Ralphie leads the CU football team at Folsom Field. (Kai Casey/CU Independent File)
The year was 1990.
The University of Colorado football team had come into its 1990-91 campaign with redemption in mind after an 11-1 campaign the previous year. The 1989-90 season had seen Colorado enter its final game of the year as the top-ranked team in college football, only to suffer a 21-6 loss at the hands of Head Coach Lou Holtz’s No.4 Notre Dame Irish that knocked Colorado out of the conversation for the national championship.
The following year, Colorado would need a whole lot of luck to make a return trip to the Orange Bowl and capture the first national championship in program history. That season, 25 years ago, was marked by a game that would become one of the great controversies in college football.
The fifth down game.
It took Colorado five downs at the end of regulation to finally score on the Missouri Tigers and take home a 33-31 victory on Oct. 6, 1990. An error by the officials allowed Colorado one more chance to punch in the winning score after failing to do so on fourth and goal, a chance that Colorado quarterback Charles Johnson did not waste on his 1-yard game-winning touchdown run.
The game will be aired this Tuesday night on Pac-12 Classics in honor of the 25th anniversary of the contest.
A preview of the program, featuring CU Sports Information Director Dave Plati and members of the team and coaching staff from the game can be found at this link.
Contact CU Independent Sports Editor Sam Routhier at samuel.routhier@colorado.edu and follow him on Twitter @samrouthier.
