Dorrell on the 2021 season: “Everybody feels we’re headed in the right direction”

Following Colorado’s ultimate game of the 2021 season, Karl Dorrell shared a few thoughts on how he believed the year went. While he wasn’t ignorant of the 4-8 record, he did appear confident that the Buffs are making strides.

“Everyone feels we have the foundation that is set to build (on) moving forward,” Dorrell said. “It is unfortunate, I would have loved to start the offseason off a win, by winning this game… using that as juice to get some things going for us in a positive way into the offseason. But there is enough of a good feel on this team that we feel we’re close.”

Dorrell even went as far as to say this 2021 team was better than the 4-2 Alamo Bowl team of 2020. Last season was obviously a strange one with COVID-19, but Dorrell was very clear in saying this year’s team had more “fight.”

Besides the second half against UCLA and most of the Cal and Minnesota games, there was passion in Colorado’s play. Brendon Lewis, in particular, was a great example of that against Utah. The final score may have been ugly against the likes of Utah and Oregon, but the Buffs didn’t roll over against the Pac-12’s best.

It’s going to take more than passion, however, to fully turn things around.

The offensive line is a good place to start. You can complain all you want with the playcalling, but the O-line was a handicap. That was ruthlessly apparent against Utah’s — albeit elite — defensive front.

“We have to continue to bring these guys forward and make improvements week after week after week,” Dorrell said of the O-line. “That is where my disappointment is, is that I felt like there has been good weeks where we’ve shown signs of that but then we didn’t make much growth at all. We have to be better there. That’s been a challenging part of this scenario the whole season is playing with a young quarterback that did get better over the course of the season.”

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Though interim O-line coach William Vlachos, who took over for Mitch Rodrigue midway through the season, did lead a more formidable front late in the season. It will be interesting to see if Dorrell keeps Vlachos in that role.

But first, Dorrell’s offseason work begins Sunday when he leaves for a recruiting trip.

“I am excited about seeing our guys that we have coming in that will be joining us,” Dorrell said. “There are a bunch of kids that are interested in us that we hope to get them feeling like this is a great place to go with a bright future.”