ASU grabs road

win after eight

lead changes

By Steve Behr 

STATESBORO, Ga. — Just when No. 2 Appalachian State had the upper hand Saturday on No. 25 Georgia Southern, things would suddenly change.

Just when Georgia Southern had the upper hand on Appalachian State, things would suddenly change all over again.

In fact Appalachian State’s thrilling 37-36 victory over the Eagles had no less than eight lead changes. Even when the lead didn’t change hands, the finish kept the 20,851 fans at Paulson Stadium on their feet as players from both teams kept making big play after big play.

“It’s in the top 10, I’ll tell you that,” Mountaineers coach Jerry Moore said about how that game stacked up compared to others in his 20-year career at Appalachian State. “It was a great football game. I’m hoping that is the game that we needed to put it all together when we had to. We were close to doing that at James Madison.”

Appalachian State (5-2, 3-0 SoCon) won for the second straight time at Paulson Stadium and became just the second team to win three games at Paulson, joining SoCon rival Wofford.

It also avenged a 38-35 loss the Eagles handed the Mountaineers last year, which snapped Appalachian State’s 30-game home winning streak and cost the Mountaineers an outright SoCon championship.

“We knew we were going to be in a dogfight,” Mountaineers quarterback Armanti Edwards said. “We couldn’t let them beat us two years in a row.”

Georgia Southern (3-4, 1-3) saw its playoff hopes sink into jeopardy. The Eagles, who have lost three SoCon games by a combined four points to teams currently ranked no lower than fourth in The Sports Network Poll, must in all likelihood win their final four games to have a chance at reaching the post season.

“Somehow we’ve got to find a way to win these close ones,” Eagles coach Chris Hatcher said. “It’s just a play here or there that comes back to get us. Sooner or later our luck has to change.”

It nearly changed during a wild finish that will go down as one of the most bizarre in this series, which Appalachian State leads 12-11-1. The Mountaineers, who trailed at halftime 20-17, got a 1-yard diving touchdown run from Edwards to take a 37-34 lead with 2:36 left in the game.

An extra point would force the Eagles to score a touchdown to win the game instead of kicking a field goal to force overtime.

Game over right?
Well, not exactly.

ASU’s reliable kicker, Jason Vitaris, missed the extra point, hitting the right crossbar leaving the Mountaineers up by three.

Georgia Southern roared back into field goal range with a 67-yard completion to Tim Camp, but quarterback Antonio Henton’s pass to the end zone and a third-and-eight from the 13 was intercepted by Travis Dowda at the goal line with 1:33 left.

Game over right?
Well, not exactly.

With the ball spotted two inches from the goal line, Appalachian State quarterback Armanti Edwards was dumped for a safety by the Eagles’ Larry Beard. That pulled Georgia Southern to within 37-36 with 1:27 left.

To complicate things even more, the Eagles took Appalachian State’s free kick and eventually moved to the ASU 27-yard line, well within field goal range. The Eagles had a timeout and had plenty of time to attempt the game-winning kick.

Game over, right?
Well, not exactly.
After Henton was called for intentional grounding, Appalachian State safety Mark LeGree intercepted Henton’s fourth-and-22 pass in the back of the end zone.

Game over right?
Exactly.

“Every SoCon game is huge,” LeGree said. “It’s a rivalry game.”
Edwards led an Appalachian State offense that rolled up 454 yards and held the ball for 10 minutes, 54 seconds of the fourth quarter. The junior quarterback finished with 157 yards rushing on 33 carries and scored touchdown runs of 5, 1 and 1 yards.

Devin Radford added 76 yards on 18 carries.

Edwards also completed 12-of-22 passes for 176 yards and two touchdowns. His 11-yard touchdown pass to

B.J. Frazier capped a game-opening 80-yard, nine-play drive.

Edwards also found Brian Quick for a 14-yard fade-route touchdown pass that capped a 10-play, 66-yard drive.

Though the two touchdown passes were obviously important, so was a simple, at least on the state sheet, completion to CoCo Hillary.

Except that his completion came on a fourth-and-five late in the game and went for a 15-yard first down.

Edwards was chased out of the pocket, but lofted a pass to Hillary just before being chased out of bounds.

“The throw to CoCo on the sideline was just unbelievable,” Moore said. “That’s one of the times in my coaching career I had the best seat in the house. The throw and the catch were almost in front of me. It was a fourth-down play and it looked like it had no chance.”

Edwards has 5,469 passing and 3,286 career rushing, giving him 8,755 for his career. He moved passed East Tennessee State’s Todd Wells for second place on the SoCon’s career list and trails only former Appalachian State standout Richie Williams, who finished with 9,370 yards from 2002-05.

Henton didn’t have a bad day himself. The Ohio State transfer completed 16-of-38 passes for 292 yards, but had two fourth-quarter interceptions.

He also ran for 99 yards on 25 carries. Adam Urbano was next on the Eagles’ rushing list with 28 yards on five carries.

“We ran the ball pretty well,” Hatcher said. “Henton’s the guy we go to running the football and we threw the ball extremely well. We moved the ball extremely well the entire game.”

Georgia Southern also got a big boost from Raja Andrews, the Eagles’ fast receiver. Andrews returned a punt 84 yards for a touchdown to give the Eagles a 10-7 lead in the first quarter, and caught six passes for 97 yards, one that went for 55 yards in the third quarter that set up a Henton 1-yard touchdown run that gave the

Eagles a 27-24 lead with 3.1 seconds left in the third.

It seemed to start a series that had both teams landing haymakers in the fourth quarter. The Mountaineers retaliated with a 60-yard drive capped by a 1-yard run by Edwards, but the Eagles, helped by a personal foul and an unsportsmanlike penalty following the same play, struck back with an 18-yard Henton touchdown pass to Michael McIntosh, putting the Eagles up 34-31 with 9:41 left.

Appalachian State converted two third downs and Hillary’s fourth-down conversion before Edwards scored the game-winner, on fourth down.

“It was important for us today to come back and win that game like we did,” Moore said. “We’re certainly not there. We’re young and green and we make mistakes and we certainly have not arrived, but we’re certainly going in the right direction.”

Appalachian State 37, Georgia Southern 36
Appalachian State 7 7 10 13 — 37
Georgia Southern 10 10 7 9 — 36
Scoring summary
First quarter
ASU—Frazier 11 pass from Edwards (Vitaris kick)
GSU—Mora FG 24
Second quarter
GSU—Andrews 84 punt return (Mora kick)
ASU—Edwards 5 run (Vitaris kick)
GSU—Henton 4 run (Mora kick)
Third quarter
ASU—Quick 14 pass from Edwards (Vitaris kick)
ASU—Vitaris FG 22
GSU—Henton 1 run (Mora kick)
Fourth quarter
ASU—Edwards 1 run (Vitaris kick)
GSU—McIntosh 15 pass from Henton (Mora kick)
ASU—Edwards 1 run (Kick failed)
GSU—Safety, Edwards tackled in end zone

ASU GSU
First downs 28 22
Rushes-yards 60-278 33-134
Passing yards 176 292
Passes 12-23-0 16-40-2
Total plays-yards 83-454 73-426
Punts-avg. 4-39.2 3-35.3
Penalties-yards 8-64 6-60
Fumbles-lost 1-0 1-0
Individuals:
Rushing: ASU—Edwards 33-157, Radford 18-76, Jackson 6-34, Courman 2-17; GSU—Henton 25-99, Urbano 5-28, Rozier 3-7.
Passing: ASU—Edwards 12-22-0 176, Hillary 0-1-0 0; GSU—Henton 16-38 2 292, Barney 0-1-0 0, Hall 0-1-0 0.
Receiving: ASU—Johnson 4-49, Hillary 3-63, Jorden 1-20, Quick 1-14, Washington 1-12, Frazier 1-11, Radford 1-7; GSU—Andrews 6-97, Camp 3-99, Russ 3-24, McIntosh 2-55, Watts 1-12, Hall 1-5.