by LINDSEY HUNTSINGER
Sports Reporter

Coming off a tough loss to East Carolina, the Appalachian State football team is preparing to face McNeese State Saturday in their first home game of the season.

Despite a 17-point forth quarter by the Mountaineers, ECU was able to hold on for a 29-24 victory.

“It was kind of heartbreaking to watch that film knowing that if you would have played a full 60 minutes the outcome may have been different,” defensive ends coach Mark Speir said. “But that’s part of learning, and growing up and focusing. You have to focus for 60 minutes, not 35.”

The loss dropped the Apps out of their No. 1 spot, and placed them as No. 2 in the FCS media poll.

McNeese State also dropped one place in the rankings, leaving them in the No. 16 spot.

In 2008 the Cowboys finished with a 7-4 record, and tied for first place in the Southland Conference (4-3 SLC).

The Cowboys return a slew of talented players, including senior tailback Toddrick Pendland. Last season Pendland was named SLC Offensive Player of the Year, and averaged 171.4 yards per game of total offense.

“Their tailback is a preseason All-American, and deservedly so,” Speir said. “He has tremendous speed and he moves. He’s not that big of a back but he runs really hard, he’s physical and a fast running back.”

They also return senior quarterback Derrick Forroux, a four-year starter who is 24-10 in his career.

“The quarterback is a competitor—he’s a gamer,” Speir said. “Sometimes you can get lulled to sleep because he’s not a flashy guy like Armanti [Edwards], but he gets the job done and he’s a great leader for them. They’re as good an offense as we saw last week, in some ways better.”

Unlike their offense, which returned six starters from last season, the McNeese State defense is relatively young this year.

“They’ve always had a great defense. This year they lost eight starters off the defense, so they’re a young team. It’s an athletic group. They all run well and all tackle fairly well,” quarterbacks coach Brad Glenn said. “Being young, we’re going to have to see as the game goes along which group we can exploit, but that’s kind of just a wait and see thing.”

According to head coach Jerry Moore, Edwards will make his first start of the season against the Cowboys.

Because of his performance against the Pirates, coaches expect Travaris Cadet will see playing time against McNeese State.

“When we got Travaris Cadet in there he gave us a kind of spark in the running game, and made some great plays which we knew he was capable of as far as running the ball. What we weren’t sure of was his accuracy in the passing game and he gets in there and goes 7-9,” Glenn said.

Speir said the key to this weekend is making sure everyone does what is asked of them.

“Sometimes the players, and you can’t fault them, they’re out there trying to make plays, but we tell them all the time you go out there and do your one eleventh,” he said.

Players and coaches agree the game must get off to a more productive start than this past weekend. Co-captain and linebacker D.J. Smith hopes this week’s practices will produce more consistency when they face off against McNeese State this weekend.

“We have to take the first half more seriously and play hard from start to finish,” Smith said. “The way you play is the way you practice. We need everybody to go hard in practice so we can go hard for 60 minutes.”

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