ASU can take over SBC race
JONESBORO — Fredi Knighten didn’t hesitate late Saturday night when asked to look ahead a few days.
“It’s safe to say that this will probably be the biggest game of my career,” Knighten said not long after helping his team hold on to beat Georgia State 48-34 last Saturday night.
Knighten has started 18 games at ASU. He and a handful of others have played in two bowl games and have started games at Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, Knoxville, Tenn., and Miami. Yet ASU’s senior quarterback from Little Rock points to the Thursday night game in Boone, N.C., as a measuring stick for his career and ASU’s season. It’s hard to argue. ASU (5-3, 4-0) will play Appalachian State (7-1, 4-0) at 6:30 p.m. Central Thursday with sole possession of first place in the Sun Belt Conference on the line. Not since ASU beat Middle Tennessee 45-0 on Dec. 1, 2012 — Gus Malzahn’s last game as the Red Wolves coach — has it held sole possession of first place. According to the league office, Thursday night will be the first time since North Texas beat New Mexico State 38-27 on Nov. 16, 2002, that two teams with 4-0 conference records have met.
If ASU wins, all that would be left on its schedule are three games against teams with losing records as it tries to wrap up its third outright Sun Belt title in five seasons.
“They can’t help but think that way,” Anderson said Monday. “I want them to welcome the environment. This is what you play the game for. I’d much rather be going into this game with two undefeated teams and something to play for than just the fact that we’re on TV.”
At the same time, Anderson understands the pitfalls attached to such a thinking.
“Keep it within reason and with what you can control,” he said. “You don’t want to be so hyped that you lose sight of the little things, the details.”
Appalachian State will present ASU with plenty of challenges.
The Mountaineers beat Troy 44-41 in triple overtime Saturday, their 10th consecutive Sun Belt victory, and they are 10-2 against league teams since joining the conference last season. They lead the Sun Belt in scoring offense (38.8 points per game), scoring defense (15.6), total offense (474.0 yards per game), total defense (298.6), rush defense (122.8), pass efficiency (168.6) and with a plus-8 turnover margin.
Junior running back Marcus Cox, who gashed ASU for 229 yards last year in Jonesboro, is third in the Sun Belt with an average of 115.1 rushing yards per game and sophomore quarterback Taylor Lamb is seventh nationally in passing efficiency (168.4).
What stands out to Anderson is that it’s largely the same group of Mountaineers who scored 31 consecutive points to upset ASU in Jonesboro last season.
Seventeen players who helped beat ASU last season
are listed as starters.
“They’re a better football team than they were last year,” he said.
“You can see it on film. It shows dramatically in special teams. I think they’re much improved there. They’re not turning the ball over. That has as much to do with experience as well.”
Appalachian State Coach Scott Satterfield called the matchup with ASU a “championship-type game.”
The Sun Belt does not hold a football championship game, and with 11 conference members it isn’t feasible for its members to play a full round-robin conference schedule. So Thursday night is as close as the Sun Belt will get to an winner-take-all game this season.
“The neat thing is that these are the two undefeated teams in the league and we’re both playing each other,” Satterfield said.
Anderson, whose team will finish the season with games at Louisiana-Monroe and New Mexico State and at home against Texas State, said his team is right on track, having won its first four conference games for the first time in four seasons.
“This is where we wanted to be, but it’s not the end of the season if you lose it and the season is not over if you win it,” he said. “You still have work to do.”