BOULDER — That puppy just became a dawg.
“Incredible player,” Michael Irvin told me, loud and proud, as we walked off Folsom Field together Saturday. “Incredible player.”
After a few steps, the three-time Super Bowl champ and Pro Football Hall of Famer crept up behind that incredible player, sight unseen.
Then he pulled CU freshman wide receiver Omarion Miller close, like a cheeky uncle, and kissed that dawg straight on the helmet.
“Big-time players make big-time plays in big moments,” Irvin, the former Miami Hurricanes All-American, said to the teen from Louisiana. “And that was (big).”
Was it ever. You know how you’ve found a star? When they make the freaking impossible look routine. Then they go out and top it.
With 1:26 left in the third quarter, Buffs down 27 and trying not to get Oregon-ed again, the 6-foot-2 freshman beat USC’s Jacobe Covington in a dead sprint up the left boundary, reached out with his left arm while Covington was pinning his right, cradled the rock like an Easter egg and turned the heave into a 44-yard gain.
And that was only the appetizer. The play that got Irvin rocking, that got everybody rolling, capped the Buffs’ first drive of the fourth stanza.
Facing a fourth-and-5 from the USC 9, trailing 48-27, CU quarterback Shedeur Sanders rolled to his right and found Miller, who was running parallel to him, in the end zone. The Buffs signal-caller fired a dart on the run to the freshman, who somehow secured the ball as he slid, senior Trojans safety Bryson Shaw draped across his belly.
“We go over those plays every day,” Miller said of his first Buffs touchdown and one of the offensive highlights of a 48-41 CU loss, its 17th straight to the Men of Will Ferrell.
“And (me) believing I can make that play. It’s all about trusting teammates. The DB just stepped in front of me and I took it back-side and wanted to just tuck the ball.”
And yeah, we already know the caveats. The Trojans are the most Lincoln Riley of Lincoln Riley teams, which means defense is optional when you wear cardinal and gold.
SC gave up 311 through the air to Nevada, 209 on the ground to Stanford, and 28 points each to Arizona State and San Jose State. To the naked eye, comparing alleged Pac-12 contenders in USC and Oregon, the Ducks looked far more physical, on every front.
Then again, Michael “Playmaker” Irvin doesn’t just reach out and kiss any old playmaker that tickles his fancy, does he?
Miller, a rangy, jump-out-the-gym type, a bayou bouncer who reneged on commitments to LSU and Nebraska before landing with Coach Prime’s Buffs, marked his CU debut by planting a flag in the record books. The dawg now holds the Buffs’ freshman record for receiving yards (196), receiving yards against a ranked opponent and receiving yards against the Trojans.
“It was crazy,” Miller admitted Saturday. “I dreamt about playing like this (on Friday) night.”
And reality was sweeter than even his coach could’ve imagined.
“I didn’t think we were gonna get that from Omarion,” Deion Sanders said after his Buffs fell to 3-2, 0-2 in Pac-12 play. “I haven’t seen that.
“He hasn’t practiced well (and) that’s why he hasn’t played … he was forced into action. And he showed up and showed out.”
While the talent remains thin in the trenches, the Buffs are loaded with capable guys at receiver and running back. But Miller showed something to both Deion and quarterback Shedeur Sanders Saturday.
Namely, that they’d be crazy to take that young man out of the rotation now.
“I’ve been telling him, ‘I need you to step up.’” said the younger Sanders, who threw for four scores and ran for another against USC. “Even from Day 1 in the summer, during workouts and everything else, I said, ‘You could be a big part of the offense, or have a freshman year and wait.”
The wait’s over.
That dawg is here.
“That boy is special,” former Buffs great Michael Westbrook told me outside the visitors’ locker room at Folsom. “(And) we have about four or five more special (guys) on sideline.
“I swear to you. I was at practice. We have six guys that can do that … these are my guys, these are my sons. They know what’s up. They know the game. They know the deal. They know the history that (CU) used to have, prior to the last 15, 20 years. They understand that because I’m yelling at them all the time: ‘You know, y’all are gonna understand what the pride and tradition of CU truly means. It doesn’t mean what you just saw in these last 15, 20 years.’”
It means defying gravity. Or logic. Whichever comes first.
It means never giving up.
It means playmakers blessing playmakers. Sealed with a kiss.
“It meant a lot, coming from (Irvin),” Miller said of his brush with a legend. “(It) kind of pumped me up a little bit. And that message was really just to keep working.
“I’ve got so much to prove. This is just one game. And y’all (haven’t) seen nothing yet.”
Want more sports news? Sign up for the Sports Omelette to get all our analysis on Denver’s teams.