Inside the Sun Belt · recap

Thirteen points were scored in Boone and ten were Old Dominion's

We wrote on Thursday that App State should win and probably comfortably. They were better, they were home, they had two weeks to prepare, and the opponent had scored eleven points a game since September.

Old Dominion won 10-3.

The whole game, in three plays

Nothing was scored in the first half. Nothing.

App State's James London kicked a 34-yard field goal with 11:41 left in the third quarter. Old Dominion answered four minutes later with a safety. Maurki James ran in from two yards with 9:30 left in the fourth, Quinn Henicle threw to Josh Rodriguez for two, and that was the game.

Thirteen points were scored in sixty minutes of football, and ten of them belonged to the Monarchs.

Nobody kicked

Count Old Dominion's ten again: a safety, a touchdown, and a two-point conversion. No extra point and no field goal.

We wrote on Thursday that Nathanial Eichner had been the most reliable thing on this team and that this was the problem, because field goals are what a stalled drive produces. On Saturday he did not score at all, and it was the best afternoon Old Dominion has had in six weeks.

They ran it

Old Dominion ran for 207 yards.

Devin Roche carried 23 times for 101. Quinn Henicle carried it 26 times for 88, which is a quarterback keeping it more often than any back on the field. Between them that is 49 carries, and it is how a team that had gained 146 total yards at Georgia State a week earlier finished with 304.

The clock tells it better than the yardage does. Old Dominion held the ball for 38 minutes and 50 seconds. App State had it for 21:10. That is a gap of 17:40, and in a game where neither offense could do much, the one that kept the ball won.

What the defense did

App State gained 158 yards. They went 1 for 13 on third down.

Malachi Singleton went 5-of-23 for 72 yards with an interception. Henry Hasselbeck came in and went 2-of-4 for minus six. The Mountaineers managed nine first downs all afternoon and did not reach the end zone.

This is a team that beat East Carolina in Greenville last month and lost 41-31 at NC State. Old Dominion held them to three points in their own conference opener.

What we asked for and what we got

Thursday's piece said the result was not the point, and that what Old Dominion needed was evidence the offense could produce a touchdown drive against a Sun Belt defense.

They produced exactly one. It was enough, and the rest of it came from a safety and a two-point play, which is not a formula anybody would draw up. Henicle also threw two interceptions and the Monarchs turned it over three times in total.

So this was not a performance that fixes the season. It is a road win over a team that was 3-1, and Old Dominion had not beaten anybody since Norfolk State on September 5.

Where it leaves them

Old Dominion is 2-4 and 1-2 in the Sun Belt. App State falls to 3-2 and 0-1, having lost their conference opener at home in front of 27,011.

Georgia Southern comes to Ballard on Thursday night on ESPN2. We wrote on Thursday that it was the one night this season the Monarchs get a national audience and a home crowd at the same time. They will walk into it off a road win instead of a five-game losing streak.