
Haynes King and Georgia Tech recovered from a disastrous start to beat Colorado 27-20 in Boulder on Friday night.
King broke off a 45-yard TD run with 1:07 to go to give the Yellow Jackets the lead for good. It was King’s third TD of the night after the Yellow Jackets turned the ball over on each of their first three possessions of the game.
Colorado had a chance to respond with two timeouts left, but the Buffaloes wasted too much time. Colorado somehow used nearly a minute without calling a timeout before even getting to its own 40-yard line. Kaidon Salter’s last-ditch Hail Mary into the end zone after the Buffs crossed midfield fell incomplete as time expired.
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Georgia Tech got the ball to start the game and fumbled on the second play when King and Jamal Haynes fumbled a handoff. Colorado immediately scored when Salter found DeKalon Taylor for a TD and an early lead.
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The Yellow Jackets made it three plays on the second drive before King couldn’t corral an errant snap on the fourth play and Colorado’s Martavius French recovered the fumble again.
But Colorado immediately punted the ball back to Georgia Tech … who promptly turned it over again when King threw an interception.
Yet the Buffaloes couldn’t capitalize on that third turnover. As Georgia Tech got a field goal to cut Colorado’s lead to 7-3 on its fourth possession, you couldn’t help but wonder if Colorado would rue its chance to not go up by at least two scores.
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And sure enough, the Buffaloes would.
It was an uneven debut for Salter in his first game with Colorado after transferring from Liberty. He was 17-of-28 passing for 159 yards and that first-quarter TD while also rushing 13 times for 43 yards and a TD. That rushing TD came in the fourth quarter after he missed a wide-open receiver in the flat for an easy score.
The Colorado defense, meanwhile, couldn’t contain King and the Georgia Tech run game. Georgia Tech ran 47 times for 320 yards as King had 19 carries for 156 yards and three scores. The Yellow Jackets averaged nearly 7 yards a carry.
It was also King’s first game back in Boulder since he suffered a season-ending leg injury in the second game of the season for Texas A&M in 2021. King opened that season as the Aggies’ starter, and appeared in just six games in 2022 before transferring to Georgia Tech ahead of the 2023 season.
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Over the last two years at Georgia Tech, King has become an efficient passer who isn’t afraid of contact in the run game. King completed over 70% of his passes a season ago and had rushed for over 1,300 yards and 21 TDs in his first two seasons with the Yellow Jackets.
His play is a big reason why Georgia Tech is a sleeper in the ACC behind Clemson, Miami and SMU.
Colorado, meanwhile, will be encouraged by its offensive line play and run game against the Yellow Jackets. But there’s still plenty to work on for Deion Sanders’ squad if it is going to be in the thick of the Big 12 mix like it was a year ago. In 2024, Colorado finished in a tie for first in the Big 12, but missed out on the Big 12 title game via tiebreakers.
This news was originally published on this post .
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