CBS SportsLine wire reports
Sept. 5, 1998

DENVER -- For nine months, Colorado players and coaches lived with the bitter memory of their underachieving 5-6 season of a year ago. In 60 minutes of football Saturday night, they erased it.

Mike

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Moschetti threw three touchdown passes and Cedric Cormier returned a punt 82 yards for another score as Colorado opened its season with a 42-14 rout of No. 15 Colorado State.

"For 280 days, we've had to taste it," Colorado coach Rick Neuheisel said. "Tonight, we got a chance to spit."

Moschetti, a junior-college transfer playing in his first major-college game, helped the Buffaloes extend their winning streak to eight games in the series with their in-state rival.

The loss dropped Colorado State to 1-1 and snapped the Rams' 10-game winning streak dating to last season, which had been tied with UCLA for the third-longest active streak in the nation.

THE BUFFALOES, TRAILING 14-13 early in the second half, scored four straight touchdowns in the first major-college football game played at Mile High Stadium.

Before the largest crowd to watch a college sporting event in state history (76,036), Colorado doubled Colorado State's output, generating 404 total yards to the Rams' 202.

Moschetti completed 21 of 32 passes for 257 yards. His counterpart, Ryan Eslinger, was 13 of 28 for 124 yards.

"Mike Moschetti is a great quarterback," Neuheisel said. "I didn't have to see him in a game to realize I made the right decision" in naming him the starter.

Neuheisel said his team "made a lot of mistakes, but they are fixable. Certainly, we can get a lot better. I'm proud of the way we played in this type of environment."

Eslinger plunged 1 yard to cap an 80-yard scoring drive to open the second half and give the Rams their only lead of the game.

COLORADO COUNTERED WITH a 79-yard scoring drive. Dwayne Cherrington had runs of 11 and 15 yards and Moschetti completed four passes, including a 13-yarder to Javon Green in the left corner of the end zone with 7:05 left.

Marcus Stiggers, No. 2, and the Buffaloes ran away from Colorado State Saturday night at Mile High Stadium in Denver. (AP)

"They had us reeling on that drive," Rams coach Sonny Lubick said. "They went right down the field and scored. We weren't in sync defensively. Then, of course, the punt (return) broke us."

Less than two minutes later, Cormier, a redshirt freshman, took a punt and dashed down the right sideline 82 yards for a 27-14 lead with 5:11 left in the quarter.

Colorado State punter Deone Horinek, who had been brilliant all night, mishandled a high snap and was tackled for a loss, giving Colorado possession at the Colorado State 18. Six plays later, Cherrington took a pitchout 1 yard for the TD, and ran for the 2-point conversion to make it 35-14 with 12:46 remaining.

Moschetti's 1-yard toss to Darrin Chiaverini made it 42-14 with 3:36 left.

WHILE COLORADO STATE could manage only 14 yards on two first-quarter possessions, Colorado drove for two field goals by Jeremy Aldrich.

Five minutes into the second period, Marcus Stiggers got loose down the right sideline and hauled in Moschetti's 53-yard TD pass for a 13-0 lead.

The Rams squandered a scoring chance later in the quarter, maintaining possession near midfield after a roughing-the-punter penalty -- one of three personal fouls against Colorado in the half. But after reaching the Colorado 43, the drive stalled.

Darran Hall's 18-yard punt return moved Colorado State past midfield, and Eslinger, stepping up in the pocket to avoid the pass rush, found Frank Rice on a 36-yard scoring pass with 1:22 left.

Colorado State, which ranked 13th in the nation last season in rushing and which returned 1,000-yard rushers Damon Washington and Kevin McDougal, was limited to just 1 net yard rushing on 17 carries in the half.

For the game, Colorado State had just 78 yards on the ground.

"THEY SHUT US DOWN," McDougal said. "They killed our running game. They made us do stupid things that we normally don't do. They were a better team than we were tonight."

The Rams lost two stars in the first half. Linebacker Nate Kwamme sprained the medial collateral ligament in his right knee and will be sidelined 3-4 weeks. McDougal suffered a mild concussion in the second quarter and didn't return until midway through the third quarter.