November 05, 2026 | Football
"I Can Do It All": Defying The Big-Man Job Description Since The YMCA
BOULDER — Chauncey Gooden knew early that he was going to be a lineman. That did not mean he had to play basketball like one.
Growing up in Nashville, Tenn., Gooden played at the YMCA with his friends until he was about 11. He was the biggest kid on the floor, as he was the biggest kid everywhere, and he had no interest in spending his afternoons near the basket.
"Nothing but three-pointers," Gooden said this week on Colorado's weekly radio show with Mark Johnson. "I wasn't trying to go in the paint and do nothing. I was trying to shoot threes."
The kid who refused to stay in the paint has grown into a second-year Buffalo who won't stay on one side of the ball, either.
Gooden has started all eight games at guard for Colorado this season after playing 18 offensive snaps in four games a year ago. He was the Outland Trophy National Player of the Week after the opener at Georgia Tech, where he also played eight snaps at nose tackle and made a goal-line stop, and he added a quarterback hurry against Weber State. His position coach is not hiding what he thinks of the whole package.
"If you're athletic and you can move and you're pretty fast, that helps, too," offensive line coach Gunnar White said on the same show. "Like Chauncey, for example. He's a special cat. He's only in his second year, but you're seeing what he's doing on both sides of the ball. It's a special deal."
The road to Boulder started early. Darius Darden Box, a Nashville native and now Colorado's director of player personnel, was at Vanderbilt when he offered Gooden as a freshman at Lipscomb Academy. It was only the second offer of Gooden's career. Around the same time, Gooden went to a camp at Jackson State, where Deion "Coach Prime" Sanders was then the head coach.
"I balled out," Gooden said. "So I always wanted to come play for Coach Prime."
When Coach Prime took the Colorado job and Box came with him, the two threads became one.
"We was building that connection all the way from there," Gooden said. "It was just like a family connection. It was just meant to be."
The size, he said, was never a phase.
"I've always been a big guy," he said. "I always stood out in every class I was in."
It runs on his father's side. His dad is 6-foot-3, the same height as his son, and his paternal grandmother stood somewhere around 5-11 or 6 feet. His mother, at 5-4, did not contribute much to the cause. The other member of the household, a sister who just turned 13, gets the softest treatment anyone in the Big 12 will see from him this year.
"I love my little sister to death," Gooden said. "I'd do anything I can for her."
On Saturdays, the family business is less gentle, and last week's 27-24 overtime win over Kansas State was the kind of afternoon offensive linemen wait for. Colorado rushed for a season-high 222 yards, and Richard Young ran for 120 of them and two touchdowns, the first 100-yard game by a Buff this season.
"It's so beautiful, just being able to see the running back run through the holes that we create up front as the offensive line," Gooden said. "It just keeps us going. We just want to keep going and keep bullying people all game."
Still, ask him where he fell in love with football and he doesn't point to the side of the ball where he earned his honors.
"When I first started loving the game of football, I was playing defensive line," Gooden said. "Being able to run through somebody's face and make a play on the ball carrier, and then the crowd loves it. It's just a full electric thing. I just love playing defense. But offensive line is where I came to, and where God has blessed me."
Asked whether there's a tug-of-war on the coaching staff over him, he didn't exactly deny it.
"Nah, for real, it definitely goes on like that," he said, before offering the diplomatic out. "But our defensive line's playing well."
His high school coaches used to tell him Colorado might give him a shot on defense. He brushed them off.
"You really haven't seen linemen playing both ways in Power Four football," Gooden said. "So I definitely didn't believe it at first. It's definitely a dream come true to say that."
The Buffs have seen a two-way player or two lately, but Travis Hunter's job did not involve the same collisions on every snap.
"It's definitely tough," Gooden said, "because it's just hitting somebody in the mouth every play. It's constant physicality, on both sides of the ball, doing different techniques. But when you really love both sides, it's just fun at the end of the day."
He's still a student on the offensive side. Against Kansas State, Leon Bell spent the afternoon pulling and flattening people, and Gooden, asked if he moves as well as the 6-8, 330-pound veteran, did not pretend.
"That's an athlete," he said. "That's a lineman right there. I just try to learn from him early on in my career. I don't think I can do what Leon Bell do yet."
Bell is also, by Gooden's reckoning, the personality of the room, with a caveat.
"Sometimes he talk a lot, sometimes he may not," Gooden said. "He definitely just got a lot to say, and then a lot not to say. So he's definitely a tricky one."
Colorado (3-5, 1-4 Big 12) plays at Arizona State on Saturday at 5:30 p.m. MT, and Gooden's focus is where a second-year starter's should be.
"We're trying to stack these wins," he said.
There is one more item on his list, though. Johnson asked him the odds that the Buffs someday line him up at fullback and hand him the ball.
"That would be beautiful," Gooden said, and then he made his case like a guy who has been waiting for someone to ask. "If you look at my high school tape, I played fullback, tight end, running back. I got like two touchdowns in my high school career."
He left no doubt about the conclusion.
"I definitely say I can do it all."
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Growing up in Nashville, Tenn., Gooden played at the YMCA with his friends until he was about 11. He was the biggest kid on the floor, as he was the biggest kid everywhere, and he had no interest in spending his afternoons near the basket.
"Nothing but three-pointers," Gooden said this week on Colorado's weekly radio show with Mark Johnson. "I wasn't trying to go in the paint and do nothing. I was trying to shoot threes."
The kid who refused to stay in the paint has grown into a second-year Buffalo who won't stay on one side of the ball, either.
Gooden has started all eight games at guard for Colorado this season after playing 18 offensive snaps in four games a year ago. He was the Outland Trophy National Player of the Week after the opener at Georgia Tech, where he also played eight snaps at nose tackle and made a goal-line stop, and he added a quarterback hurry against Weber State. His position coach is not hiding what he thinks of the whole package.
"If you're athletic and you can move and you're pretty fast, that helps, too," offensive line coach Gunnar White said on the same show. "Like Chauncey, for example. He's a special cat. He's only in his second year, but you're seeing what he's doing on both sides of the ball. It's a special deal."
The road to Boulder started early. Darius Darden Box, a Nashville native and now Colorado's director of player personnel, was at Vanderbilt when he offered Gooden as a freshman at Lipscomb Academy. It was only the second offer of Gooden's career. Around the same time, Gooden went to a camp at Jackson State, where Deion "Coach Prime" Sanders was then the head coach.
"I balled out," Gooden said. "So I always wanted to come play for Coach Prime."
When Coach Prime took the Colorado job and Box came with him, the two threads became one.
"We was building that connection all the way from there," Gooden said. "It was just like a family connection. It was just meant to be."
The size, he said, was never a phase.
"I've always been a big guy," he said. "I always stood out in every class I was in."
It runs on his father's side. His dad is 6-foot-3, the same height as his son, and his paternal grandmother stood somewhere around 5-11 or 6 feet. His mother, at 5-4, did not contribute much to the cause. The other member of the household, a sister who just turned 13, gets the softest treatment anyone in the Big 12 will see from him this year.
"I love my little sister to death," Gooden said. "I'd do anything I can for her."
On Saturdays, the family business is less gentle, and last week's 27-24 overtime win over Kansas State was the kind of afternoon offensive linemen wait for. Colorado rushed for a season-high 222 yards, and Richard Young ran for 120 of them and two touchdowns, the first 100-yard game by a Buff this season.
"It's so beautiful, just being able to see the running back run through the holes that we create up front as the offensive line," Gooden said. "It just keeps us going. We just want to keep going and keep bullying people all game."
Still, ask him where he fell in love with football and he doesn't point to the side of the ball where he earned his honors.
"When I first started loving the game of football, I was playing defensive line," Gooden said. "Being able to run through somebody's face and make a play on the ball carrier, and then the crowd loves it. It's just a full electric thing. I just love playing defense. But offensive line is where I came to, and where God has blessed me."
Asked whether there's a tug-of-war on the coaching staff over him, he didn't exactly deny it.
"Nah, for real, it definitely goes on like that," he said, before offering the diplomatic out. "But our defensive line's playing well."
His high school coaches used to tell him Colorado might give him a shot on defense. He brushed them off.
"You really haven't seen linemen playing both ways in Power Four football," Gooden said. "So I definitely didn't believe it at first. It's definitely a dream come true to say that."
The Buffs have seen a two-way player or two lately, but Travis Hunter's job did not involve the same collisions on every snap.
"It's definitely tough," Gooden said, "because it's just hitting somebody in the mouth every play. It's constant physicality, on both sides of the ball, doing different techniques. But when you really love both sides, it's just fun at the end of the day."
He's still a student on the offensive side. Against Kansas State, Leon Bell spent the afternoon pulling and flattening people, and Gooden, asked if he moves as well as the 6-8, 330-pound veteran, did not pretend.
"That's an athlete," he said. "That's a lineman right there. I just try to learn from him early on in my career. I don't think I can do what Leon Bell do yet."
Bell is also, by Gooden's reckoning, the personality of the room, with a caveat.
"Sometimes he talk a lot, sometimes he may not," Gooden said. "He definitely just got a lot to say, and then a lot not to say. So he's definitely a tricky one."
Colorado (3-5, 1-4 Big 12) plays at Arizona State on Saturday at 5:30 p.m. MT, and Gooden's focus is where a second-year starter's should be.
"We're trying to stack these wins," he said.
There is one more item on his list, though. Johnson asked him the odds that the Buffs someday line him up at fullback and hand him the ball.
"That would be beautiful," Gooden said, and then he made his case like a guy who has been waiting for someone to ask. "If you look at my high school tape, I played fullback, tight end, running back. I got like two touchdowns in my high school career."
He left no doubt about the conclusion.
"I definitely say I can do it all."
Â
Players Mentioned
Tuesday, November 03
Tuesday, November 03
Sunday, November 01
Sunday, November 01
