Appalachian State head coach Jerry Moore wants to put last Saturday behind the Mountaineers.

The Citadel visited Boone, N.C., on Saturday, and left with a 52-28 win, and Moore hopes it will be a learning experience for ASU (1-2, 0-1 Southern Conference), which faces Chattanooga (1-2) in its home opener Saturday at 6 p.m. at Finley Stadium.

"The mood’s fine," Moore said. "We’re disappointed -— when I say the mood is fine, it hasn’t been a happy-go-lucky 48 hours — but our mood is fine. I think we’ve got a good football team. Those things happen to you in sports, and your ability to bounce back determines what kind of team you are."

After watching film, Moore said he found it wasn’t a lack of effort that resulted in the loss, it was more about execution.

"At first I thought, probably, there were a ton of missed tackles," said the ASU coach. "But they had plays where they were running untouched. We had some missed tackles, obviously, but it was more of an assignment thing than it was missing tackles."

While the Mountaineers dropped to No. 17 in the Football Championship Subdivision media poll, The Citadel (3-0, 2-0) passed No. 11 Georgia Southern and landed at No. 10.

Bulldogs coach Kevin Higgins hopes the military atmosphere at The Citadel will keep the success of knocking off two Top 10 opponents in conference from getting to his players’ heads.

"I think there’s a lot of noise from the outside," said Higgins. "We’ve worked hard at not listening to the noise and making sure we focus on the task at hand. One of the nice things being at The Citadel is you have enough challenges within the gates that the noise from the outside sometimes doesn’t reach."

The Citadel faces N.C. State Saturday at 6 p.m. on the road.

A tough start

For the first time since 1979, the Furman Paladins are 0-3. After losing to Samford (3-0, 1-0) in the season opener for both teams on Sept. 1, the Paladins lost to Coastal Carolina and No. 11 (FBS) Clemson.

Furman head coach Bruce Fowler turned to true freshman Reese Hannon in the second quarter of the Coastal Carolina game on Sept. 8, when starting quarterback Dakota Derrick left the game with a shoulder injury.

Hannon engineered a comeback in the Coastal Carolina game, forcing overtime, before the Paladins eventually lost in the third extra period.

Last Saturday against Clemson, Hannon passed for 235 yards on a 19 for 29 clip, adding a touchdown and an interception in Furman’s 41-7 loss.

"To come into the game like he did two weeks ago and help get us back into the game with his performance," said Fowler, "then to go into a situation at Clemson, playing the No. 11 team in a big stadium, … he’s been phenomenal for us in a pretty tough situation."

Furman returns home to face Presbyterian Saturday at noon in Greenville, S.C.

A better picture

After playing what amounted to two tune-up games and outscoring its opponents 116-7 the first two weeks of the season, the Wofford Terriers (3-0, 1-0) finally learned a little bit about how good they really are last Saturday when they defeated SoCon opponent Western Carolina (1-2, 0-1), 49-20, Saturday in Spartanburg, S.C.

"Going into the (WCU) game, quite frankly, we didn’t know what we were all about," said Wofford coach Mike Ayers. "We had played Gardner-Webb, and after that we played Lincoln, and we were still wondering what we were going to be like against a Southern Conference opponent."

The No. 7 Terriers will remain unbeaten for at least another week as they have a bye on Saturday. They will return to action on Saturday, Sept. 29 at Elon.