Upset In the Big House One For the Ages

What a way to open the 2007 college football season.

The biggest upset in the history of Michigan football and one of the biggest shocks in the history of the sport occurred at the Big House on Ann Arbor when defending DI-AA champion Appalachian State shocked the world by beating the Wolverines 34-32 on Saturday.

No Division I-AA team had beaten a team ranked in The Associated Press poll between 1989 and 2006, and it's unlikely that it had ever happened before. The Division I subdivisions were created in 1978.

The Mountaineers are not eligible to receive votes in the AP Top 25 poll because they're not in the Football Bowl Subdivision. The Mountaineers' win over Michigan was their first over a Football Bowl Subdivision opponent since their 20-10 win over Wake Forest in 2000.

Appalachian State's win does seem to trump the game second-tier programs used to regard as their crowning achievement -- The Citadel's season-opening win in 1992 over Arkansas that led to the firing of Razorbacks coach Jack Crowe after the game.

Carr will not get fired after this upset, but he might be wishing he had retired after last season when the Wolverines won 11 games before closing with losses to Ohio State and USC.

What the world saw was a blocked field goal in final seconds that gave the little Mountaineers a victory that will be talked about long after we have turned to dust.

Appalachian State 34, No. 5 Michigan 32. Who can believe it?

The team from Boone, N.C., took the lead with 26 seconds left when Julian Rauch kicked a 24-yard field goal. Corey Lynch blocked a 37-yard try on the final play, and the Mountaineers sealed a jaw-dropping upset that might have no equal.

The two-time defending champions from former Division I-AA were ahead of the nation's winningest program 28-14 late in the second quarter, before their storybook afternoon seemed to unravel late in the fourth quarter.

Hart's 54-yard run with 4:36 left put the Wolverines ahead for the first time since early in the second quarter.

One snap after the go-ahead touchdown, Michigan's Brandent Englemon intercepted an errant pass, but the Wolverines couldn't capitalize and had their first of two field goals blocked.

Then Appalachian State drove 69 yards without a timeout in 1:11 to set up the go-ahead field goal.

Appalachian State has won 15 straight games, the longest streak in the nation, and 27 of its last 31. The Mountaineers are favored to win the Football Championship Subdivision, but they weren't expected to put up much of a fight against a team picked to win the Big Ten and contend for the national title.

Games are not won on paper and now Lloyd Carr and the rest of the Michigan players and fans know how true that old cliche really is.