I’m sure it was clear to anyone watching yesterday that we got completely annihilated by The Citadel. In fact, as bad as the score looks, the score doesn’t quite represent just how bad we got beat. Here is my attempt to make sense of it all:
#21 The Citadel – 52 / @ #8 Appalachian State – 28
The Good
The flyover. The funnel cake. The fact that it’s over?
The Bad
THE DEFENSE looked like they had no idea what was going on against the triple option. That’s not good since Georgia Southern and Wofford also run a form of it.
THE OFFENSE looked like they had no idea what the score was (short throws & runs while down by 5 scores).
SPECIAL TEAMS was doing fine, but didn’t want to make the rest of the team look bad so they let a punt get blocked/returned for a TD.
The Ugly
FAN SUPPORT – The best thing about running this blog by myself (and not worrying about having to make money off of it) is that I can say whatever I want. Well I don’t care who hears it, this week – the only thing worse than our play was our fans.
I get it. I was as frustrated as anyone. To the handfuls of people that stayed the whole game or watched/listened to the entire game from home – I’m not talking to you. To those of you who left early, you really suck. The players didn’t get to leave early. You didn’t leave early when we were beating Montana last week. By the 2nd half, the stands were empty and now I’ve gotta listen to morons talk about firing the coaches. Did we lose BECAUSE of our fans? No, but the fickle support you just showed our players could mentally impact the next one.
It was 1 game people. You talk about a sense of entitlement from the perspective of the players? That’s nothing compared to the sense of entitlement that our fans have. Yes here at App we always expect to win. That doesn’t mean you have to be a douche when we lose.
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D-II Glenville State – 0 / @ Chattanooga – 35
The worst part about this game is that it was played on Thursday. That gave Chattanooga 3 extra days to get ready to play us this week. Other than that, UTC only allowed 17 yards rushing from Glenville State & only 78 total. They also put up 477 yards in a pretty balanced offensive display. It’s hard to really judge against such weak competition though.
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Liberty – 14 / @ #14 Montana – 34
I hope we respond to our loss this week as well as Montana did to theirs last week. They beat a solid Liberty team by double digits. Looking back I wonder how we won that game. It was like a totally different team.
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D-II West Virginia State – 14 / @ Elon – 48
Elon played without the benefit of their head coach who was hospitalized on Fri for chest pains. Best of wishes to him and his family, but if it was going to happen, it couldn’t have happened on a better week. I’m actually surprised WVSU scored twice.
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Samford – 44 / @ Gardner-Webb – 23
Samford is quietly maintaining their undefeated status. Our game against them is going to be a tough one. That being said, Gardner-Webb isn’t any good this year. But Samford should beat WCU next week and they will be 4-0 before going into the gauntlet of GA Southern/Citadel/App State/Chatty/Wofford. They could be 4-5 coming out of that.
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Furman – 7 / @ FBS #11 Clemson – 41
The final score wasn’t surprising. It is interesting that Furman put up 352 yards on offense but only managed 7 points though. They’ve had a rough start going 0-3 but they’re better than their record indicates. They should win their next 2 games against WCU and Presbyterian. Then they’ll go to Wofford looking for an upset.
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ECU – 24 / @ Southern Miss – 14
Personally, I thought ECU would lose here but it was a relatively close game. The good news is ECU isn’t atrociously bad, but it remains to be seen just how good they are.
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#20 Eastern Kentucky - 35 / @ Coastal Carolina – 17
I thought that Eastern Kentucky was overrated, but apparently not. Coastal is a decent team, but this shows that they are pretty beatable as well. We can’t sleep on them but I think we’re a better team (depending on the week I guess).
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Western Carolina – 20 / @ #9 Wofford – 49
WCU is getting better but they still have a long way to go. Meanwhile Wofford is doing everything they’re supposed to. In the new rankings, they should be the highest ranked team in the SoCon. They should win their next 2 games against Elon & Furman as well. WCU will really show us what they’re made of next week against Samford.
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#11 Georgia Southern – Bye Week
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SoCon Standings
1. The Citadel 3-0 (2-0 SoCon)
2. Samford 3-0 (1-0 SoCon)
Wofford 3-0 (1-0 SoCon)
3. Elon 2-1 (0-0 SoCon)
Chattanooga 1-2 (0-0 SoCon)
4. Georgia Southern 1-1 (0-1 SoCon)
Appalachian State 1-2 (0-1 SoCon)
Western Carolina 1-2 (0-1 SoCon)
Furman 0-3 (0-1 SoCon)
John:
Great post. Our fans have become so intoxicated with success, we have trouble dealing with the sobering reality that The Citadel has an extremely good football team and that it was better than we were yesterday.
But I must confess, I left a few minutes early. My wife, who was waiting in the parking lot, kept texting me to “come on to the car” so we could get a good seat for supper. I stalled as long as I could, but eventually relented with four minutes left. As I walked out, I had to pass Margaret Moore. That, for me, was the low point in the day. I felt ashamed. I just had to get this off my chest.
I agree with everything that you say about our fans but when you come to a calibar type of school such as App State with the football program we have you expect your players to come out and play hard every game i understand losing but at least show up and play. With the calibar team we have and the coaching we have we all expect students or fans for our team to show up and play their ass and hearts out every day!!!!
Excellent post. It was a devastating defeat and one in which the opponent deserves the greatest amount of credit. I certainly thought we were capable of losing. However, I wasn’t anticipating a drubbing. Nonetheless, it is amazing how quickly some of are fans are jumping ship. I just hope the water is not too deep.
It is a shame that people left early. It was also a shame that the team gave up. I mean the missed tackles we looked like the bad news bears trying to stop that option. I have never seen the lack of effort from any app team as I saw Saturday. You drive four hours every home saturday to see a game you would like to see an all out effort.
Bravo for ripping the “fans.” These are the same morons on Appfan, b1tching and demanding the coaches be fired and they can’t even stay the whole game. I was there till the end and I was also deeply disturbed by the spoiled child attitude from all the people that left. Definitely more troubling than a big loss at home.
Of course we should be disappointed, but the way the fans throw the team, coach, and AD under the bus is unbelievable to me. After the 2004 loss at Western Carolina (one of the most devastating and embarrassing losses I ever witnessed) the team came back to win three national championships. Every successful program has, and will continue to experience adversity and hopefully the way you respond to it is the measure of a good program. Let’s hope we respond with resiliency.
I turned the game off after the blocked punt. It was the first time that I’ve ever turned a game off early or left a game. When the team doesn’t quit, the fans shouldn’t quit. I saw a team and coaches who quit.
Jerry Moore has probably coached against the triple option 70 times. There is no reason we were unprepared. You have a responsibility to your team to prepare them. The team has a responsibility to commit to the game plan. And guess what, tickets cost money. If the game is not worth the time or money, it is no ones right to make them sit there or keep the game on the radio or TV. That was a shame of a Saturday. Not because we lost, but because we didn’t even show up. If the team doesn’t show up, why should the fans have to sit there waiting for them?
BTW, Dale Jones should be fired. We are allowing about 500 yards of offense and our D has not been solid in about 6 years. There needs to be immediate improvement or let’s find a new D coordinator. We are not a program that does extreme things during the season, but this needs immediate attention.