Middle Tenn St vs

Appalachian State

at New Orleans
Sat, Dec 15
6:00 PM Pacific
Rotation: 209
Odds: Appalachian State -6.5, Total: 47.5

Game Analysis

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Appalachian State (-6.5)  28   Middle Tennessee State  19

I would have considered Appalachian State for at least a Strong Opinion in this game if not for the departure of head coach Scott Satterfield, who took the job at Louisville and took his offensive and defensive coordinators with him. The co-offensive and co-defensive coordinators are still with the program but new play-callers on both sides of the ball is a bit of a concern. Then again, whatever play-calling tendencies the MTS coaching staff may have uncovered are probably useless.

There is no doubt that Appalachian State has the better team, particularly on the defensive side of the ball. The Mountaineers allowed just 16.4 points per game against FBS opponents and that number shrinks to just 13.6 per game if you exclude their overtime game at Penn State to open the season. Appalachian State yielded less than 300 total yards per game at just 4.5 yards per play (to teams that would average 5.5 yppl against an average defensive team). The average rating of the offenses that App State faced is a bit better than the offensive rating of Middle Tennessee State, which is 0.2 yppl worse than average. The Blue Raiders are 0.4 yards per rushing play worse than average and veteran quarterback Brent Stockstill may be completing 70% of his passes but those passes aren’t going very far and he’s been 0.3 yards per pass play worse than average this season (6.5 yppp against teams that would allow 6.8 yppp to an average quarterback. The math projects just 294 yards at 4.4 yppl for the Blue Raiders in this game.

Middle Tennessee’s strength is actually their defense, which allowed just 25.3 points per game and 5.4 yppl but rates as average after compensating for their opposition (their opponents would average 24.9 points and 5.3 yppl against an average FBS defense). Appalachian is a bit worse than average offensively and the math projects 376 yards at 5.8 yppl for the Mountaineers. Not having Satterfield calling plays, which is considered a strength of his, may hurt the offense a bit, which is why I picked Appalachian by 9 points rather than the 11 point margin that the math model projects. The math shows no value on the total after adding a few points for this game being played in a dome but I’ll lean with Appalachian State despite the coaching change.

  • Team Stats
  • Game Log
  • Middle Tenn St
  • Appalachian State
MTSU
Offense
Defense

Rush

  • Run Plays 32.4 35.2
  • Run Yards 132.1 166.9
  • YPRP 4.6 5.3




Pass





  • Pass Comp 23.8 17.7
  • Pass Att 34.6 30.7
  • Comp % 68.8% 57.7%
  • Pass Yards 259.8 212.9
  • Sacks 2.9 2.6
  • Sack Yards 18.4 18.7
  • Sack % 7.8% 7.7%
  • Pass Plays 37.5 33.3
  • Net Pass Yards 241.4 194.2
  • YPPP 6.4 5.8

Total

  • Total Plays 69.9 68.5
  • Total Yards 391.9 379.8
  • YPPL 5.6 5.5

TO


  • Int 0.8 1.1
  • Int % 2.3% 3.7%
  • Fumbles 0.6 0.6
  • Turnovers 1.4 1.7
 
  • Points 28.0 26.7
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