How cool did those alt-uni’s look? It almost makes me think we need to bring something similar into our regular rotation.
I had a rough week on my predictions going 3-4 (31-12 overall). But I don’t mind one bit because those upsets helped us out tremendously in the conference title race.
Coastal Carolina 14 / @ #17 Appalachian State 55
I predicted a blowout win, but our guys exceeded even my expectations this week. Incredible job!
OFFENSE
399 Rushing yards and 285 passing yards. What else can I say? We absolutely dominated the line of scrimmage. We had the ball 13 times and on 9 of those times we scored. We did throw 1 interception but that was our only turnover of the game. If you told me we could play all of our games with only 1 turnover I would take it.
Steven Miller averaged 11.9yds a carry. Insane. He had 218 all-purpose yards and 2 touchdowns. His longest was an incredible 75yd touchdown run.
Sean Price showed up again today with 8 receptions for 128yds. The longest being a 69yd touchdown strike. He had 2 touchdowns on the game.
DEFENSE
For me, this was the question mark going into the game. Sure our defense did an awesome job against Chattanooga, but Coastal was supposed to have a really high-powered passing offense.
Minus two long drives for touchdowns in the 2nd quarter, I have nothing to complain about. They held Coastal to 114yds on the ground and a 190 in the air. Keep in mind, Coastal put up 356yds in the air against FBS Toledo just last week.
Jeremy Kimbrough had his usual excellent game with 11 tackles. Brandon Grier threw in 6 more. Stephen Burns did a nice job of forcing a fumble.
SPECIAL TEAMS
Although they’re expected, Drew Stewart & co did a nice job of making all their field goals and extra points.
Our worst play of the game was also somehow my favorite. In the 4th quarter, Sam Martin kicked-off 65 yards to the 0yd line. Then Coastal returned the ball 87 yards to the App 13. But it would have been a touchdown if Sam Martin hadn’t made an incredible tackle. I love that the kicker didn’t give up. Coastal would soon after fumble the ball back to us.
I think one of our biggest problems right now is kickoff coverage. I think Sam Martin is doing a good job of kicking the ball so hard that that there is no chance of return. However, I think that’s masking the fact that our kickoff coverage has holes. I’m sure we’ll be working on that this week. Overall, fantastic game!
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#6 Wofford 49 / @ Elon 24
If I told you Wofford would only have 16 passing yards, you would tell me that they lost in blowout fashion right? Well, on top of that they had 500 rushing yards. That’s pretty amazing.
Meanwhile, Elon had the opposite strategy. They had 361yds in the air but only 49 on the ground. I thought they would do a little better after almost beating Georgia Southern last week. But I guess Wofford is as good as advertised.
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Western Carolina 24 / @ Furman 45
I actually thought Western would get their first D-I win of the last two seasons here. What was I thinking? They’ve got a looooong way to go if they were beaten this badly by lowly Furman. WCU actually put up a decent number of yards, but it was like their defense never came out of the locker room.
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Samford 16 / @ #10 Georgia Southern 35
I had a chance to watch most of this game live after the App game ended. This was really a game of momentum. When it started, these two teams looked really evenly matched but with different styles of play. Then GSU caught a pick 6. The crowd and their defense responded off the energy from that big play.
Like the Wofford/Elon game this was a tale of two styles. GSU only had 34yds in the air, but 360 yards rushing. Samford, who usually has more of a balanced attack, had 291 yds in the air, but only 63 yds rushing. Once again Rushing > Passing when you can only do one well.
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Chattanooga 28 / @ #11 The Citadel 10
THANK YOU CHATTANOOGA!!! They gave us our first conference win of the season last week. This week they put the conference race back in our hands. Now we control our own destiny for at least a share of the SoCon title. But we need The Citadel to lose again to control our own destiny for the autobid.
Just like I was clueless when The Citadel destroyed us, I’m clueless as to how they lost to Chattanooga. The stats were almost identical between the two teams across the board. The big difference I see is that Chattanooga won the turnover battle 2-0. The Citadel also had 2 drives end on downs. Chattanooga’s only major mistake was a missed field goal early in the game.
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UTEP 18 / @ East Carolina 28
Our loss to ECU doesn’t look so bad anymore. Each team traded 3 interceptions a piece in this sloppy game. UTEP threw in a fumble for good measure. I guess their excuse is that it was raining and the ball was wet. In any case, I hope ECU keeps on winning.
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#21 Montana 26 / @ #7 Eastern Washington 32
Wow, what a heartbreaker for Montana. I really thought they were going to win this one. E Washington was up 17-10 at the half. But Montana roared back and was up 26-24 with just 2:19 left in the game. But E Washington recovered their onsides kick and turned that into a touchdown with only 00:53 left on the clock. Montana was able to move the ball to the EWU 29 but just didn’t have enough time left to score.
