Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (2024)

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Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (1)

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Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (2)

James Madison

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  • Roster

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Team Statistics

Team Statistics
Game Stats TRO APP
Total Yards 348 456
Pass Yards 302 301
Rushing Yards 46 155
Penalty Yards 2-15 6-51
1st Downs 25 24
3rd Downs 6-11 7-15
4th Downs 1-2 3-4
TOP 27:52 32:08
Scoring Summary
Scoring Play Visiting Team Score Home Team Score
1st Quarter

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (3)

13:48 - APP - Wells,Christian 17 yd pass from Davis,Dashaun (Hughes,Michael kick) 3 plays, 38 yards, TOP 01:05

0 7

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (4)

06:49 - TRO - Billingsley,DK 19 yd run (Buce,Brooks kick), 13 plays, 75 yards, TOP 06:59

7 7
2nd Quarter

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (5)

08:43 - TRO - Watson,Gunnar 1 yd run (Buce,Brooks kick), 8 plays, 81 yards, TOP 03:51

14 7

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (6)

01:22 - APP - Castle,Anderson 18 yd pass from Brice,Chase (Hughes,Michael kick) 14 plays, 75 yards, TOP 07:21

14 14

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (7)

00:00 - TRO - Watson,Gunnar 1 yd run (Buce,Brooks kick), 12 plays, 75 yards, TOP 01:22

21 14
3rd Quarter

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (8)

11:35 - APP - Harrington,Daetrich 19 yd run (Hughes,Michael kick), 9 plays, 75 yards, TOP 03:25

21 21

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (9)

00:29 - APP - Hughes,Michael 23 yd field goal 10 plays, 74 yards, TOP 04:37

21 24
4th Quarter

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (10)

10:10 - TRO - Vidal,Kimani 1 yd run (Buce,Brooks kick), 12 plays, 64 yards, TOP 05:14

28 24

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (11)

00:20 - APP - 0 yd safety

28 26

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (12)

00:00 - APP - Horn,Christan 53 yd pass from Brice,Chase ( ) 4 plays, 53 yards, TOP 00:15

28 32

Total Yards

TRO

348

APP

456

Turnovers

TRO

1

APP

First Downs

TRO

25

APP

24

Game Leaders

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (13)

#7 Brice,Chase

  • CMP
    22
  • TD
    2
  • YDS
    284
  • INT
    0

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (14)

#17 Davis,Dashaun

  • CMP
    1
  • TD
    1
  • YDS
    17
  • INT
    0

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (15)

#6 Peoples,Camerun

  • Avg
    4.6
  • TD
    0
  • YDS
    78
  • GAIN
    83

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (16)

#4 Harrington,Daetrich

  • Avg
    8.3
  • TD
    1
  • YDS
    58
  • GAIN
    58

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (17)

#3 Marshall,Ahmani

  • Avg
    3.2
  • TD
    0
  • YDS
    16
  • GAIN
    16

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (18)

#13 Horn,Christan

  • No
    5
  • TD
    1
  • YDS
    98
  • Long
    53

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (19)

#2 Robinson,Kaedin

  • No
    4
  • TD
    0
  • YDS
    68
  • Long
    42

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (20)

#88 Pearson,Henry

  • No
    2
  • TD
    0
  • YDS
    40
  • Long
    29

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (21)

#4 Ross,Nick

  • Tackles
    12
  • TFL
    0.0
  • Sacks
    0.0
  • YDS
    0

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (22)

#15 Parker,Andrew

  • Tackles
    10
  • TFL
    0.0
  • Sacks
    0.0
  • YDS
    0

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (23)

#6 Jones Jr.,Steven

  • Tackles
    6
  • TFL
    0.0
  • Sacks
    0.0
  • YDS
    0

Receiving Yards

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (24)

#13

Horn,Christan

Horn,Christan

98

Robinson,Kaedin

68

Pearson,Henry

40

Wells,Christian

25

Passing Yards

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (25)

#7

Brice,Chase

Brice,Chase

284

Davis,Dashaun

17

Rushing Yards

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (26)

#6

Peoples,Camerun

Peoples,Camerun

78

Harrington,Daetrich

58

Marshall,Ahmani

16

Brice,Chase

3

Tackles

Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (27)

#4

Ross,Nick

Ross,Nick

12

Parker,Andrew

10

Jones Jr.,Steven

6

Hampton,Nick

6

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By BretStrelow | App State Athletics

BOONE, N.C. —

An unforgettable Saturdayat App State began with ESPN College GameDay's first visit to Boone. It thendelivered a second unbelievable, historic ending at The Rock.

Call it the Miracle on the Mountain: Part 2.

Chase Brice's 53-yard, Hail Marytouchdown pass to Christan Horn —with help from 6-foot-4 teammate Dalton Stroman's crowded tip at the 5-yard line and Kaedin Robinson's sealing block after Horn made a circling catch of the tip at the 8 —gave App State a thrilling 32-28 win against Troy in their Sun Belt Conference opener.

Thrilling. Historic. Unbelievable. Unforgettable.

What other adjectives are fit to describe all that transpired during the last 24 hours in the High Country?

"Wow. I'm thankful for a win and proud of our players for playing 60 minutes," App State head coach Shawn Clark said. "That's what our program is built upon —never giving up. I think God's a Mountaineer today."

Twenty years after winning the original "Miracle on the Mountain" game by returning an intercepted two-point conversion pass for a go-ahead two points with seven seconds left in a 16-15 home win against Furman, App State (2-1) pulled off a shocker with no time remaining on the clock and, by the end of the celebration, no shortage of stunned reactions from players, coaches and fans who had congregated on the stormed field.

Just like country music star Luke Combs and beloved GameDay personality Lee Corsohadpredicted seven hours earlier,with Corso wearing Yosef headgear to close GameDay's appearance in a packed Sanford Mall atthe center of campus,App State did indeed beat Troy.

No one expected it to happen like that.

"It was a surreal moment," Horn said. "I'm still in awe, honestly."

"I threw it, and I'm looking. I'm praying," Brice said. "I see the tip, and Christan, I see him come across, catches it in his breadbasket and I'm like, 'Nobody's there. Nobody's there.' I didn't know what was going to happen, and nobody knows what's going to happen.

"It's like jumping in the (duck) pond with our students. They don't know what to do, so I was in that position. I didn't know what to do, so I started running, hands going up. I run in the (Rock) Garden area, I'm high-fiving people, and I'm noticing people jumping out of the stands. I'm actually helping people down, and I'm like, 'Here's a hand. Here's a hand.' "

Brice's incompletion on a fourth-and-goal pass from the 2 gave Troy (1-2) possession with 1:13 left and a 28-24 lead. After three plays — and two final timeouts used by App State — the Trojans took a fourth-down safety on purpose instead of punting from the end zone, leaving App State with just 20 seconds to field a free kick and score. Troy executed a squibbed kickoff that Ahmani Marshall fielded at the 34 and returned 13 yards.

Three straight incompletions from the App State 47 set up one final heave with two seconds remaining, and it took three receivers to create one successful, viral connection between Brice and Horn.

The actual name of the play? "Big Ben" — similar to a 63-yard Hail Mary that Florida used to beat Tennessee in 2017, when current App State offensive coordinator Kevin Barbay was the Gators' director of player development.

A crowd of 34,406 fans witnessed more history, although some of those had to return to the stadium after leaving with App State's chances of a victory looking bleak. Immediate fireworks above the north end zone facility signaled to many that something amazing had just unfolded nearby.

It was the fourth-largest crowd in Kidd Brewer Stadium history and the biggest crowd for a non-ACC opponent.

"To have College GameDay here in an atmosphere like this, it was super cool to see that (Friday) night into today, just the fans going crazy," Brice said. "I saw some phenomenal signs out there. I think we left a lasting impression on the College GameDay crew. They were pumped for it, and we were excited for it. A lot of people want to talk about the distraction of it. I think it wasn't really a distraction and didn't really get us off course. I want to give credit to Troy.

"I thought both teams played really hard. I think it's special for Boone to have College GameDay here, and ultimately none of that was too much of a distraction for our team in the long run."

Brice threw for 278 yards with two touchdowns, Camerun Peoples gained 84 yards on 17 carries and Daetrich Harrington added 58 more yards on the ground while scoring a 19-yard touchdown. Horn led App State with 98 receiving yards, and Robinson's 68-yard day included a 42-yard gain.

Nick Ross recorded a career-high 12 tackles and Andrew Parker contributed 10 for a defense that forced one turnover and totaled three sacks.

An already fired-up crowd had more reasons to cheer when Dexter Lawson Jr. intercepted a pass on the first play from scrimmage, giving App State possession at the Troy 38.

Brice's 11-yard pass to Miller Gibbs and Peoples' 10-yard run set up a trick-play touchdown, as Dashaun Davis took a handoff from Brice and threw a high-arching, 17-yard touchdown pass to fellow receiver Christian Wells.

Troy responded with a 13-play, 75-yard touchdown drive in which it went 3-for-3 on third-down conversions and scored on DK Billingsley's 19-yard touchdown run.

App State recorded three first-quarter sacks, with solo efforts from Tyler Bird and KeSean Brown being followed by a combo deal from Nick Hampton and Hansky Paillant, but quarterback Gunnar Watson had two 1-yard sneaks for touchdowns in the second quarter.

Brice's 18-yard touchdown pass to running back Anderson Castle tied the game late in the second quarter but Troy drove 75 yards in 82 seconds and scored on the final play of the half. Keeping its offense on the field from the 1 with three seconds left, and after a long wait with no signal on the sneak, Watson was credited with a tiebreaking score.

Receiving the second-half kickoff, App State tied the game with a nine-play, 75-yard touchdown that included a clutch third-down grab by Horn and a 19-yard touchdown run by Harrington.

App State's defense made a key stand inside the red zone, benefiting from a missed 32-yard field goal, then went 74 yards in the other direction before taking a 24-21 lead on Michael Hughes' 23-yard field goal.

The Trojans moved back ahead with a 12-play, 64-yard touchdown drive that ended with 10:10 left, and App State's offense ate up almost nine minutes with a 17-play, 73-yard march. That drive included a fourth-and-3 pass to Gibbs for 7 yards to the Troy 27 and a fourth-and-3 pass to Marshall for 4 yards to the Troy 5, but a third fourth-down attempt from the 2-yard line to Eli Wilson at the back of the end zone wasn't successful.

Two run stops, each followed by an App State timeout, preceded a third-down run that allowed Troy to run the clock down. The intentional safety covered five seconds, and Marshall's return of the free kick consumed five more.

Three straight incompletionstriggered another fourth-down passing opportunity for Brice, and that one will go down in history.

"If you watch the tape, it's to a T how it's supposed to be done," Clark said. "He goes up and touches it, and you have Horn come in and get it. The most impressive thing on the whole deal is Kaedin Robinson blocking for him, just like we practiced it.

"Practice execution is game day reality, and our kids took that to heart."

It's a day that will be remembered for many things.

Mousetraps. Meatballs.

And yet another Miracle on the Mountain.

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Mountaineers Follow GameDay Debut With Stunning, Last-Second Win - App State Athletics (2024)

FAQs

Did Coastal Carolina lose to App State in the SBC elimination game? ›

7 seed Coastal Carolina Chanticleers were defeated 6-3 by the No. 6 seed Appalachian State Mountaineers in an elimination game of the 2024 Guardian Credit Union Sun Belt Conference Baseball Championship presented by Troy University in Montgomery, Ala., on Thursday morning.

What division is App State Football? ›

Appalachian State fields varsity teams in 17 sports, 7 for men and 10 for women. The football team competes in the Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), formerly I-A, as a result of the transition to the Sun Belt.

Has Coastal Carolina ever won a bowl game? ›

The victory was Coastal's second bowl victory in program history and first since a 47-41 win over Northern Illinois in the Tailgreeter Cure Bowl in 2021.

Will Coastal Carolina go to a bowl game? ›

CONWAY, S.C. – Coastal Carolina football will makes its fourth consecutive bowl appearance when the Chanticleers face off against the San Jose State Spartans in the EasyPost Hawai'i Bowl at 10:30 p.m. ET on Saturday, Dec. 23, from the Clarence T.C. Ching Athletics Complex in Honolulu, Hawai'i.

Who is App State's biggest rival? ›

The Appalachian State–Georgia Southern football rivalry, also known as Deeper Than Hate, is a college rivalry between the Mountaineers of Appalachian State University in Boone, North Carolina, and the Eagles of Georgia Southern University in Statesboro, Georgia.

Is App State a big party school? ›

Appalachian State University

#10 Top Party Schools in North Carolina.

Has App State ever been ranked? ›

The Associated Press has ranked the App State football team in the AP Top 25 Poll for the second time in school history. Fresh off their 17-7 win over Louisiana-Lafayette Oct. 9, the Mountaineers (5-0, 2-0 Sun Belt) earned 148 votes, good for No. 24 in the poll.

Is Coastal Carolina in the NCAA Tournament? ›

Gary Gilmore's run as Coastal Carolina's baseball coach is not done yet. The Chanticleers (34-23) were selected Monday as an at-large team in the 2024 NCAA Tournament.

Who is Coastal Carolina rivals? ›

Their fiercest in-state rivals are Charleston Southern, College of Charleston, and Winthrop. Coastal has rivalries with every Sun Belt school in the East Division (Appalachian State, Georgia State, Georgia Southern, South Alabama, and Troy). Coastal's main Sun Belt rivals are Appalachian State and Georgia Southern.

Who is South Carolina football rival? ›

South Carolina Gamecocks Football
RivalriesClemson (rivalry) Georgia (rivalry) North Carolina (rivalry) Tennessee (rivalry)
Heisman winnersGeorge Rogers – 1980
Consensus All-Americans4
ColorsGarnet and black
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