The cynics will say 5-7 is 5-7, the same old CU nowhere. It wasn’t. Year 1 of the Mel Tucker Era, in hindsight, wasn’t really about the destination. It was about the journey.

The 2017 road to postseason ineligibility ended with three straight losses and four defeats in five contests, a gentle slide into oblivion. A year ago, the truck went straight off a cliff and took a slow-motion descent, thanks to seven consecutive losses, into a fiery abyss.

The Buffs’ 2019 November was different. This time, they got off the mat, bloodied but unbroken, and got some shots in. This time, they swung enough late to take this thing, somehow, to the judges’ scorecards.

“Oh, it’s a radically different feel,” Joel Klatt, the Fox Sports college football analyst and former CU and Pomona quarterback, said of Tucker’s debut campaign, which ended late Saturday night with a 45-15 shakedown at No. 6 Utah. “It is aesthetically different when I watch this team and how they’re trying to finish the season, finish drives. They play physical, they run the football. They play hard, with effort.

“I think the areas that most fans wanted to see, and specifically wanted to see grow, have come to fruition. Namely, the ability to play strong late in the game and the ability to compete and play tough.”

Alas, tough was not enough to counter Utes tight end Brant Kuithe (122 scrimmage yards), whose two second-quarter touchdowns flipped the script. Or for quarterback Tyler Huntley (14-of-17 passing, two scores), who danced and squirted out of danger — usually out of the grip of Davion Taylor — most of the night.

And yet you’re looking forward, not backward. You’re thinking about sophomore wideout Daniel Arias, and that 27-yard touchdown catch early in the fourth quarter, the first second-half score surrendered by the Utes at home all season, and wondering just how high that ceiling goes.

You’re picturing an offense that leads with a fist instead of its feet. You’re admiring the early holes that opened up for Alex Fontenot (49 yards on 13 carries) against the nation’s No. 1 rush defense, a red wall that had given up only 55.9 rushing yards per contest coming into Saturday.

The last chapter was always going to be a dud. The Buffs (5-7, 3-6 Pac-12) were on adrenaline. The Utes (11-1, 8-1) were on a mission. Flush it and grade 2019 on a curve.

“I think he’s been great,” CU radio analyst and former Buffs coach Gary Barnett said of Tucker’s inaugural campaign. “I think he’s been spectacular. There are always high expectations with a new coach coming in, but with a new coach coming in that hasn’t been a head coach, those expectations are generally unfair.

“But this guy, in my opinion, has been better than advertised. He has done the little things better than a new head coach ever does. He has kept the demeanor and calmness with his football team and squad that first-year coaches can’t necessarily do. In my opinion, he is far ahead of anybody that has ever come in as a first-year coach.”

Yes, you could argue that 5-7 could have been — should have been — 6-6, that the late-game clock management that iced November wins against Stanford and Washington might have also turned around a come-from-ahead home setback to a flawed USC side at Folsom Field a month ago. Or that going for two when you had momentum during a home rally against Air Force, in hindsight, was probably a safer bet than playing for overtime and defending a short field against an option attack that you’d spent hours struggling to tackle.

“He needed to have the right guy in his ear on that one,” Barnett said. “The situation with SC, yeah, that’s probably a combination of a lot of things, and he’s got to bear some responsibility.

“But at the same time, I think they beat Nebraska because of him. And probably beat Stanford because of him. At Arizona State, I think we had a lot of stuff going for us, but I think you’ve got to say that the way he’s handled everything, you’ve got to give him his due in there and it may have made a difference.”

Your glass is half-full. A year ago at this time, you were ready to empty what was left into the sink.

“It’s going to take (time),” Klatt said. “But it can happen. Utah is proving that right now. Oregon is proving that. I think CU can play at the top end of the Pac-12 in the future. It’s just going to take a couple of recruiting cycles to continue to that progress, the toughness they’ve started with under Mel.”

It’s 5-7, and here you are, sad again as the holiday decorations come out of the closet and the tailgating toys get shoved back in. Only it’s a different sad, sadness with a pinch of pride, the kind of glum you haven’t felt for what’s seemed like ages. And then it hits you: You’re sad, all right. But only because it’s over.