Pac-12 Announces 2023 League Football Schedules

BOULDER—The Pac-12 Conference released its schedule Wednesday for conference football games for the 2023 season, with the University of Colorado's final slate having four league home games along with six in all at Folsom Field to mark the stadium's 100th season of service.

It also will be the first season of CU's 28th full-time head football coach, Deion "Coach Prime" Sanders.

The non-conference schedule has been set since 2017; the Buffs under Coach Prime will open on the road at College Football Playoff participant TCU on Saturday, Sept. 2. It will be the 41st time CU opens a season on the road, but only the fourth time since 1995; Colorado opened that year with a win at Wisconsin. The Buffs previously opened a season in the state of Texas on two occasions (1940 at Texas, 1960 at Baylor).

Colorado will then host two long-time rivals back-to-back to open the 100th season of Folsom Field. Nebraska will head to town on Saturday, Sept. 9; both schools left the Big 12 Conference ahead of the 2011 season and played a home-and-home series in 2018-19, with the Buffaloes winning both, 33-28 in Lincoln and 34-31 in overtime in Boulder.

Colorado State then will make the trip 50 miles south into Boulder for a Saturday, Sept. 16 match-up, the first between the state's rivals since 2019. In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic canceled the final of an 11-game series that was put into place in 2009. The two schools will play Sept. 14, 2024 in Fort Collins, and again in home-and-home games in 2029-30, 2033-34 and 2037-38.

The last time both Nebraska and CSU were on the Buffs' home schedule was in 2005.

Attention then turns to the Pac-12 Conference schedule, the last with Southern California and UCLA as members of the league before they depart for the Big Ten.

The Buffs will open Pac-12 league play on the road for the sixth time since joining the conference in 2011, heading to Eugene, Ore., to face Oregon on Sept. 23. This will be the second time the Buffs will open league play at the Ducks and the third time against Oregon overall. CU won 41-38 at Oregon on Sept. 23, 2016, the conference opener in what would eventually be a Pac-12 South Championship season and one of the largest turnarounds in Pac-12 history going from 1-8 in 2015 to 8-1 in 2016.

CU will then host Southern California to close out September on Sept. 30 at Folsom Field, in what will be the final match-up between the two as conference foes. Colorado is searching for its first-ever win against the Trojans.

October will open with a trip to Tempe to take on Arizona State. Then on a short week, the Buffs will face Stanford on Friday, Oct. 13, in the game that will be played as part of Family Weekend on CU's campus. After a bye week, the Buffs will head to Los Angeles to face UCLA for the final time in league play on Oct. 28.

November will open with CU's annual Homecoming game against Oregon State on Nov. 4 and the home finale will coincide with both Senior Day and Veterans Day with Arizona visiting Boulder on Nov. 11. With the home schedule complete, the Buffs will have their second Friday game at Washington State on Nov. 17 followed by the regular season finale at Utah on Nov. 25, the Saturday after Thanksgiving.

The Pac-12 Championship game is scheduled for Friday, Dec. 1 at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas.

California and Washington are the two conference opponents that will not appear on CU's schedule for the 2023 season.

"We're excited about the home schedule we've put together for both the start of the Coach Prime era and the 100th season at Folsom Field," CU Athletic Director Rick George said. "Having both Nebraska and Colorado State at home for the first time in 18 years, the final game against USC for the foreseeable future and Family Weekend, Homecoming and Senior Day games set, 2023 is shaping up to be one of our most exciting home schedules in a long time."

Season ticket renewals are underway and the Feb. 2 deadline is quickly approaching.

Television game selections and start times for the first three weeks of the season will be known in early June, with all remaining games from Sept. 23 through the final week of the regular season to be made 12 or an occasional six days in advance per contractual agreements with the Pac-12 and its television partners, ESPN, FOX and the Pac-12 Networks.

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