Three Points Short in Boulder, and Sal Had the Clippers Ready
Cleveland State21
Colorado24
- Game
- 2024 Week 7
- Date
- 2024-10-26
- Site
- Away
- Result
- Loss
- Record
- 4-3
Colorado 24, Vikings 21. On the road, in the mountains, by three.
I went to Sal’s for a haircut Monday morning, which was a mistake. Sal Moretti has cut what’s left of my hair for twenty-five years. Sal was born in Athens, Ohio, and bleeds Bobcat green, and Sal had the radio on and a look on his face like a man who’s been waiting all week.
“Close losses build character, Mick,” he said, clippers buzzing. “Ask Ohio. We’ve got so much character we had to rent a storage unit.” Then he took a little more off the sides than I asked for, and I’m almost certain it was on purpose.
Here’s the honest thing: we were close and we didn’t finish. We’re 4-3. Our three losses are by eleven, four and three. That’s a team knocking on the door. Teams that knock on the door this many times eventually get invited in for coffee.
Zero pierogi. A salad tonight, out of solidarity, and a hat until the sides grow back.
Mickey is eating a salad. I want that on the record. That’s how you know it’s bad.
Three losses, all by one or two scores. The Vikings are 4-3, and every loss has the same shape: competitive, respectable and wrong at the end. You can call that bad luck once. Three times, it’s a profile.
I came home and put on a ballad record so slow the needle nearly fell asleep. My neighbor knocked to ask if everything was okay. I said, “Colorado.” He said, “Ah.” In Cleveland, that’s a full conversation.
The honest version: a first-year staff in a new conference is three possessions away from being undefeated. Either that’s a good team that hasn’t learned to close, or a mediocre one that keeps getting lucky enough to be close. The Doom Model believes the second. I believe the Doom Model, mostly.
Kansas comes to town next. If the Vikings can’t handle that at home, I’ll write the “regression” column myself. I already have a draft. It’s long.
Back and forth
Every loss is by one score, Kenny!
Every loss. That’s the operative word.
Sal took extra off the sides. Out of spite.
Sal’s the most consistent defense you’ve faced all year.
Close again, short again, and the only thing that got shut down more efficiently than the offense was Mickey’s hairline.
Split Decision is fiction. Mickey Bridges, Ken Hogmanes and The Lakefront Ledger are invented; the games and scores are not.