FCS Roundtable: Week 1 Surprises & Montana-Appalachian State

Teams from the Championship Subdivision combined for upsets over their FBS counterparts with games involving McNeese State, Eastern Washington, UT-Martin and Youngstown State capped it off with a dominating win over Pitt. William & Mary, Northern Iowa, Liberty and Indiana State also put scares into BCS conference opponents. But were these clashes the most surprising story lines of Week 1?

And heading into Week 2 is a marquee match-up for the subdivision. Montana and Appalachian State can both make compelling claims to be the most consistent FCS program in the last decade: Montana won a national championship, reached the title game five times since 2000 and won at least a share of the Big Sky every season but one. Appalachian State rolled off three national titles and is a fixture in the postseason.

The debate moves onto the field, where at Kidd-Brewer Stadium the two collide for the first time since their epic 2009 semifinal meeting.

Ben Moore, PantherTalk.com

My suprise was Youngstown State registering a resounding win at Pittsburgh 31-17. The Penguins wefe not even a Top 10 rated team in the FCS polls and thumped a Big East team in a game that was basically over with 12 minutes to go in the 4th quarter. Huge credit to Eric Wolford and his coaching staff.

I really like App State at home. I thought they played well in the first half vs. East Carolina but committed far too many penalties to give themselves a shot. If they can get more balanced against the Grizzlies, I think they have a great shot at the win.

I believe that the subdivision will be forced to encourage more competitive non-conference games because the major FBS conference teams will be adding one additional conference game which shrinks the opportunity for the pay games. I believe it makes the top teams stronger and they should play each other prior to the FCS Playoffs.

Kyle McGough, Yosef’s Cabin

There were several surprises this week in the FCS. Things started out with McNeese State beating Middle Tennessee State on Thursday night, which was unexpected. Sure, Middle Tennessee is no powerhouse, but they are an FBS school with 22 more scholarships than McNeese. Whether this victory was a testament to a solid Cowboy team or a weak Blue Raider team remains to be seen. Along those same lines, William & Mary gave Maryland a real fight. William & Mary beat Virginia a few years ago and they were close to beating another ACC team this year. There were two other surprises in the FCS, but they were Montana and Appalachian State, so we’ll get to those now while discussing the big matchup this week.

As for this coming week, all of the eyes in the country are going to be on the big out of conference matchup when Montana travels to play Appalachian State at 6:30 pm. Both of these teams are looking good.

Montana
I’d really like to take this opportunity to go back to last weeks roundup and change my opinion on whether Montana will make the playoffs. After seeing Dan Moore run wherever, whenever he wants to as well as seeing freshman QB McKinney look pretty comfortable while throwing for 214 yds and 2 TD’s and 1 INT, this team is going to be a force this year. More importantly, if McKinney continues to develop and improve, the Montana offseason QB issues could be a blessing in disguise as McKinney has the chance to be a 4 year starter and really blossom into a great leader with the Grizzlies. If you have to pick a hole in Montana’s defense, it has to be the secondary. Don’t confuse that with Montana’s defense being weak, they seemed to be quite stingy in week 1, but their secondary did give up 172 yards and 2 TD’s. 80 yards and a TD of that however came on one play, so the defense as a whole is tough.

Appalachian State
There were big question marks surrounding both the offensive and defensive lines at Appalachian State as well as the overall ‘age’ of the Mountaineers this season. There are only 7 seniors on the roster which makes for a very young team from top to bottom. The Mountaineers lost to the Pirates 35-17, however 21 of those points came against special teams as well as a fumble recovery for a TD. Both lines were impressive as the defense did not allow much for ECU until the 4th quarter and the offensive line protected Jamal Jackson very well and opened up lots of room for Appalachian’s running backs. As with Montana, the secondary with the Mountaineers appeared to be suspect as ECU’s new QB Rio Johnson missed a couple of wide open passes. There is a lot of youth in that backfield and they will need time to develop chemistry and get comfortable in their positions. The biggest question mark will be the running back situation with Appalachian State with Chisholm out for a month with an injured hand. Stephen Miller will certainly be in the mix but there’s questions as to who else Coach Moore may use against Montana.

Gametime
This game is going to be a great one. Appalachian has a sense of revenge on their mind with their 2009 semi-final playoff loss to Montana still cutting deep. The home and home series they have signed up for is a fantastic way to build the FCS brand. People enjoy seeing the big titans clash and more of these games will only help the FCS. The FCS needs to work with the major networks to get these games consistently aired on a national platform.

With that said, look for Appalachian and Montana to come out swinging. I see a tightly contested game going late into the 4th quarter before a winner is decided. It may be a homer pick, but I do believe Appalachian will come out on top in this one. With it being a home contest and coming off such an impressive performance against ECU, I don’t believe the Apps will stumble. The crowd is going to be rowdy, hostile and big. I expect the attendance record to be broken this weekend.

Appalachian State 38 – Montana 35

Kyle Roth, BisonIllustrated.com & College Sports Journal

I came away really impressed with the play from two Missouri Valley teams in Week One, most notably the Youngstown State Penguins, who should (quite deservedly) find themselves in the top ten across the national polls after being in the 15-25 range in most preseason publications after soundly defeating the ACC’s Pittsburgh Panthers 31-17.

The Penguins not only never trailed throughout the game, but the offensive execution we saw so well last season looks to have not missed a step behind junior quarterback Kurt Hess (13/23 completion, 154 yards and 2 touchdowns) as the team racked up 381 total yards of offense, committed one penalty and had zero turnovers on the road. Seeing that kind of offensive finesse this early in the season and against a BCS-conference opponent is awfully impressive, and I think this sets the table for what should be an incredible four-way tussle for the Valley crown between the Penguins, North Dakota State, Illinois State and Northern Iowa.

Speaking of the Panthers, requisite respect given for the gutsy fourth-quarter rally UNI displayed against the 12th-ranked Wisconsin Badgers of the Big Ten. The Panthers started a redshirt freshman in place of graduated two-year starter Tirrell Rennie, and Sawyer Kollmorgen responded by throwing for 18/34 completion, 265 yards and 3 scores without an interception in one of the FBS’s toughest venues in his first career start. That’s simply incredible, and shows that Northern Iowa should keep pace with their high level of play last season despite losing some major players on both sides of the ball.

On the flipside, and staying in the Valley vein, what on earth happened to Southern Illinois? With the past two season seeing win totals of 5-6 and 4-7 respectively, Head Coach Dale Lennon probably felt the seat getting a little warm, and that was before getting a 49-spot dropped on them by the OVC’s Eastern Illinois. The Salukis coughed up six turnovers and a ridiculous 522 total yards of offense (including 369 yards five passing touchdowns to EIU QB Jimmy Garoppolo) in the lone stinker the MVFC allowed in the opening week (not counting FBS games). Unless the tides can turn quickly in Carbondale, we might not see Lennon or his mustache in town at the season’s conclusion. Interestingly enough, too, if the Salukis are able to right the ship and contend for a playoff, Eastern Illinois would be playing Valley Spoiler for the second year in a row after beating Illinois State last year, ultimately costing them the Valley’s third playoff bid.

I’m probably the outlier when I think that Appalachian State-Montana isn’t going to be the heavyweight slugfest most folks are expecting, simply because I’m not that high on Montana after the shenanigans that went down this past season resulting in a total flip of the apple cart in Missoula.The Grizzlies looked impressive beating up on an overmatched South Dakota team this past weekend, but still allowed 24 points to a hapless Coyotes’ squad that the Mountaineers will only be too eager to replicate. Combine that with UM going away from Wa-Griz for the matchup and I think App wins this one handily in front of an insane crowd.

That said, these are the kind of games that need to happen for there to be more interest in the FCS nationally. Last year’s marquee game, NDSU-Georgia Southern, was nixed when the latter party coughed up a $60,000 check to play some Division-II school instead. Granted, that rematch ended in the playoff route that led the Bison to the national title, but it’s still one of those high-caliber matchups that builds steam and attracts the TV cameras. A few more lie in the wake in my part of the country as the Bison take on both Montana and Montana State in the next few seasons, both of which should still find all parties being in the Top 25 (if not much higher) and worthy of some national steam.

Otherwise, keep a close eye on NDSU-Colorado State this weekend if you’re looking for FCS Upset Special #5.

Rob Abbott, JMU Sports Blog

I’ve come to expect at least a few FCS over FBS upsets, so none of those really jumped out at me. And with many FCS contenders choosing to play cupcakes, there really wasn’t a particular game result that shocked me either. However, I was extremely surprised by how often JMU threw the ball. The joke among JMU fans is that head coach Mickey Matthews likes to “run to set up the run”, but the Dukes put the ball in the air 34 times in the 55-7 win against St. Francis. JMU only attempted more than 18 passes in a game three times last year. And in each of those games the Dukes were throwing in an attempt to mount a comeback. This is a team that 2 years ago upset a powerful William & Mary squad without completing a single pass. So for the Dukes to open it up a little bit and air it out 32 times, even with the game out of reach for the entire second half, was pretty shocking.

I love, love, love this early season clash between Montana and App State. The Mountaineers deserve a lot of credit for scheduling such a tough Montana team immediately after playing a game at an FBS program. A loss decreases their margin of error for the playoffs that much more before even opening SoCon play. That should crank up the intensity on their end. Games like this are great for FCS and could go help prove to the naysayers that some awesome football is played outside of the FBS. In my opinion, Montana vs App State is the best match-up at any level of college football this weekend. It’s a real long shot, but if the powers that be wanted to generate more hype for the FCS game (and line their pockets with more $$$ in the process), they’d lean on ESPN to do one College Gameday broadcast a year from the site of a marquee FCS match-up.

As a fan of JMU and defender of the CAA, I love the idea of CAA and SoCon teams getting together for regular season match-ups. Fans of both conferences both brag about how strong their respective leagues are so it would be great to see the teams face off in the regular season. I’d also like to see some of the more traditional FCS powers get a chance to do home and homes with some of the top teams in the Ivy League. Since the Ivies don’t participate in the playoffs, it would be fun to see how they stack up against the best of best in the regular season.

Russell Varner, SouthernPigskin.com

Now that Week 1 has come and gone, I can say that it was a slight disappoint to me (cue the booing and tomato throwing). Don’t get me wrong, it was great to have football back. I guess I was just surprised by the lack of close games, at least in the SoCon.

Take out the Samford-Furman game – which was a classic – and you’ll see that the closest game was Chattanooga’s 21 point loss to USF. Margins of victory in all SoCon games were 3, 21, 22, 27, 28, 35, 58 and 62. I know it was the first game of the season and that teams are still a little sloppy, but I was hoping for a few more competitive games. That’s what surprised me most about Week 1.

Anyway, onto the topic at hand – Montana-Appalachian State. This should far and away be the best game of the weekend at any level of college football. Personally, I think College Gameday made a mistake when they chose to go the Florida-Texas A&M over this game. I absolutely believe the FCS should encourage more games like this – they need it to try and build a bigger fan base and establish themselves as something other than the ‘level below the FBS.’ As for what they could do to better promote these games? Well, look at what I send two sentences ago – let’s get College Gameday to come to one of these marquee FCS games. The atmosphere would be definitely be better than what the show had last week for Alabama-Michigan. As stated before, this weekend would have been perfect. The FBS matchups this week are lacking at best. That Florida-Texas A&M is the best game on their slate says a lot. It comes nowhere close to matching that of Montana-App Sate.

On paper, these teams match up very well, which should come as little to no surprise. Both teams have explosive offenses, which should make for a high-scoring affair. The Mountaineers’ offense is led by quarterback Jamal Jackson, a dual-threat quarterback who had 300 yards passing on East Carolina in their loss last week. The Grizzles are coming off a game that saw them total 568 yards and a school-record 34 first downs. 34. Talk about video game numbers. Big news has recently come out of Boone though: star defensive back Doug Middleton is out for the year thanks to an ankle injury he suffered last week. This puts extra pressure on the rest Mountaineer defense, particularly linebacker Jeremy Kimbrough, who will have to play that much better for App to come out on top Saturday. I think they will set up to the challenge though, as the Mountaineer faithful will take App to the next level and come out on top in a classic nail biter.

Shaun Bummer, Griz Nation Blog

Apart from some of the FCS vs. FBS results, most notably Youngstown State and Northern Iowa, the biggest surprise to me in week one was the performance of Southern Utah’s Brad Sorensen who was not able to get much done against the Utah State defense. Sure, it was against an FBS squad, but Sorensen was only completed 12 of 31 passes for 153 yards along with an interception. No matter the opponent, you would expect more from a Payton Award candidate (in fact, Sorensen was my preseason pick to take home the Payton Award in last week’s Saturday Blitz Roundtable… Maybe I need to make a change??).

As a University of Montana student, fan, and blogger, I’m pointing out the obvious in stating I’ve been waiting for the Montana/Appalachian State match up for a long time. This is a marquee game for the FCS and is a powerhouse match up similar in nature to Michigan/Alabama or LSU/Oregon from last season. For the record, I’ll even take off my maroon shaded glasses in looking at the game.

The Grizzlies have won both of their previous games against the Mountaineers in classic fashion, both in the FCS semifinals in 2000 and 2009. The two playoff games were in Washington-Grizzly Stadium and now, the Grizzlies will head to Kidd-Brewer Stadium for the first time in school history.

There is a ton I like on both sides of the ball for Montana and Appalachian State. While the game can go either way, I believe the Mountaineers have the slight edge, especially with home field advantage. Jamal Jackson, who passed for 300 yards last weekend against East Carolina, is a nice quarterback with duel-threat capability for the Mountaineers. Additionally, Appalachian State has a solid group of receivers in Tony Washington, Andrew Peacock, and true freshman Malachi Jones that can put up solid numbers against the Montana secondary.

Montana’s strength on offense will be its run game. The Grizzlies had two 100+ yard rushers in Dan Moore and Peter Nguyen last weekend against South Dakota along with a nice performance from RS freshman Trent McKinney also with a duel-threat capability. Additionally, Montana has a solid linebacking corps led by Jordan Tripp who earned Big Sky Defensive Player of the Week honors last weekend.

Steve Suess, FCS Football Network

I think the Missouri Valley Football Conference surprised everyone in week one. By now, you’ve been living under a rock if you don’t know that Youngstown State beat Pittsburgh on Saturday night, but the MVFC’s accomplishments go way past a single upset from week one.

Take Indiana State running back Shakir Bell, for example. Bell, an early favorite for the Payton Award, rushed for 192 yards on 24 carries against an Indiana team that refused to recruit him because of his size. More notably, Indiana State had a great opportunity to beat the Hoosiers and very well could have if a few more whistles fell in place late in the fourth quarter.

Or how about Northern Iowa and quarterback Sawyer Kollmorgen? The Panthers put the fear of God in Wisconsin this past weekend in what would have been considered the 2012 version of Appalachian State-Michigan, and they did it all with a freshman behind center. Kollmorgen completed 18 of 34 passes for 265 yards against a top-notch BCS defense. If you’re looking for a surprise, there’s your guy.

Fellow ranked teams North Dakota State and Illinois State won big as expected, and even the Valley bottom-dwellers put a pair of Big Twelve teams on upset alert. Although a quick look at the scoreboard wouldn’t tell you so, the South Dakota State – Kansas and Missouri State – Kansas State games went down to the wire until the fourth quarter.

As far as the Montana and Appalachian State contest this weekend is concerned, I am both excited and somewhat annoyed. It’s great to have the Championship Subdivision in the national spotlight and two ranked teams going at it, but to the casual college football fan, this game will have the perception of being a “pre-national championship.” The casual college football fan doesn’t understand that not only are these not the two best teams in the FCS, but these teams are likely the third best teams in their conference. Hopefully the broadcast team can talk about more than what happened in the past and focus in on some of the great FCS programs around right now.

Mid-major basketball is extremely successful because of smart scheduling, and I think opportunities exist for the FCS to schedule smarter and generate some good publicity. Now, obviously scheduling basketball and scheduling football are two completely different animals. The problem is overcoming some early hurdles conceptually and conferences working together to bring publicity to the subdivision.

In the future, I would love to see an annual MVFC-CAA Gridiron Challenge (much like the MVC has in basketball with the Mountain West right now). All Colonial and Valley teams leave one game open every year and they are matched up by the previous season’s record (with some varying differences to ensure teams alternate home and away each season). This would create dream matchups in a part of the season when the FCS is largely looked at as a “practice game” for the big boys.

Think of what we could have seen on the schedule this season. Perhaps it’d be North Dakota State taking on Towson, New Hampshire heading out to the UNI-Dome, Youngstown and Old Dominion in an offensive explosion, or Illinois State and Delaware battling to see which team was the bigger 2011 playoff snub.

Obviously, there are hurdles in place as far as instant implementation. Unlike basketball, football schedules are usually set three, sometimes four years ahead of time, which is why these conferences (and also the Big Sky and SoCon) should consider working together immediately. In the past, FCS schools didn’t want to play tough non-conference competition because it took eight wins to get in the playoffs. With the playoffs expanding yet again in 2013 to include an additional three more at-large bids, there’s no excuse keeping most of these teams from scheduling quality FCS opponents.

Joe Suhoski, VBR Productions

I hate leading off on a negative note but I was a little surprised by Towson’s performance against Kent State Thursday. The result was not as much the surprising part (a 41-21 loss) as it was how they lost. Kent State scored a touchdown on the game’s first drive then recovered a fumble on Towson’s first drive; the Golden Flashes scored another touchdown four plays later. On the subsequent kickoff the Tigers lost another fumble, which KSU turned into a field goal. Towson was plus-eight in turnovers all of last year but were minus-six on Thursday. I’m sure Coach Ambrose will use this game as a “discussion point” for taking care of the ball the rest of the season.

Other surprising highlights include Youngstown State and Eastern Washington earning wins on the road against FBS teams. That the teams won is not overly surprising but how easily they defeated their opponents (YSU 31-17 over Pitt, EWU 20-3 over Idaho) raised some eyebrows. Liberty, William and Mary, Northern Iowa and Indiana State all hanging tough in their road games versus FBS squads deserve recognition as well.

Without having done much research into Montana or ASU I’ll refrain from analyzing the game itself. I’m more intrigued by your question about what the NCAA can do to encourage more games between the powerhouse teams. Two recent developments could indirectly make such marquee matchups happen more frequently – expansion of the playoffs and the addition of a twelfth game. Eight-league-game schedules allow three OOC opponents. Several FCS teams play one FBS game, leaving only two other slots. The better programs would hurt their at-large chances if it lost in one of those two open games against higher-quality teams. Adding that 12th game may alleviate that, along with an increase playoff field where teams wouldn’t be punished for losing to the Montana’s or Appalachian State’s.

As far as promoting it, one specific experiment the NCAA itself could encourage is a showcase game every year, similar to what the NHL does with its annual outdoor hockey game. A couple years in advance, the NCAA could negotiate with two of the better programs to leave an open date in their calendars to play each other. You’d have to get the national media to cover the game (if not ESPN, then maybe NBC Sports). This would help promote awareness of the quality of play in the FCS.

Another idea could be to have inter-conference challenges. For example, on the second or third week of the season, teams of the CAA and SoCon could be pitted against each other (limited by the number of teams in each conference). Conference superiority is a hot topic among message board warriors, and having conferences go head-to-head on the same weekend would grow rivalries from within, which may eventually catch the attention of more casual fans. As a CAA hoops fan I’m somewhat familiar with members of the Missouri Valley Conference, so I wouldn’t mind CAA football take on teams like NDSU and Youngstown State.