Getty QB Zac Thomas of the Appalachian State Mountaineers
The Appalachian State Mountaineers (4-1) will head Bobcat Stadium to face the Texas State Bobcats (1-7) Saturday.
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The game (3 p.m. ET start time) won’t be on regular national TV anywhere, but anyone in the US can watch App State vs Texas State live on ESPN+ right here:
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Once signed up for ESPN+, you can watch App State vs Texas State live on the ESPN app on your Roku, Roku TV, Amazon Fire TV or Fire Stick, Apple TV, Chromecast, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, iPhone, Android phone, iPad or Android tablet.
You can also watch on your computer via ESPN.com.
App State vs Texas State Preview
The Mountaineers have won three in a row, and they’re coming off a 31-13 win over a bad LA-Monroe team last week. App State had a solid game on offense, although their rhythm was constantly disrupted by their inability to keep drives rolling on third down. The Mountaineers went 4-11 on third down, but they also went 3-4 on fourth down, which helped.
App State quarterback Zac Thomas is 77-118 for 971 yards, eight touchdowns and four interceptions on the season, and he has also been a threat in the running game. Thomas was the team’s leading rusher against Monroe, netting 109 yards on 11 carries. He’ll be going up against a Texas State defense that has allowed 30+ points in each of its last four games, so there will be opportunities.
“Texas State has a very good defense, nothing to look past,” Thomas said this week. “We just have to go out there, play our style of ball and come out with a victory.”
App State is sitting in second place behind Coastal in the Sun Belt, and they cannot afford a second loss here. Head coach Shawn Clark said that he’s fully expecting a tough battle because that’s the way it goes.
“We have a very good conference from top to bottom, and if you don’t come ready to play you’re going to get beat,” Clark said. “That’s the beauty of the Sun Belt. It doesn’t matter who you’re playing, if you can’t take care of the football and can’t run the football, you’re going to get beat.”
They may have to prepare for two quarterbacks, however. After five consecutive losses, Texas State head coach Jake Spavital has opened up the quarterback competition again, with starter Brady McBride now competing against junior Tyler Vitt. McBride had three turnovers in the Bobcats 44-34 loss to Louisiana-Lafayette, and his throws were all over the map, so it wouldn’t be a surprise to see Vitt get the nod.
“We’ve kind of been our own worst enemy this entire year,” Spavital said. “Everything that we’ve done is really self-inflicted. You talk about all these moral victories, we’re just frustrated with moral victories. Like, I tell you guys every week they play hard, and they do and you guys see that. It’s kind of common sense that they’re just playing extremely hard and competitive. But we’ve got to be more consistent and clean up the football part of it.”