I have an interesting, or at least what I feel is interesting relationship with Appalachian State football. Of course, I was among the masses feverishly searching out the fledgling Big Ten Network on the day of its first college football Saturday 15 years ago this month, in disbelief when the ESPN ticker showed the Mountaineers leading a preseason BCS championship favorite Michigan in the fourth quarter.
But a moment two years earlier often pops into my head when I think of Appalachian State. The otherwise forgettable Adam Sandler-helmed remake of The Longest Yard includes a throwaway line about App State wherein Sandler compares a hypothetical prisoner team playing the guards to Florida State opening with “some slack Div. II team, kick the living shit out of ‘em.”
Aside from an obsessive tick to scream at Sandler, "FCS! Not Div. II!”, this bit of dialogue makes me smile. The writers could have chosen any then-Div. I-AA program to insert there: Florida State1, the program from which the fictional Paul Crewe was to have played, met The Citadel in its paycheck game that same year, for example.
But that it was Appalachian State feels like the Football Gods taking control of the keyboard and punching in a program that would give this scene gridiron relevance for years. And it happened immediately.
The Mountaineers won the first of three straight national championships in the months following The Longest Yard. Around the time the Sandler vehicle hit DVD2, Appalachian State had climbed into the top 10 of the Div. I-AA polls with an offensive style that helped change the college football landscape.
I was not yet FCS-pilled in 2005, so I hadn’t thought much of Sandler’s Appalachian State quip until tuning into the Playoffs during the Mountaineers’ first title run. I was incredulous at the “slack Div. II team” being on the cusp of winning a national championship.
Then they repeated in 2006. Then came 2007 and an introduction to a national audience that: 1. likely knew nothing about the FCS powerhouse and assumed it was an interchangeable punching bag for programs like Michigan to pay for a glorified scrimmage; and 2. was just discovering the existence of Big Ten Network.
The 2007 Mountaineers marked the peak of the dynasty in many ways, thanks in no small part to beating Michigan, but also for the presence of Armanti Edwards.
It’s no secret to anyone who’s paid the slightest bit of attention that the electrifying sophomore’s playmaking against the Wolverines defense that day helped lead to Michigan hiring Rich Rodriguez as its head coach.
Rich Rod’s tenure in Ann Arbor may have been brief3, but the blue-blood program adopting a radical change in its brand of football because of how badly an Appalachian State quarterback burned it ranks among the more remarkable developments in the sport’s last 20 years.
Edwards won a pair of Walter Payton Awards, the FCS equivalent of the Heisman, after leading the Mountaineers to their third national championship. His second Payton win came at the end of the 2009 season, a landmark year for me personally in my sports journalism career.
I worked for CBS at the time, which owned the NCAA website. The lead college football writer for NCAA.com abandoned his position when management dictated FCS would garner much of the outlet’s focus. Like a lineman scooping a fumble to run for a touchdown, I was in the right place at the right time.
The 2009 season made me an ardent supporter of the FCS, and validated my pursuing sports journalism after college, where I’d been just a few years prior. The culmination of that season as the national FCS reporter was a trip to Chattanooga for the final National Championship Game played at Finley Stadium.
Villanova’s win over Missouri remains one of the 10 best games I’ve ever covered, and that week in Chattanooga is among my favorite memories from my career. Part of my coverage included the awards ceremony in which Edwards received his second Payton.
Edwards was as gracious and engaging as he was entertaining when scrambling out of the pocket. I’d already been a fan of his play since the Michigan upset, but speaking to him made me more so.
Fast forward to present-day, and Appalachian State has come a long way since 2005. The Mountaineers are now not just in the FBS, but thriving as one of the success stories among former I-AA programs to make the jump in the last 25 years.
Boone welcomes College Gameday with the Mountaineers fresh off another Top 10 power-program upset, this time of Texas A&M. I’m no longer the target demographic for Gameday — which feels a little weird to write, given around the same time of App State’s Longest Yard shoutout, I went so far as to DVR the ESPN program when I couldn’t be awake at such an ungodly hour4 — but I plan to check in this week.
Campuses like Appalachian State’s in general are the kind of spots I wish Gameday targeted more often. I loved the program years ago because it seemed to more closely embrace the uniqueness of the sport than it does today. But more specifically, I absolutely loved Boone making my first trip there a year ago.
Going there again feels like the intervention of the Football Gods. Although I covered USC and UCLA home games during the COVID-shortened 2020 season, the empty stadiums and press-box precautions made the experience feel alien. I also suffered from a bit of fatigue during the ‘20 season; my stance was wholly neutral on playing that fall, in that I wanted the players to have the experience and felt like if the university departments could make it happen without compromising the safety of the athletes, they should try it.
But if they didn’t feel like it was feasible, it would be disappointing but I understood. As the more aggressive proponents brayed like jackasses, accusing anyone of honest reporting on the pandemic of cheering for the virus, I just sorta grew tired of the 2020 presidential election-influenced pall cast over the season.
The Coastal Carolina-BYU game in December engrossed me in a way no matchup that season had come close to matching; and, really, stood out as one of the best games in the last 10 years, period.
Spring arrived, and with it a vaccine and the promise of a return to a normal season in 2021. As such, I scoured an ideal football weekend where I could hit multiple games — including a CAA member was a must — and see places I’d never experienced.
Appalachian State against that Coastal Carolina team, the saviors of the 2020 season for me, on a Wednesday night was fate as written by the Football Gods. And man, did they deliver.
I’ve written before about the aura of that game; how it underscored in an age of Playoff obsession that conference championships and regional rivalries matter; how the Sun Belt got it right when to came to shaping its future.
Beyond just football, however, Boone wowed me with its natural beauty. Visiting brought to life so many memories. Not bad for the home of a slack Div. II team.
The various mentions of Florida State in the film are in homage to Burt Reynolds, a Seminole football alum and Paul Crewe in the original Longest Yard. While I long ago outgrew the humor of most Sandler movies, I appreciate how he weaves both his knowledge of sports and little nods like that into his scripts.
Remember when distributors would release films to theaters, they’d have runs of a month or more, depending on popularity, and wouldn’t be available for home release until a good 5-7 months later? We’ve come a long way.
I highly recommend John U. Bacon’s book Three & Out on Rich Rod’s stint at Michigan. I came away from reading it firmly believing had Rodriguez been given support, he would have gotten the Wolverines going — and with a head-start on rival Ohio State in cultivating a modern offense against a Big Ten resistant to change. But that’s a discussion for another time.
Look, I was a college kid on Pacific Time, OK? An 8 a.m. wake-up on a Saturday in those days, I may as well have been a cattle rancher. Today as a parent, if I ever sleep until 8, I’d need a toxicology report to ensure no one drugged me the night before.