For App State, the 23 points are the most honest answer to the questions the preview raised about the offense. The full player box wasn't available, so it's not possible to say from here how Malachi Singleton's ankle or the center spot with Jayden Thomas held up. The line score does show this wasn't another 3-point afternoon. It also wasn't the 34-31 version that beat James Madison. The Mountaineers scored 7 in each of the first 2 quarters, 3 in the 3rd and 6 in the 4th, which is an offense moving the ball some and finishing drives rarely.
The defense that was supposed to make this easy for App State was the side that won it. Georgia State came in having allowed 49 at James Madison, 38 at Arkansas State and 31 to Coastal Carolina. In Boone it gave up 23, its lowest total since the 42-10 win over Old Dominion, and it never let the Mountaineers make a real run. The board had moved toward App State all week, and that move turned out to be wrong.
App State did get a chance in the 3rd quarter. Its defense shut Georgia State out for the whole 3rd, a field goal made it 26-17, and on a 44-degree, windy Boone afternoon one more stop could have made the 4th quarter a fight. It didn't get that stop. Georgia State scored 13 in the 4th, the same late scoring it showed against Coastal, and this time it was protecting a lead.
The win gets Georgia State to 5-4 and 2-3 in the Sun Belt, which brings bowl eligibility back into view after a stretch that looked like it was ending the season early. App State is also 5-4 and 2-3 in conference, has lost 2 straight, and has now lost at home to a team that hadn't won since early October.
The preview's final line said that if App State scored 3 again, the problems were bigger than 1 ankle. It scored 23, and the problem turned out to be the defense. A unit that held Old Dominion to 10 and Georgia Southern to 19 gave up 26 in a half at home. App State's offense played better than it did in its last game and still lost by 16.
