College Football

Previewing Colorado football’s special teams

Previewing Colorado football’s special teams

Colorado has built a history of having strong special teams play. The legs of the Buffs’ kickers and punters have sent footballs flying into orbit on a regular basis.

This year seems to be no different as the Buffaloes have highly-touted players in the placekicking and punting rooms. Colorado also returns its top three leaders in special teams point totals from a year ago, along with a host of young players who will be looking to make their mark. Additionally, both the punt and kick return positions also seem to be set going into the season.

Let’s look at how we believe it will all play out.

Placekicker Depth Chart

Ron Chenoy-USA TODAY Sports

Starter: Cole Becker

Backup: Cristiano Palazzo

Kicker Breakdown

Cole Becker returns as the starter this year after a true freshman campaign where he hit on 14-of-20 field goal attempts and was 25-of-25 on extra points. Kickoffs were also well managed as only 18 kicks were returned against the Buffaloes last season. Backing him up could be Cristiano Palazzo, who returns home from Oregon. Palazzo was seeing reps as a kickoff specialist at Oregon and could be in play if he can continue to show he can boom kickoffs through the back of the endzone.

Punter Depth Chart

Starter: Ashton Logan

Backups: Noah Hubbard, Trent Carrizosa

Punter Breakdown

Ashton Logan comes to Colorado as a highly touted three-star prospect from the 2021 class who took a greyshirt last year. Logan also has experience as a kicker as well after handling both in high school.

Behind Logan are two freshmen walk-ons in local product Noah Hubbard and Trent Carrizosa. These two will battle it out in camp to be the first man up if injuries strike the punter position.

Returners Depth Chart

Isaiah J. Downing-USA TODAY Sportsffd

Kick Returns:

Starter: Nikko Reed

Backups: Deion Smith, Maurice Bell

Punt Returns:

Starter: Chase Penry

Backup: Maurice Bell

Returner Breakdown

Chase Penry and Nikko Reed are your primary returners in the punt and kick games. Both players saw a lot of action on both units last season and will be heavily utilized again for the upcoming season.

Penry returned three punts last year for an average of 17.7 yards while also acting as the sure-handed option for the coaches. He got two attempts in the kickoff return space, taking them back for a total of 24 yards. Reed really was efficient in his impact in the kickoff return game last season, taking his only official attempt 100 yards to the house against Utah. He also took a punt back for five…

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