App State Falls At Georgia In 2017 Opener

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ATHENS, Ga. – There was no SEC upset scare this time.

A year after taking Tennessee to overtime in a road opener, Appalachian State began the 2017 season with a 31-10 loss at No. 15 Georgia on Saturday night.

Senior quarterback Taylor Lamb completed 18 of his 27 passes for 128 yards and had a late touchdown run contribute to his team-leading 66 rushing yards for the Mountaineers, who trailed 21-0 at halftime with a sellout crowd of 92,746 in attendance for the ESPN game in Sanford Stadium.

"I think Georgia is a really fine football team," App State coach Scott Satterfield said. "They're obviously very talented. They have so many seniors that have played a lot of football in the SEC, and that really showed against us tonight. We made too many mistakes. You can't do that against an average football team and expect it to turn out very well, but especially against a caliber of team like Georgia."

Georgia (1-0) led 31-0 before Appalachian safety Desmond Franklin intercepted a fourth-quarter pass and returned the ball 26 yards to Georgia's 21. Two plays later, Lamb rushed up the middle for a 20-yard touchdown with 5:41 remaining.

An interception by sophomore linebacker Jordan Fehr set up a final possession for redshirt freshman quarterback Zac Thomas, who led the Mountaineers (0-1) into field-goal range before Michael Rubino converted a 43-yard kick in the last minute.

"I was proud of the way our guys finished," Satterfield said. "We talk in our program all the time about how we finish. That's what we're made of, and what we did in the fourth quarter is going to make our football team. We'll build off that and take a positive out of this game."

App State junior running back Jalin Moore added 38 yards on 13 carries and made a career-high four catches for 34 yards.

Two runs and two catches by Moore accounted for App State's first four plays, and Lamb followed that start with a 32-yard option keeper. Eight of his 10 official carries produced 90 rushing yards, but two sacks cut 24 yards off the total.
 
"We were trying to force ourselves with the run because that's what we do, and they were clogging it up," Lamb said. "I had to pull it a couple times to get outside and loosen it up a little bit. I thought we were successful in the passing game when we were in those third-and-shorts or second-and-mediums."

Capitalizing on penalties and miscues by the Mountaineers, Georgia finished with a 368-284 advantage in total yards. Nick Chubb rushed 15 times for 96 yards and two touchdowns, and fellow senior Sony Michel scored once while rushing for 87 yards on 16 carries.

Neither team scored until Chubb reached the end zone on a 1-yard carry in the final minute of the first quarter. A 44-yard rush from Michel early in the second quarter preceded Javon Wims' 34-yard touchdown on a pass from backup quarterback Jake Fromm, who came in following a first-quarter injury to sophomore starter Jacob Eason, and Michel ended Georgia's next drive with a 6-yard touchdown run.

The Bulldogs marched 60 yards on their first drive of the second half before kicking a 23-yard field goal, and Chubb's 8-yard touchdown run late in the third quarter helped Georgia establish a 31-0 advantage. Fromm, a freshman, completed 10 of his 15 passes for 143 yards in relief of Eason, whose only completion in three attempts netted 4 yards.

Some bright spots for the Mountaineers came from the contributions of six true freshmen, including offensive starters Noah Hannon, Thomas Hennigan and Malik Williams.

Hennigan and Williams were two of the three starters for a short-handed receiving corps. Hennigan tied for the team lead with four catches that produced 28 yards, and Williams had one catch for 7 yards..

App State plays its home opener next Saturday, when Savannah State will face the Mountaineers at 3:30 p.m. in Kidd Brewer Stadium. Appalachian's FCS national championship teams from 2005-07 and the historic 2007 upset of Michigan will be recognized at halftime.