Colorado head coach Tad Boyle admitted early in the 2017-18 preseason that, given the bulk of his expected rotation was barely old enough to vote, he would take a different mental approach into his eighth season at the helm of the Colorado men's basketball team.
Year eight would be a new Year One.
Sure, it perhaps was a subliminal way of tempering expectations. What realistic fan expects miracles in Year One? Yet it also seemingly offered a new template put forth by Boyle that, if successful, will allow the Buffaloes to harbor realistic expectations of being more than spectators on weekends like this, when the best of the best in the college basketball world takes center stage, and these days best of the best can include programs like Loyola Chicago, Kansas State, and Texas Tech.