App. State knocks off No. 6 A&M

On paper, there was no reason to believe that Appalachian State would have a chance Saturday against No. 6 Texas A&M.

But Mountaineers coach Shawn Clark, who makes 10 times less than the over $9 million Texas A&M coach Jimbo Fisher receives each season at the Southeastern Conference school, made it clear to his 18 ½-point underdog team that the game is not played on paper and mindset would mean everything.

“The key was belief,” an exhausted Clark said. “You have to believe in yourself and believe in this program. I told them take the logo off of the helmet, take the logo off the field and let’s go play football.”

And play football they did, with Chase Brice throwing for 134 yards and a touchdown and a stingy defense taking advantage of two turnovers to stun the Aggies 17-14.

“It didn’t feel real at first,” Brice said. “I’ll be honest, I was just in shock. I just couldn’t believe the way we fought and finished. It was just great.”

Appalachian State won a week after scoring six touchdowns and 40 points in the fourth quarter in a 63-61 opening loss to North Carolina.

“It means something to me to beat the No. 6-ranked program,” Clark said. “It’s two different programs. We don’t recruit at the same level. We don’t have what they have, but we have a lot of heart and we have the right kind of players in our program.”

Sanders helps Arkansas past South Carolina: Darren McFadden and Felix Jones make for some serious company. Rocket Sanders can now say he’s there with those all-time Arkansas running backs.

The Razorbacks’ sophomore running back ran for a career-high 156 yards and two touchdowns in helping the No. 16 Razorbacks beat South Carolina 44-30 on Saturday.

Sanders joined McFadden, twice a Heisman Trophy finalist, and Jones, the player with the sixth-most yards rushing in school history, as the only three Arkansas players to run for 150 yards and two scores against the Gamecocks.

Utah throttles Southern Utah: After dropping a heartbreaker to Florida in the season opener, Cameron Rising said Utah didn’t want to leave anything to chance against Southern Utah.

“The game plan was just to come out and dominate,” Rising said.

Dominate they did as Rising threw for 254 yards in the first half, Dalton Kincaid had 107 yards receiving and two touchdowns and No. 13 Utah routed Southern Utah 73-7 on Saturday.

Leary, NC State beat Charleston Southern: Devin Leary kept finding the end zone for No. 18 North Carolina State, sometimes with a tough-nosed edge that had him unbothered by would-be tacklers.

“If I’ve got to get a little gritty, I’m willing to do it,” the quarterback said.

Leary’s play was one of several positive signs for the Wolfpack in Saturday’s 55-3 win against Charleston Southern in the team’s first chance to move past the shaky finish from its opener at East Carolina.

Leary tied a program record by accounting for six touchdowns, with four coming through the air.

OSU rolls: C.J. Stroud threw three touchdown passes to Marvin Harrison Jr., TreVeyon Henderson ran for another two scores, and No. 3 Ohio State raced past Arkansas State 45-12. Harrison had a career-best seven catches for 184 yards. Coupled with his three-touchdown performance as a first-year player in the Rose Bowl last season, Harrison became only the second Ohio State receiver to have a pair of three-touchdown games in his career.

Georgia shuts out Samford: Stetson

Bennett passed for 300 yards while throwing and running for touchdowns and No. 2 Georgia’s rebuilt defense delivered another dominant performance in the Bulldogs’ 33-0 win over Samford on Saturday.

One week after giving up only a field goal in a 49-3 season-opening rout of then-No. 11 Oregon, Georgia’s defense again played up to the standard it set while winning last season’s national championship. Samford (1-1) was held to 128 yards and three first downs.

Washington State upsets Wisconsin: Nakia Watson scored two touchdowns against his former team as Washington State beat No. 19 Wisconsin 17-14 on Saturday. Watson scored on a 2-yard run in the second quarter and put the Cougars (2-0) ahead for good by turning a short completion into a 31-yard score with 5:12 left in the third quarter. Watson rushed for 522 yards and five touchdowns at Wisconsin from 2019-20 before transferring.

Hartman leads Wake Forest: Sam Hartman passed for 300 yards and four touchdowns, and No. 23 Wake Forest beat Vanderbilt 45-25.