Today, following Colorado's first day of fall camp, head coach Karl Dorrell and Miguel Rueda, the team's director of health and performance, confirmed that the entire football team, beginning tonight, will begin a two-week period of living together in a hotel.
The intention is to form a quasi bubble environment in similar fashion to what the NBA and NHL have done. Dorrell and players expressed confidence that strict discipline will be maintained.
An obvious question that arises regarding the Buffs being inserted into an essential bubble has to do with 100-plus college-age students being able to feasibly maintain discipline, social distance and stay within their assigned space.
For Dorrell, given that Colorado's season for a long time wasn't going to happen this fall, the mutual recognition amongst players that everyone's individual actions and decisions are impacting the end goal of hitting the field and hosting UCLA on Nov. 7 is reason enough for the team to stay disciplined.
"They understand and they get it," he said. "They understand why it’s important to do things within the protocol that we’re doing it so that it can give us a chance to be healthy at the start of the season.”
Furthermore, the players are not naive. They've most likely been able to take a look at professional sports examples to see how beneficial a bubble is to conducting a season in the most safe, uninterrupted manner.
“I think it our players have seen, with the NBA and NHL bubbling and that’s why they’re able to complete a season, I think they get that and get why we’re doing it," Dorrell said.
"We try to keep everybody as healthy as we can and still are operating under the Boulder ordinance in terms of things that are really specific for us to do."
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For senior linebacker Nate Landman, one of only nine scholarship seniors Colorado has in 2020, being in the bubble will be helpful to the youthful team in terms of building an identity and establishing team camaraderie.
“I think the bubble will actually be pretty beneficial for us," he said. "Being a young team, I think developing some team morale and team chemistry is a necessity for us this year. Having close quarters in the hotel will speed that up for us and keep guys safe. (It gives us) time to build on that bond and team characteristics.”
Additionally, as Dorrell alluded to, the players understand what is at stake. A selfish excursion to a party or an otherwise unintelligent decision to leave the bubble could have catastrophic implications on the 2020 season in a worst case scenario.
But for the Buffs, everyone being together establishes a system of accountability, not to mention that the players' days are already pretty chock full of activities, from the two-hour pre-practice COVID testings every morning, then to practice, then coupled with class and schoolwork.
"After practice, we’re back to the hotel and we’re there for meetings. Dinner is at the Champions Center which is 30 seconds away. I think people are stepping up and realizing the end goal of what we want to accomplish."
“Having guys like myself and other guys on the team step up and stress that bigger picture — I don’t think with this team we have to worry too much about people going out and breaking the rules.”
Fellow senior K.D. Nixon also views the bubble with a lens of positivity. Specifically, he shared the same sentiments as Landman — being in the bubble with all of his teammates will bring the team closer together and help enforce accountability from the top of the roster down.
Plus, who says you can't still have fun, laugh and otherwise enjoy yourself at the hotel?
At the end of the day, the bubble has its benefits and is far from a prison sentence.
"We know for a fact that we just have to stay away from people, handle our business in class and on the field and do things the right way," Nixon said. "But also, I think this bubble will help us. It’s different — you get a chance to be with all of your brothers — being in a hotel where you can talk to each other, have fun with each other and love each other."
"But we’re still social distancing — I want to make sure I say that. We still get the time to have fun and be around each other. Within that you can build a team and have great chemistry. That’s something that I think is going to pay off.”
