Appalachian State Mountaineers beat GASO: Seizes Sun Belt Destiny
The Appalachian State Mountaineers sent a ripple through the college football world. Since it mainly involves the Sun Belt Conference, it may not be felt too far but it completely flipped the script in that conference with a 31-13 victory over Georgia Southern Thursday night.
The game started out simple enough. The Georgia Southern run game scored first and had a 7-3 lead leaving the first quarter. That was when everything changed. Appalachian State rolled off the next 31 points. In the second quarter alone they changed the nature of the game by scoring two touchdowns to make it a 17-7 game.
That got Georgia Southern out of what they like to do. They could no longer run the ball to win. They had to try and throw. This is not something that they liked doing. The result was that they threw two interceptions to further push the game out of reach. The Boone crowd got to see last year’s Bogey man fall in front of their eyes.
The secret weapon in the App State offense was quarterback Taylor Lamb. While running back Marcus Cox scored twice, it was Lamb’s 202 passing yards that opened a new dimension to the Mountaineer attack. That combo proved too much for a Georgia Southern defense to contain.
With their victory over Georgia Southern, Appalachian State now sits on top of the Sun Belt Conference along with 4-3 Arkansas State. The road is suddenly clear for the Mountaineers to make a run at the conference title.
All they have to do is beat the teams that they beat last year late in the season. Then a trip to New Orleans could be there for the taking in just their second year in the league.
The Mountaineers play the Troy Trojans on Halloween in Boone. Trick or Treat, App fans.