Colorado's spring camp has wrapped up and we enter a slow period in Colorado football as the Buffs' players don't report for fall camp until August 1.
For the next few weeks, CUSportsNation.com members will be voting on the best quarterback in Colorado history. Last week, members gave their nominations, and based on the amount of nominations, we put together the seeding for "The Great 8: Best CU Quarterback of All Time Tournament."
This is the third matchup in the first round as Darian Hagan and Bobby Anderson have already moved on in their respective contests, setting up a pivotal semifinals.
The Great 8, Round 1 Matchup: No. 3 Koy Detmer vs No. 6 Joel Klatt
*** To vote for the winner of this round, click here ***
The Detmer profile
1992-1996
Detmer threw for 5,390 yards in his four year playing career at Colorado and tossed 40 touchdowns compared to 25 interceptions. Detmer filled in for Kordell Stewart in 1992 as a true freshman and threw for 962 yards and eight touchdowns.
Detmer took a redshirt year in '93 and backed up Stewart once again in '94 as the Buffs won the Fiesta Bowl that season against Notre Dame. Detmer attempted just 19 passes.
With Kordell Stewart off to the pros, Detmer still wasn't able to grab the keys to the offensive as John Hessler came in and had a strong season in '95, keeping Detmer on the bench and playing in just five games.
But Detmer's redshirt senior season is where he solidified himself as an all-time great Buff quarterback, throwing for 3,156 yards, 22 touchdowns, and 12 interceptions, leading CU to their fourth straight bowl victory in a Holiday Bowl win over the Washington Huskies.
Detmer holds a number of Colorado football records.
- Completions in a half (22)
- Yards gained in a game by a true freshman (418) and junior (426)
- Average yards per attempt in career (9.07)
- Most 70-yard pass completions in career (6, tied with Liufau)
- Most 400 yard passing games in career (5)
- Only Buff quarterback(s) with 3,000 yards passing (Liufau and Detmer)
- Most touchdown passes in as season by a CU senior (22)
The Klatt profile (via cubuffs.com, records mentioned below are from 2005)
2002-2005
- CU’s starting quarterback for his sophomore through senior seasons (started all 12 regular season games in 2005), he set 44 school records in his tenure, the second most records ever set by one student-athlete at the school in any sport (Byron White set 51 between 1934 and 1937).
- He missed the Champs Sports Bowl against Clemson after being the victim of a vicious, illegal helmet-to-chin cheap shot (by Texas’ Drew Kelson) in the Big 12 title game, suffering a severe concussion that required an overnight hospital stay; he was not cleared to play in the bowl and wasn’t back to normal until January.
- He earned honorable mention all-Big 12 honors from both the Associated Press as well as the league coaches, as he quietly had one of the best years by a quarterback in the conference.
- He has 34 career starts at the position (19-15), the second most CU by a signal-caller; that led to him to take over almost every major career passing record at the school: yards (7,375), touchdowns (44), completion percentage (60.8), attempts (1,095), completions (666) and interceptions (33); the only ones to escape him were total offense (second with 7,255) and passer rating, where he finished seventh (124.6).
- He also set a school record with nine career fourth quarter comebacks to win or tie games, and had a host of single-game and single-season records along with all his career marks. He had 15 career 200-yard passing games, five of which exceeded 300 yards (not including bowls).
- For his career, he had a 24-to-2 ratio of touchdowns to interceptions in the red zone, taking just one sack as well. As a senior, he was one of 22 candidates on the watch list for the Johnny Unitas Award, and was selected as Colorado’s most valuable player in a vote by his teammates, winning the Zack Jordan Award in the process.
- He also won the John Mack Award as the outstanding offensive player, as selected by the coaches, and the Buffalo Heart Award, a fan honor.
- He completed 241-of-400 passes for 2,696 yards and 14 touchdowns, throwing just eight interceptions (his 0.20 interception percentage was a season record).
- He topped the 200-yard mark six times, headlined by a 398 yard effort on 28-of-36 accuracy against Texas A&M. At one point, he strung together a school record 139 passes without an interception, during a stretch of the season where he threw 12 touchdowns with just one pick over a six game span.
- He also finished as the Big 12 Conference’s fifth all-time leading passer (the league includes bowl yards, thus he had 7,708).
