By Brenda June Temple

February 09, 2024

BOULDER – Deion “Coach Prime” Sanders has announced coaching staff updates for the 2024 season with three new additions to the staff and two others shifting roles within the program.

Internally, Pat Shurmur, who began last season as an analyst and was moved to co-offensive coordinator midseason, will take that role on full time.  Another analyst, Vincent Dancy, will move to an assistant coach for outside linebackers.  Brett Bartolone will also move from wide receivers to tight ends.

New to the staff are Defensive Coordinator Robert Livingston, Offensive Line Coach Phil Loadholt and Wide Receivers Coach Jason Phillips.

Livingston joins the Buffs from the Cincinnati Bengals, where he was on staff the last eight seasons, the last six focusing on the safeties.   Along with former Buffs Josh Tupou and Chidobe Awuzie, he helped the Bengals reach Super Bowl LVI after knocking off the Kansas City Chiefs in the AFC Championship Game.  Prior to coaching, he worked as a scout with the Bengals from 2012-14.  This will be his third season coaching in college, as he was a defensive quality control coach for Vanderbilt in 2011 and at Furman in 2010.  He played his college ball at William & Mary, graduating in 2010 with a degree in Kinesiology.

Loadholt returns to the state of Colorado for the first time since his prep days where he attended Fountain-Fort Carson High School in Fountain, Colo.  Recruited to Colorado by Gary Barnett, he instead attended Garden City Community College for two years before signing with Oklahoma, where he started for two years before being a second round pick in the 2009 NFL Draft.  He played for the Minnesota Vikings from 2009-15 and then broke into the coaching ranks at Central Florida for the 2018-19 seasons.  He spent the 2020-21 seasons at Ole Miss before becoming an analyst at Oklahoma the past two seasons.

Phillips returns to Coach Prime’s staff for the second time, where he was hired as the co-offensive coordinator and receivers coach for the 2021 season when Jackson State was 11-2 overall, 8-0 in the SWAC and advanced to the Celebration Bowl.  Phillips spent the past two seasons in the Canadian Football League coaching receivers for the Hamilton Tiger-Cats.  A Houston native, he played for the University of Houston where he led the nation in receiving and was an All-American in 1987 and ’88 with Andre Ware as his quarterback.  He was drafted into the NFL in 1989 and spent five seasons there before heading to the CFL for four more.

He began his coaching career in 1999 and has also served on staffs at Houston, Baylor, Kansas, SMU, Oregon State, Utah State, and Texas State at the college level, and along with his stint in the CFL, he spent the 2000 season with the Houston Marshalls of the short-lived Spring Football League.

Shurmur joined Coach Prime’s staff in July 2023 as an offensive analyst and by the end of the season, he was the co-offensive coordinator.  After taking the 2022 season off, he had spent the previous 22 seasons in the NFL, serving a variety of roles from tight ends coach and offensive line coach to offensive coordinator and head coach.  He was the head coach of the Cleveland Browns in 2011-12, interim coach of the Philadelphia Eagles in 2015 and head coach of the New York Giants from 2018-19, also spending time with the St. Louis Rams, Minnesota Vikings, and Denver Broncos.

He began coaching in college at Michigan State as a graduate assistant coach in 1988-89 and then as the tight ends, offensive line and special teams coach from 1990-97 and at Stanford as the offensive line coach in 1998.  He was the NFL Assistant Coach of the Year in 2017 as the offensive coordinator of the Vikings.  He played at Michigan State from 1983-87, earning All-America honors at center in 1987 as a senior when the Spartans defeated USC in the Rose Bowl.

Dancy joined Coach Prime’s inaugural staff as an analyst in 2023, coming to Colorado from Mississippi Valley State, where he coached for eight seasons, including as the head coach from 2018-22.  Dancy is a Jackson State graduate, where he was an All-SWAC linebacker and safety.  His coaching career also began at JSU in 2009 after he earned a master’s degree from West Alabama, serving the Tigers first as a graduate assistant and then full time safeties coach.  In 2014 he served as the defensive coordinator at Payne College.

Coach Prime and the Buffaloes will hit the field March 18 for the start of Spring Football, with the Black & Gold Day Spring Game set for April 27.  The 2024 season will see North Dakota State head to Boulder for the season opener as the Buffs host Baylor for Homecoming on Sept. 21, the first Big 12 game at Folsom Field in almost 14 years.

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