Wyoming vs Colorado State Prediction, Picks & Odds — Sep 5, 2026

The 114th Border War arrives with the series at 57-52-5 for Colorado State and Wyoming's 28-point win in the last meeting still hanging over it. Colorado State is the home favorite on a narrow basis: Hauss Hejny has the only FBS snaps of any quarterback here, and he returns as the settled starter. Everything else is two rebuilt rosters guessing about each other.

0%

-38

1%

-32

2%

-24

4%

-18

8%

-10

13%

-4

17%

+4

18%

+10

16%

+18

11%

+24

7%

+32

3%

+38

1%

+46

Wyoming winsColorado State wins

Market: Colorado State −3Projected: Colorado State by 9 (72%)

The range of outcomes for this game. Each bar is how often the final margin lands in that range — the more it leans toward Colorado State, the more likely Colorado State wins.

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Colorado State's 38-player exodus

Colorado State's offseason was a teardown: 38 players out against 32 in, a position-weighted talent balance deep in the red, and four-star receiver Armani Winfield gone to South Florida. Jordan Mosley and Stephon Wright arrived with four-star billing of their own, but the net runs negative. Last season's 2-10 record and 30.8 points allowed describe a team that no longer exists.

What remains is a passing game with three efficient part-timers and no volume receiver. Tommy Maher, Tay Lanier and Lavon Brown each cleared +0.28 EPA per play last season on target shares between nine and 12 percent, and all three project into the same modest band: Maher 16 to 49 receiving yards, Lanier 14 to 44, Brown 15 to 34. Winfield's targets are unclaimed, and none of the three has carried that load.

Wyoming's paper edge belongs to players who left

The clearest unit advantage belongs to Wyoming's passing offense against Colorado State's pass defense, worth about six-tenths of a standard deviation. It is a 121st-ranked unit against a 120th-ranked one. Wyoming returns 12 percent of last season's passing production, so that ranking describes nobody who will take a snap Saturday.

Tyler Hughes projects as the starter: a William & Mary transfer with four seasons of record, positive career EPA, no FBS snaps and a new offense to learn. Eric Richardson is the returning target, and he cost Wyoming yardage last season at -0.17 EPA per play on an eight percent share; he projects for 9 to 25 receiving yards, with Charlie Coenen at 11 to 34. Colorado State keeps 41 percent of its passing production and the quarterback who generated it.

Neither team can make a quarterback uncomfortable

Wyoming finished 110th in sacks and 113th in tackles for loss; Colorado State was 117th and 128th, near the floor of the sport. Wyoming then lost edge rusher Axel Ramazani and interior linemen Lucas Samsula and Gabriel Ikechukwu from that front, replacing them with Ja'Quan Redfern out of Murray State and Thaddeus Gianaris out of Dartmouth. The 18th-ranked pass defense Wyoming brings in was built on coverage, and coverage without pressure ages badly.

Colorado State kept its secondary whole. Lemondre Joe (13 pass breakups, 3.5 sacks, 56 tackles), Jace Bellah (four interceptions, 57 tackles) and Jahari Rogers (eight breakups) all return to a group that graded 120th, and that continuity is the most credible case that the worst thing about this team improves. Stephon Wright, the four-star lineman in from UConn, decides whether the back end gets any help in front of it.

Colorado State pulled eight interceptions last season and Wyoming ten, and both return the defensive backs who produced them: Bellah on one side, Desman Hearns with five breakups and two interceptions on the other. With both pass rushes near the bottom of the sport, an interception here is likelier to come from a quarterback's own mistake than from anything a defensive front creates.

Colorado State is starting its run game from zero

Colorado State returns none of last season's rushing production, so a 76th-ranked run game is a blank page. UConn transfer tackle Diego Rodriguez is the notable new part. Wyoming has the mirror-image problem: 81 percent of its rushing production returns from a unit that ranked 114th.

Samuel Harris took 29 percent of the rush share at +0.12 EPA per play and projects for 24 to 66 yards, with Landon Sims at 11 to 32. Those are thin bands against a Colorado State run defense that ranked 104th and still grades the small edge in that matchup. A total of 46.5 with the under favored fits the evidence: 19-28 is the projection, and neither offense has a demonstrated way to outrun it.

◄WyomingfavorsColorado State►

Roster talentoverall talent level of the roster — recruiting pedigree plus an independent preseason roster gradeColorado State +4

Quarterbackthe projected starter's quality and how settled the job isColorado State +3

Last season's body of worklast year's power rating, regressed toward the averageWyoming +2

Returning productionhow much of last year's production is back this seasonColorado State +2

Each ingredient of our projection and the side it favors — bars toward Colorado State are why it's the pick (home field is counted separately).

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Wyoming's path is a Short, ugly game

Wyoming was the better team last season: 4-8 against 2-10, 20.5 points allowed against 30.8. It won the portal cycle on net, and its coverage unit is the strongest single group in the stadium. If Hughes is functional, Harris reaches the top of his range and Hearns's ball production repeats, the game shrinks to a version Colorado State's offense has not shown it can win.

What each side has to do

Colorado State needs Hejny to punish a front that cannot reach him, and needs one of Maher, Lanier or Brown to grow into a volume target instead of three interchangeable role players. Wyoming needs its rebuilt defensive line to hold up without Ramazani and Samsula, and needs Hughes to look closer to a functioning FBS starter than to a first-time transfer.