you one final time before we all ring in the New Year!

Construction Information
The light is at the end of the proverbial tunnel: we are approximately two months away from completing the third and final phase of our Athletics Complex Expansion. The indoor practice facility, including a state-of-the-art 300-meter track and the underground parking garage are all nearing completion, expected toward the end of February.

Competition Update

Our all sports record against Division I competition this year currently stands at 303-81-4, a 78.6 winning percentage. The largest contributor to that mark were our cross country teams, which both claimed the Pac-12 and Mountain Regional titles with runner-up finishes at the NCAA Championships. They combined for a 199-3 record this fall. Mark Wetmore continually rakes in coach of the year honors at most every turn, but he was honored with the ultimate: he was selected as the coach on the all-time Pac-12 cross country team, quite an accomplishment considering CU has been in the league all of five years. Then again, his teams have won seven league titles and two national championships in that time.

The men’s basketball team is off to a terrific start, going 11-2 with the only setbacks in the opener against now No. 2 Iowa State and in the championship game of the Continental Tire Las Vegas Classic to No. 18 SMU. Those losses were by a combined 10 points and in-between, Tad Boyle’s troops ran off 11 wins in a row, the fifth longest streak in school history. Senior Josh Scott is one of three players in the nation averaging 18 points and nine rebounds while shooting at over 60 percent, one of the reasons we are on the verge of cracking the nation’s Top 25.

Linda Lappe’s women have played one of the nation’s tougher non-league schedules (57th out of 349) and completed play with a 5-6 record; now the tough Pac-12 looms on the horizon. The relatively young team (seven underclassmen) is showing improvement and has solid leadership with senior Jamee Swan enjoying an All-Pac-12 kind of a season, averaging 15 points and eight rebounds per game.

Nelson Spruce finished off one of the greatest careers ever by a Buffalo, earning second-team All-Pac-12 honors on the field and second-team Academic All-American honors in the classroom. He set and/or tied a total of 43 school and conference records in his time at Colorado, and he became just the fifth player to earn our MVP honor – the Zack Jordan Award – twice. The future for him is obviously bright, he has represented us well and we wish him the best in the upcoming NFL Draft. Chidobe Awuzie also earned second-team Pac-12 honors and he’ll be one of our team leaders again in 2016.

Mike MacIntyre is wrapping up his annual evaluation of all things in the program; we had aspirations of getting back to the postseason for the first time since 2007 but obviously fell short of that goal. While there were many positives to the season, a 4-9 record and not qualifying for a bowl game is not what we want and we will continue to work hard to get our football program back to its traditional winning ways.

Staff Changes

There have been a couple of staff changes to date, one of which brings back a very popular former player, Darrin Chiaverini, as the co-offensive coordinator and receivers coach. Since he retired playing professionally, he’s has a meteoric rise in the coaching ranks and we’re excited that he is returning to Boulder.

Volleyball finished with a 19-13 overall mark, with an 11-9 record in Pac-12 play; despite those numbers, the NCAA did not issue an invitation to the team to return to the tournament a third straight year. By now you likely know that we have named a new head coach, Jesse Mahoney, who had tremendous success down the road at the University of Denver. He’s a Boulder native who got his start coaching our men’s club team 20 years ago. As I stated when we hired him, when I met with our volleyball student-athletes, I told them that we would go out and hire the best coach, mentor and leader for them. I have no doubt that we accomplished all three in making what I felt was a needed change in leadership for the program.

Accolades

Senior Alexis Austin earned honorable mention AVCA All-America honors, capping a fine career which also saw her earn AVCA All-Pacific South Region and All-Pac-12 team accolades for this past fall.

How about freshman soccer player Sarah Kinzner? She helped her native Canada to the silver medal in the Women’s Under-20 Championships in Honduras earlier this month. The Calgary, Alberta native plays midfielder for the Buffaloes and had a goal and two assists in appearing in all 20 games; she scored two goals in the five tournament games as Canada posted a 3-1-1 record.

In the final Learfield Cup rankings for the fall sports, we’re ranked No. 20 on the strength of the runner-up finishes by our men’s and women’s cross country teams at the NCAA Championships. The Pac-12 has six schools in the top 20, as does the Atlantic Coast Conference (which has two more teams). No other conference has more than three (the rest of the Power 5: Big Ten 3, Big 12 0, SEC 0).

And earlier this week, the CU Boulder Office of Advancement announced that our own associate director of development for the Buff Club, Marcus Palas, was the 2015 Charles McCord Award winner for the CU-Boulder campus. This award is given by the CU Foundation in recognition of development staff for their dedication, teamwork, collaboration and service to the organization.

Winter Sports Info

And with winter officially upon us, that means our ski team is finishing preparations to defend their NCAA title and make a run at the school’s 21st national championship in the sport. Did you know that with 88 individual titles in the sport, alpine and Nordic, that CU has had more individual champions than any other school?

Notable

Most of you probably saw that football signed a top junior college receiver last week – Kabion Ento. He is from East Central Mississippi Community College; now here’s something hardly anyone might remember: his coach there was Ken Karcher, who was the third-string quarterback on the Denver Broncos behind John Elway and Gary Kubiak in the 1987-88 seasons. How that’s for a Colorado connection!

We’re currently counting down the “Top 15 in ’15,” some of our top moments of the calendar year on CUBuffs.com. Speaking of the website, former Boulder Camera sportswriter Neill Woelk is completing his first six months as our contributing editor to the site, and he’s been pretty busy – to the tune of nearly 200 stories to date. I hope you’re enjoying his perspective that he’s added to our content, not to mention the volume.

As always, a friendly reminder that you can check the progress of our construction and learn more about our Sustainable Excellence Initiative by visiting www.cusustainableexcellence.com, with additional information on how you can support us in a number of areas at www.cubuffclub.com (and you can always call the Buff Club office, 303-492-2200).

All of us in athletics wish you a wonderful holiday season and a Happy New Year. Go Buffs!

Go Buffs!

Collaboration and Unity,


Rick George

Athletic Director
 
"There have been a couple of staff changes to date ..." I'm probably being hopeful and interpreting Rick's comments as I would like, but that sounds like more than simply filling the current vacant positions to me.
 
"There have been a couple of staff changes to date ..." I'm probably being hopeful and interpreting Rick's comments as I would like, but that sounds like more than simply filling the current vacant positions to me.
you are reading too much into that, he says "couple of changes" then lists a couple changes.
 
you are reading too much into that, he says "couple of changes" then lists a couple changes.
Well, good morning to you too. My emphasis was on the "to date" portion of his comments - I guess I should have used bold text for that part.
 
Well, good morning to you too. My emphasis was on the "to date" portion of his comments - I guess I should have used bold text for that part.
i read it the same way you did, a bit loaded. i'm also not sure Chiv's rise in the coaching ranks is "meteoric". he was the assistant special teams coach for a while at T Tech and now our co-oc? the latter seems to be the meteor.
 
2007 - wide receivers coach - Mt. San Antonio College First job after NFL career
2008 - co-offensive coordinator - Mt. San Antonio College Promotion in 2nd year
2009 - assistant special teams coach - UCLA Small fish in a big pond
2010 to 2013 - associate head coach in charge of recruiting,co-offensive coordinator and special teams coordinator - Riverside City College Big fish in a small pond
2014 - special teams coordinator - Texas Tech Midsize fish in a medium-large pond
2015 - wide receivers plus special teams - Texas Tech Promotion in 2nd year

Chiaverini is a young coach. This is great progress, and looking past the job titles and schools, he has consistently had excellent on-field performance from his players, getting wins and getting his kids prepared to move up to the next level.
 
i read it the same way you did, a bit loaded. i'm also not sure Chiv's rise in the coaching ranks is "meteoric". he was the assistant special teams coach for a while at T Tech and now our co-oc? the latter seems to be the meteor.
I never think of meteors rising, rather crashing down...seems the metaphor is just the opposite of its use.
 
i read it the same way you did, a bit loaded. i'm also not sure Chiv's rise in the coaching ranks is "meteoric". he was the assistant special teams coach for a while at T Tech and now our co-oc? the latter seems to be the meteor.

WTF are you talking about?
 
ok, i'm just saying maybe there's a little bit of hyperbole here. that's all. i also think you guys are overreacting a touch.

didn't mean to offend or insult DC. he's a great Buff. my apologies.

i worked at CU for a decade and i'm little over-sensitive to what i consider it's PR angle of itself. in a lot of ways, CU would rather have good PR than do substantive things to make the institution a better school. [off soap box].
 
i worked at CU for a decade and i'm little over-sensitive to what i consider it's PR angle of itself. in a lot of ways, CU would rather have good PR than do substantive things to make the institution a better school. [off soap box].

I would absolutely agree and take it one step further by saying the University would actually take actions that are not in the best interest of the school in order to avoid bad PR.
 
Mick is right imo. DC was making sound and steady progress for an assistant coach, but short of getting the promo at CU, it was not exactly "meteoric". That just sounds like the Fat Man.... And I'm sick of him.
 
I would absolutely agree and take it one step further by saying the University would actually take actions that are not in the best interest of the school in order to avoid bad PR.

always a cosmetic, immediate fix at CU. how is it the University which is located in Boulder, Colorado and has finals the 3rd week in December every year has no protocol in place for heavy snow? it snows in Colorado. ok. no backup plan for something that is very real possibility every year? we'll just cancel the finals and say there is no make-up exam possible. that is colossally bad administration and weak commitment in execution to being a top tier research 1 university.

off topic, i know.
 
always a cosmetic, immediate fix at CU. how is it the University which is located in Boulder, Colorado and has finals the 3rd week in December every year has no protocol in place for heavy snow? it snows in Colorado. ok. no backup plan for something that is very real possibility every year? we'll just cancel the finals and say there is no make-up exam possible. that is colossally bad administration and weak commitment in execution to being a top tier research 1 university.

off topic, i know.
So the students were just excused from their finals and took their grade-to-date?
 
always a cosmetic, immediate fix at CU. how is it the University which is located in Boulder, Colorado and has finals the 3rd week in December every year has no protocol in place for heavy snow? it snows in Colorado. ok. no backup plan for something that is very real possibility every year? we'll just cancel the finals and say there is no make-up exam possible. that is colossally bad administration and weak commitment in execution to being a top tier research 1 university.

off topic, i know.

So the students were just excused from their finals and took their grade-to-date?

Equally curious - please explain. Also, applying the same logic, are you saying that DIA should never cancel flights due to inclement weather?
 
I don't really know what you expect the university to do. A lot of it is out of their control. What about all the snow on the roads outside of campus? What about all of the kids who had flights home that couldn't make a rescheduled final?
 
always a cosmetic, immediate fix at CU. how is it the University which is located in Boulder, Colorado and has finals the 3rd week in December every year has no protocol in place for heavy snow? it snows in Colorado. ok. no backup plan for something that is very real possibility every year? we'll just cancel the finals and say there is no make-up exam possible. that is colossally bad administration and weak commitment in execution to being a top tier research 1 university.

off topic, i know.

So where were the spiders while the fly tried to break our balls?
 
always a cosmetic, immediate fix at CU. how is it the University which is located in Boulder, Colorado and has finals the 3rd week in December every year has no protocol in place for heavy snow? it snows in Colorado. ok. no backup plan for something that is very real possibility every year? we'll just cancel the finals and say there is no make-up exam possible. that is colossally bad administration and weak commitment in execution to being a top tier research 1 university.

off topic, i know.
I am pretty sure they thought snow days were a thing of the past with Global Warming...
 
So the students were just excused from their finals and took their grade-to-date?
yes. the tuesday exams were canceled. 80% of the students were undoubtedly thrilled and started drinking immediately but the other 20% has a grade in the balance are counting on the final to make the B+ an A- or the D a C. the syllabus is a contract between teacher and student....and part of the grade is the final. students deserve better. my point is that the university should have a contingency plan for snow in Colorado in December and they clearly don't. it shouldn't blow any one's mind that it snows in Colorado in December.

the DIA comparison is a bit overstated for effect, sure. and so the finals aren't held on tuesday with 10 inches of snow on the ground but the university has an obligation to honor it's commitments and have some idea about what to do in the event of weather contingencies which are not mind-blowing out of the ordinary.

CU took the easiest way out rather than dealing with the situation in a responsible, academically sound manner. even though it was going to be a pain in the ass, maybe. sometimes life is like that.
 
I don't really know what you expect the university to do. A lot of it is out of their control. What about all the snow on the roads outside of campus? What about all of the kids who had flights home that couldn't make a rescheduled final?

it's not unthinkable to reschedule a final when school resumes in January. it's also not unthinkable in today's digital utopia to make an exam available after the fact online. obviously it's tremendous problem....all of which could be solved if CU had a policy in place...but they didn't. that's what i expect.

CU takes in more out of state tuition that almost any school in the US....but they are always complaining about not having money. lot of that disappears into an ineffective, bloated administrative structure full of people driving Saabs and taking friday ski days. just saying.
 
Equally curious - please explain. Also, applying the same logic, are you saying that DIA should never cancel flights due to inclement weather?

People can die in plane crashes. I suppose they can die in a final too but probably not more than 1%. Also, airlines RESCHEDULE those flights and passengers. Why can't CU?
 
Syllabuses are not contracts. Nothing is signed or stated as guarantee. It is nothing more than an outline of the course requirements, expectations and schedule of events.
 
There are tons of issues with rescheduling finals for when students come back and online finals where everyone can cheat, what does that prove?

Most teachers don't believe in finals anyway as it is just more or a crashing time where students forget everything afterwards. Sounds like some students should have studied a little harder during the semester and are making excuses.
 
There are tons of issues with rescheduling finals for when students come back and online finals where everyone can cheat, what does that prove?

Most teachers don't believe in finals anyway as it is just more or a crashing time where students forget everything afterwards. Sounds like some students should have studied a little harder during the semester and are making excuses.

I took a few 4000 level classes that had a total of 3 grades; midterm, paper, and final. I'd have passed without the final. But there are courses out there that dont offer much grading opportunities. And then their are the grad students and the law school. Did the law school also cancel? Its hard for me to understand why the semester can not be extended 2-3 days more because of this possibility.
 
I agree with Mick on this. I know many students were happy, but I think it is a huge disservice to many students who were going to use that final to help (or hurt) them getting over the hump. There were classes when I was there that the final was 40% of the grade. Pretty rough that CU didn't have a better plan for this.
 
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