Heritage High School grad Garrett Grayson will try to do the unthinkable Saturday when the quarterback leads Colorado State into Tuscaloosa to face top-ranked Alabama.
Does Colorado State (1-2) have a chance against the two-time defending national champions?
“I’m excited. I can’t wait,” Grayson said in story published on examiner.com. “Everybody in the country, in the world, obviously is doubting us. Hopefully we’re going to go down there and shock the world. That’s the mindset we have. We have nothing to lose. They have everything to lose. That’s the kind of the mentality we’re going in (with).”
Local fans can watch the game on ESPN2 at 4 p.m.
Colorado State enters Saturday’s game 39.5 point underdogs. Should the Rams win, it would be just slightly less of a shock than the largest college football upset as gauged by a Vegas point spread. That occurred in 2007 when 41-point underdog Stanford beat No. 1 USC in the Coliseum.
Colorado State’s season got off to a rocky start with losses to Colorado and Tulsa. It had some wondering whether coach Jim McElwain would take the keys to the offense away from the junior from Vancouver. The players, however, stuck behind Grayson.
“He keeps his composure very well during games,” senior lineman Jared Baird said. “He’s very encouraging to the wide receivers and to us up front. He’s calm, cool and collected in the pocket and on the sideline.”
Grayson’s numbers haven’t been terrible. He’s averaging 202 yards per game with only two interceptions.
But in its first two games, Colorado State was just 7 of 32 on third down conversions.
Baird said critics shouldn’t focus solely on the quarterback.
“That’s part of playing quarterback, you going to get a lot of attention,” he said. “It doesn’t have to necessarily be your fault. Again, these losses have been on the offense as a whole and on the team as a whole, not on just one guy.”
Alabama plays its home opener one week after beating Texas A&M in the season’s most highly anticipated game thus far.
The Crimson Tide will present a challenge different than any opponent on the Rams’ schedule. Grayson said that’s due to Alabama’s speed.
“We’ve just got to play smart,” Grayson told the Reporter-Herald of Loveland, Colo. “I know they’re going to be fast, probably going to be faster than anything we’ve seen, so we’ve just got to be fast. We can’t really go out there thinking. I think if we play fast and don’t think about it, I think we’ll be just fine.”
