UNIVERSITY PARK, PA — Appalachian State football played its traditional season-opening “gimme” game on Saturday, losing to #10 Penn State 45-38 in overtime, thus leaving no doubt in the sports world that the Mountaineers are complete shit.

College football typically opens on Labor Day weekend, with renowned powerhouses providing lowly schools the exciting opportunity to have their teams get absolutely fucked for a decent six-figure paycheck. App State, however, fell short of fan expectations by not utterly demolishing the nationally-ranked, legendary Penn State football program.

“You obviously feel angry when you lose the first ‘cupcake’ game of the season,” said trainer Nate Speith. “Losing to Penn State every year is Michigan’s job, and we beat Michigan for Christ’s sake!”

This most recent loss sets an upsetting trend for such a proud football program: despite winning 37 games since its promotion to Division I-A in 2014, the team has also lost closely-contested games early in the season to such FBS bottom-dwellers as Clemson, Michigan, and Tennessee, including a crushing home loss against Miami. The Mountaineers are consistently in contention, only to prove yet again that early in the year, they cannot will themselves past even the weakest of teams.

The stunning and heartbreaking loss sends App State reeling into next week’s visit to dreaded rival UNC-Charlotte, perhaps the most difficult opponent that the Mountaineers will face this season.

“Losing a close game never feels good, especially when the competition is subpar at best, but we’ll take the lessons we’ve learned and try to apply them to the season-defining grudge match that we’re going into next week,” Coach Scott Satterfield stated in his postgame press conference.

At press time, the team arrived back in Boone greeted by dozens of Mountaineer faithful with decorative signs reading “At Least You Tried” and “App State Best State”.