FORT COLLINS — As Mountain West contenders go, the Rams took the stage in ball gowns and combat boots. But the boot they grabbed Friday night, bronze and beautiful, fit Jay Norvell like a pair of glass slippers.

The Rams clinched the Bronze Boot — the coveted award for the CSU-Wyoming winner since 1968 — with 1:18 left in the fourth quarter on, appropriately enough, a gut-wrenching surge.

As Jalen Dupree rumbled for 11 yards on third-and-8 in a 24-10 win, CSU quarterback Brayden Flower-Nicolosi raised both arms in triumph. A kneeling later, he sprinted some 4.1 seconds and 40 to the corner of the visiting touchline at Canvas Stadium, where the boot awaited the loving arms of his new green and gold overlords.

It was the Rams’ first win in the series since 2020, and CSU’s first Frontier War win in front of a paying home crowd since 2014. Three coaches ago.

Norvell’s Rams (7-3, 5-0 MW) are in the hunt for a league title on the strength of defense, offensive line, bubblegum and piano wire. It’s not pretty. But it’s not broken either.

Tailbacks Justin Marshall and Avery Morrow, CSU’s 1-2 punch, combined for 188 rushing yards while BFN poked and prodded for 197 passing yards, completing 14 of 17 attempts.

Yes, the Cowboys (2-8, 2-4 MW) are a hot mess and might not have scored 20 points against the Rams if you watched them the first 14.

But for Norvell, you don’t apologize for a rivalry win, no matter how ugly. Especially when it happens in front of a sold-out crowd at Canvas Stadium – an arena that Norvell needs to keep filling.

The third-year CSU coach certainly knew what it was. Norvell was seen in the tunnel before the tilt with his arms in the air, trying to fire up the crowd as he led the Rams onto the field. That fire spilled into the opening drive, which saw the hosts grind, punt and march 75 yards on 11 plays in 3:31 to take a quick 7-0 lead.

In retrospect, it was a turf kick with asterisks. CSU’s education staff was a little too busy as temperatures dropped and old grudges were rekindled. Morrow was concussed a few times and missed much of the second half. Kicker Jordan Noyes was wide left from 44 yards in the first quarter and short from 57 yards early in the fourth.

CSU should have put the Pokes away for good with a minute left in the first half, leading 17-3 with four downs at the Wyoming 5. But two attempts by Marshall and one by Morrow were stonewalled, and on fourth-and-goal at the 1: the Rams fumbled off a jet sweep that opened an escape hatch for the stumbling, how-are-they-still-in-this Cowboys.

Then again, when you haven’t raised the bronze boot since 2020, style points are for jerks and pedants.

The win even had a little extra historical joy as Friday is the last Border War game in FoCo until 2028. The first break in the series since World War II is coming in the fall of 2026.

CSU and Wyoming have been conference brothers since the Rams joined the WAC in 1968. But that will change in two years thanks to a Mountain West exodus in which four members, including CSU, will split from the former and join the new Pac -12.

Kass Sprague of Laramie spoke for many Cowboys fans in the second quarter when she raised a frosty beer in a cold hand to toast the Battle for the Boot.

“It’s (expletive),” Sprague said of the series going dark in 2026 and ’27. “It’s the best rivalry in sports, so it makes me sad. I feel like all these conference changes take away from all good rivalries.”

That said, she doesn’t blame the Rams for jumping on an offer from Oregon State and Washington State, the two schools left in the bag that included the Pac-12 name, its broadcast rights and settlement payouts.

“I think it’s kind of stupid,” she said. “I don’t think they’ll make any money from it…you get the idea, but whatever.”

“They just hate each other,” Anthony Stoeter, a Wyoming fan and law student from Pensacola, Fla., told me just before halftime, “but they also love each other. It’s kind of cool.”

Here’s the thing: This past Thursday, the Rams and Pokes jointly announced an eight-year contract for the Battle of the Bronze Boot — as a non-conference series — that begins in three seasons and runs through 2035.

“It’s just — we’re a small state, a small (campus) town,” Sprague said of Wyoming. “And it’s really cool to beat them — beat the sheep, basically.”

When we said adieu, that option appeared to be off the table.

The opening 30 minutes were largely a green and gold fest. The Rammies led at halftime in total yards (274 to 61), first downs (12 to four), rushing yards (151 to 40) and passing yards (123 to 41). A 14-point deficit flattered the Cowboys, who got a 38-yard run by Marshall on the second play from scrimmage and sputtered for most of the next two stanzas.

“FIRST AND GOAL, RAMS!” shouted the speaker above us.

“Well, (expletive),” Kass said. “I guess they can win this one.”