Despite having only about half of the total yards as their counterparts, the Charlotte 49ers were able to rely on a strong defensive effort to hold on for a 17-7 win over Southern Miss Saturday afternoon at Richardson Stadium.

With the win, Charlotte sits at 4-4 on the season and 3-2 in Conference USA play. "I like where we are. Our guys have bought into what we're talking about," Coach Brad Lambert stated after the game.

While the offense struggled to move the ball most of the day against the top-CUSA Golden Eagle defensive squad, the Charlotte defense stepped up to the challenge and help Southern Miss out of the end zone for most of the day. When the Golden Eagles did find some offensive rhythm, the 49ers defense worked together to shut them down, forcing three turnovers in the first half as well as a missed field goal.

Senior linebacker Juwan Foggie leads the NCAA with six interceptions

Juwan Foggie had a pick-six to end the first quarter and give the 49ers a fourteen-point lead. Foggie added another INT in the second quarter, giving him an FBS-leading six on the season. It was also Foggie's second interception return for a touchdown this season. "Coach had the perfect scheme drawn up. I just read the quarterback's eyes and made a play," Foggie said after the game.

Junior linebacker Jeff Gemmell was excited for how well his teammate was playing. "When guys like Foggie getting a pick-six, I went out there and hit like three or four of my teammates. When you're having fun and thankful for making good plays, you have that gratitude. That's really where it starts to kick in and you realize you have something special."

Safety Ben DeLuca had a team-high 12 tackles to lead the defense. The junior from Florida also added an interception to give the 49ers three on the day, tying a program record.

Redshirt senior Hasaan Klugh scored Charlotte's lone offensive touchdown on the day, a five-yard run that topped off an eleven-play, 75- yard drive early in the first quarter.

Lambert was happy about his team's performance. "All the way around, kicking game, offense, defense, the kids kept fighting. A good team win right here." Lambert was particularly excited about how his offense closed out the game. "We ran four straight plays to get that a first down and the games over. Everyone knew we were going to run it. They knew it, we knew it, everybody else knew it. And we got that first down. It's a good team win."

Charlotte (4-4, 3-2) plays out of conference next week at Tennessee (3-5) while Southern Miss (3-4, 2-2) hosts Marshall (5-2, 3-1).

STATESBORO, Ga. — No. 25 Appalachian State suffered its first Sun Belt Conference loss of the season Thursday, falling 34-14 at league co-leader Georgia Southern.

Anthony Flory had a team-high 10 tackles for the Mountaineers, who were playing their first game as a ranked team at the FBS level. They lost starting quarterback Zac Thomas to an injury three plays into the game and second-leading tackler Jordan Fehr to a targeting penalty in the first quarter.

Georgia Southern finished with 24 points off the five turnovers it forced, and App State was held to 288 yards of offense. Peyton Derrick and Jacob Huesman took snaps at quarterback the rest of the way after Thomas left the game, and Huesman threw a 4-yard touchdown pass to Malik Williams with 10 seconds remaining.

The Mountaineers (5-2, 3-1) return to action Nov. 3 at Coastal Carolina (4-3, 1-2).

Demetrius Taylor's blocked punt and D'Marco Jackson's 15-yard return to the Georgia Southern 31 created the first scoring opportunity on a rainy night at Paulson Stadium. The Eagles (7-1, 4-0) immediately followed a goalline interception and long return to start the second quarter with Shai Werts' 57-yard touchdown pass to Darion Anderson.

App State answered back quickly, using Marcus Williams Jr.'s 23-yard run and backup quarterback Derrick's 50-yard pass to Corey Sutton to set up a 1-yard touchdown run from Williams.

App State's defense forced a three-and-out, with MyQuon Stout and Flory converging for the stop on a third-and-3 carry, but the Eagles made a fumble recovery at the Mountaineers' 10 following a muffed punt in heavy traffic.

Wesley Fields' 10-yard touchdown run on the next play put Georgia Southern ahead for good, and a three-and-out possession preceded a six-play scoring drive for the Eagles, who took a 17-7 lead on Tyler Bass' 42-yard field goal.

After Georgia Southern forced a three-and-out to open the second half, Fields rushed for 32 yards on a third-and-7 conversion and Werts scored on a 47-yard option keeper. The Eagles moved ahead 27-7 late in the third quarter on a 43-yard field goal that followed an interception on a tipped pass.

Huesman took over at quarterback for App State late in the third quarter, and one of the Eagles' four interceptions set up Fields' 18-yard touchdown run with 3:28 remaining. Huesman led a late scoring drive and threw the first touchdown pass of his career in the closing seconds.

POSTGAME NOTES

Appalachian State is now 30-4 in its last 34 conference games and 14-3 in its last 17 conference road games.

A week after batting down two passes, Demetrius Taylor recorded the first blocked punt of his career. With Steven Jones blocking two punts against Gardner-Webb and Tae Hayes blocking a field goal against South Alabama, the Mountaineers have four blocked kicks this season, a total that's tied for third place nationally.

Corey Sutton, who entered the game with a yards-per-catch average of 21.53 that ranked No. 9 in the nation, had his third reception of at least 40 yards this season. He hauled in a 50-yard reception to set up a first-half touchdown.

Cole Garrison, a sophomore, made his first career start at right guard.

Carolina Gridiron ranks the top fifteen teams in each classification weekly during the football season. Teams are ranked based on a number of factors including strength of schedule, wins, and quality losses. Interact with us on Twitter (@NCGridiron and @NCGridironNews) and let us know your thoughts using the hashtag #CGTop15.

BOONE — Appalachian State has made history again during its record-setting start in FBS football.

At 5-1 overall and 3-0 in the Sun Belt Conference, the Mountaineers earned their first Top 25 ranking as an FBS member when the newly released AP Poll on Sunday listed App State at No. 25.

It's tied for the highest ranking ever for a Sun Belt team, as Troy's one-week appearance at No. 25 in the AP Poll during the 2016 season is the only other case of a Sun Belt team being ranked in either poll. With a school-record 78 voting points in this week's Amway Coaches Poll, the Mountaineers are one spot outside the 25th spot, 17 voting points behind Miami.

App State Earns First-Ever AP Top 25 Ranking

Led by head coach Scott Satterfield, Appalachian State is currently in its fifth season of FBS competition, and it's the only program with a bowl win in each of its first three eligible seasons following the complete transition. The Mountaineers are 40-10 in their last 50 games and 30-3 in their last 33 league games.

App State led in the final minute of a 45-38 overtime loss at Penn State to open the 2018 season, and it has won its last five games by a combined score of 231-49. That includes a 35-9 road victory on ESPN2 against Arkansas State, the preseason West Division favorite in the Sun Belt Conference, and a 27-17 home victory against Louisiana on Saturday. A touchdown by the Ragin' Cajuns with 1:03 left Saturday accounts for the only second-half points given up by Appalachian's defense since the Penn State game.

The Mountaineers are currently No. 5 nationally in scoring offense (44.8 points per game), No. 11 in scoring defense (15.7 points per game), No. 8 in yards allowed per game (294.8), No. 17 in offensive yards per game (476.0) and tied with Utah State for No. 1 in special teams touchdowns (four).

Appalachian was unofficially No. 29 in last week's AP Poll and No. 31 in last week's Coaches Poll. The Mountaineers return to action Thursday with a 7:30 p.m. road game at Georgia Southern on ESPNU.

The 2018 football team is the first App State team to be ranked nationally in the top 25 since the 2016-17 wrestling team closed that regular season at No. 19.

The Shrine Bowl of the Carolinas was first played on December 4, 1937, in Charlotte, N.C., making it the oldest high school football all-star game in the nation. The annual game featuring many of the top high school players from North and South Carolina is played to benefit the Greenville (South Carolina) Unit Shriners Hospital for Children and the 21 other Shriners Hospitals for Children across the nation.

Congratulations to the following players who were selected to represent North Carolina in the 2018 Shrine Bowl. This year's game will be played at 1 p.m. on Saturday, December 15th at Wofford's Gibbs Stadium in Spartanburg, South Carolina.

Pos.	Name	School	Ht.	Wt.
DB	Alex Angus	Page	6'2"	195
DB	Shyheim Battle	Rocky Mount	6'2"	180
LB	Prince Bemah	Hunter Huss	6'0"	225
QB	Kennique Bonner-Steward	Hough	6'4"	215
WR	Elijah Bowick	Myers Park	6'1"	215
LB	Derek Boykins	Central Cabarrus	6'1"	225
WR	Khafre Brown	West Mecklenburg	6'1"	185
OL	Isaac Chapman	Alexander Central	6'2"	275
K/P	Matthew Chmil	Page	5'10"	170
DL	C.J. Clark	North Stanly	6'4"	305
OL	Jack Cutler	South Iredell	6'5"	290
DB	Tony Davis	Hunter Huss	6'2"	195
LB	Jurriente Davis	Dudley	6'0"	205
OL	Larry Dowdy	South Point	6'3"	290
OL	C.J. Elmonus	AC Reynolds	6'7"	270
DL	Keziah Everett	Farmville Central	6'2"	322
LB	Treveon Freshwater	Northeastern	6'3"	235
WR	Nolan Groulx	Hough	5'11"	190
OL	Billy Hambrook	Charlotte Catholic	6'3"	270
DB	Anthony Harris	Havelock	6'2"	172
DL	Joshua Harris	Person	6'3"	320
OL	Sam Hartsell	Concord	6'4"	280
OL	Isaiah Helms	West Caldwell	6'3"	315
QB	Sam Howell	Sun Valley	6'2"	220
DL	Savion Jackson	Clayton	6'3"	275
RB	Zonovan Knight	Southern Nash	6'0"	189
LB	Lee Kpogba	Parkland	6'2	210
LS	Drew Little	North Stanly	5'11"	230
DB	Khalid Martin	East Forsyth	6'1"	205
RB	Demetrius Mauney	East Rutherford	6'1"	190
DL	Jaden McKenzie	Wake Forest	6'3"	285
DB	JaQuan McMillian	West Forsyth	5'11"	175
RB	Syheam McQueen	Scotland	6'1"	215
OL	Jacob Monk	Corinth Holders	6'4"	300
OL	Parker Moorer	Mallard Creek	6'5"	280
DL	John Oxce	Southwest Guilford	5'11"	245
LB	Jacob Roberts	Mallard Creek	6'1"	220
LB	Jaylon Scott	Shelby	6'2"	230
WR	Emery Simmons	South View	6'2"	190
WR	Welton Spottsville	Havelock	6'0"	210
ATH/WR	Mateo Sudipo	Wake Forest	6'1"	185
LB	Drake Thomas	Heritage	6'1"	230
DB	Kam Walker	Clayton	6'1"	200
ATH/TE	Ken Walker	Pisgah	6'5"	240

BOONE — Another second-half statement from Appalachian State's defense. Another strong rushing performance from Darrynton Evans.

It added up to another Sun Belt Conference victory for the Mountaineers.

Evans rushed for a career-high 183 yards on 26 carries and scored two touchdowns, including a tiebreaking one on a 20-yard reception late in the first half, as App State remained unbeaten in league play with a 27-17 home win against Louisiana on Saturday at Kidd Brewer Stadium.

The Mountaineers (5-1, 3-0) were close to pitching a second-half shutout for the fifth straight game, but the Ragin' Cajuns (3-4, 1-2) cut into a 27-10 deficit by scoring with 1:03 remaining. Akeem Davis-Gaither recorded a career-high 15 tackles while contributing to a pair of sacks, Noel Cook had a sack in his 13-tackle performance and App State limited the productive rushing attack from Louisiana (3-4, 1-2) to 140 yards on 41 attempts.

The victory sets the stage for a first-place showdown Thursday at rival Georgia Southern, which is 3-0 in the Sun Belt as an East Division co-leader.

"When you're teaching off of this kind of film and kind of game, you love for it to be a win, and that's what it was," App State head coach Scott Satterfield said. "We're setting ourselves up there at 3-0 in the league, right where we need to be in Sun Belt league play with a short week coming up. We're already gearing up for Georgia Southern (on Thursday), and that's on everybody's mind right now as we head toward this week."

Offensively, quarterback Zac Thomas threw for 106 yards and rushed for 43 more, contributing to the 266 yards on the ground from the Mountaineers. They forced defensive three-and-outs on six of the first nine drives by Louisiana, with Caleb Spurlin, Demetrius Taylor and Okon Godwin also contributing in the sack category, and Jordan Fehr's fumble recovery set up App State's first touchdown.

Evans broke a 10-10 tie with 2:11 remaining in the first half on his catch of a perfectly thrown pass from Thomas, who absorbed a hit on the throw, and Evans' 65-yard run to the Louisiana 6 on the second play of the third quarter set up another touchdown for a 24-10 lead.

On those two possessions, Evans had touches on nine of App State's 13 plays.

"The O-line was opening it up," Evans said. "I'm saying, 'If it's going to be like this, we might as well just keep running it and keep running the same plays.' The coaches, they had a good beat on the defense and were making great calls, and the O-line was moving people around."

Marcus Williams Jr. powered his way into the end zone from the 6 immediately after the career-long run from Evans, who cut between blocks from left guard Ryan Neuzil and center Noah Hannon in the middle of the field.

Evans rushed for his previous high of 115 yards on his 16 carries in App State's previous game at Arkansas State, where star running back Jalin Moore suffered a season-ending ankle injury. Evans made just his second career start Saturday.

"It's always nice knowing if you do your job, the person behind you is going to do theirs. That's kind of our motto on offense. We're DYJ – we do our job. Especially as an offensive line, you can't really control anything else. We just try to do our best at doing our job, and we've got some special backs in the backfield."

Evans said Moore's appearance and words on the pregame intro video that played on the Kidd Brewer Stadium videoboard had an inspirational effect, and Moore interacted with his teammates in a jubilant postgame locker room only a few days removed from surgery.

"Seeing him today just made us glow up," Evans said. "Even our motivational video, they had his voice on there, and everybody just got pumped."

The Mountaineers maintained a two-touchdown lead thanks to a defensive stand after Louisiana started a drive at the App State 32 late in the third quarter. Facing a third-and-2 situation from the App State 12 to open the fourth quarter, Desmond Franklin and Fehr stopped 221-pound back Elijah Mitchell for no gain.

When Mitchell took a handoff on the fourth-down play, true freshman linebacker Trey Cobb and Franklin again tackled him for no gain.

"I always call Trey my son," senior linebacker Anthony Flory said with a laugh about his much-younger teammate, "and whenever I see him, I say, 'Son!' Just to see him make that play felt good. It was just fun and good to see."

App State flipped the field by advancing to its 46-yard line before Clayton Howell drilled a 53-yard punt that rolled to a stop in Steven Jones' hands at the 1. Demetrius Taylor batted down a third-down throw to force a punt that enabled the Mountaineers to drive for a 29-yard, game-clinching field goal from Chandler Staton with 2:46 left.

"The defensive line did their part today," Davis-Gaither said. "They played extremely hard like they always do. They cleared the way for us to play fast and read our keys and make the plays we're supposed to."

App State took a first-quarter lead on a 2-yard touchdown run from Evans, whose score came five plays after Fehr's fumble recovery at the Louisiana 25, and the Ragin' Cajuns responded with an eight-play scoring drive that ended with Levi Lewis' 38-yard touchdown pass to Mitchell.

There was another tie early in the second quarter as a 40-yard field goal from Staton preceded a 43-yard field goal by Louisiana's Kyle Pfau. Evans put the Mountaineers ahead for good on the first touchdown catch of his young career.

Next up is the trip to Statesboro, Ga., for the ESPNU game with Georgia Southern on Thursday night.

"You have to put this one to bed really quickly and move forward because on Wednesday we'll be heading to Georgia," Satterfield said. "I'm proud of our guys and the way they fought and the way they continued to play and come up with enough plays to get the win."

MURFREESBORO, TN – The Charlotte 49ers dominated time of possession and total offense, boasted a 100-yard runner for the second straight game, but fell at host Middle Tennessee, 21-13, Saturday. The 49ers defense put up its best performance of the year, holding the Blue Raiders to just 144 yards of total offense, but Middle Tennessee cashed in on two interceptions in 49ers territory to post the win.

"I thought everyone on defense played well," head coach Brad Lambert said. "I thought (defensive coordinator) Glenn (Spencer), the defensive staff, the kids -- they had a really good plan and executed extremely well. That's a good offense, an offense that I was really nervous about because of (Blue Raider quarterback) Brent (Stockstill). I thought our defense really stood up. Bottom line is we've got to make a couple more plays and give ourselves a chance to win the game."

Charlotte (3-4; 2-2) struck quick, taking a 6-0 lead on Benny LeMay's 57-yard run on the 49ers first possession. It was the 49ers longest rushing TD of the season and the 10th TD of LeMay's career. LeMay had three carries for 64 yards on the opening drive to post the 49ers to the early lead.

LeMay (129 yards rushing) finished the game with his third 100-yard performance of the season. He finished the game with 187 yards of total offense, more than the Blue Raiders team.

Charlotte's defense held the Blue Raiders to 144 yards of total offense, their lowest offensive output of since 2007, when #2 LSU held them to 90 yards.

The Blue Raiders, however, took the lead midway through the second quarter on Stockstill's 29-yard TD pass to Ty Lee following a missed 48-yard field goal attempt by Jonathan Cruz. After Evan Shirreffs first interception of the year gave the Blue Raiders the ball at Charlotte's 15-yard line, Stockstill hit Lee for a second TD, this time from five yards out, to give the Blue Raiders a 14-6 halftime lead.

Another Shirreffs' INT, after being hit while he passed, landed Middle Tennessee at Charlotte's 22-yard line in the fourth quarter. A pass from Stockstill to Gatlin Casey was fumbled into the endzone, where Casey recovered for the touchdown and a 21-6 lead.

Charlotte scored late in the fourth on Shirreffs 23-yard TD pass to Mark Quattlebaum to cut the lead to one score, 21-13, but the Blue Raiders recovered the ensuing onside kick to preserve the win.

 "You want to give yourself a chance to win the game," Lambert said. "The drive that really hurt us was the drive right out of the first half. We really moved the ball well, made first downs, tied up the clock and then we stalled. That's where we've got to learn to get better. Once we get in the score zone pushing the ball right down there."

LeMay has his second straight 100-yard rushing performance. Charlotte forced two turnovers, including r-Fr. LB Henry Segura's strip sack which landed the 49ers at the Middle Tennessee 23-yard line in the first half, but was unable to convert them into points. After the fumble recovery, an offensive pass interference call sent Charlotte back and Cruz was unable to connect on a 52-yard field goal attempt.

Charlotte returns home Saturday to face Southern Miss at 2:00 p.m. on ESPN3.