How a freshman QB led Coastal Carolina past Georgia State, closer to bowl eligibility

Fred Payton learned just a few hours before game time Saturday that he would be starting for the first time in his college career.

He was certainly prepared for the occasion.

The freshman from Suwanee, Ga., completed his first five passes and was impressive in helping Coastal Carolina improve to 5-3 and move within a win of being eligible for the program’s first bowl game with a 37-34 win over Georgia State.

Payton completed 12 of 17 passes for 222 yards and a touchdown, and rushed for 62 tough yards on 17 carries.

“I feel I was pretty comfortable from the start just because of the process we took this week,” said Payton, who is 6-foot-2 and 200 pounds. “I felt really prepared and confident not only in myself but in my teammates, that I could lean on them and they could lean on me.”

Payton, who led CCU to a win in relief over Massachusetts last week with two second-half touchdown passes, played nearly every snap on offense in a departure from Coastal’s recent ploy of rotating quarterbacks. He got help from sophomore running back Torrance “C.J.” Marable, who gained 128 yards with a touchdown on 12 carries.

Payton played high school football 22 miles from Georgia State Stadium and had a number of friends and family in attendance. He attended Atlanta Braves games when the Panthers’ stadium was Turner Field.

“I was pumped,” Payton said. “Just being back here in my hometown in front of my family, getting my first start and getting a win like this it means everything.

He led Coastal on a go-ahead 10-play, 76-yard drive in the final seven minutes. A 48-yard pass to Marable out of the backfield gave the Chants a first-and-goal at the 5, and after two runs and a pass gained no yards they settled for a 23-yard Massimo Biscardi field goal to take a three-point lead with 2:54 to play.

Georgia State (2-6, 1-3 Sun Belt Conference) reached Coastal’s 36 in the final minute but turned the ball over on downs following a pass breakup that included a lot of contact, a Preston Carey pass breakup, and overthrow of receiver Penny Hart behind the defense deep down the right sideline.

“Speaking for the defensive line, we were thinking this is on us as a defense. We were preaching that amongst each other,” said junior defensive tackle Sterling Johnson, a Clemson transfer. “You live for moments like that growing up and playing college ball, you’re like, ‘Man, I want to be the guy to go out there and do stuff, clutch-time things.’ ”

Coastal Carolina’s run defense was gashed in the third quarter, allowing 206 yards and three rushing touchdowns on nine carries in the 15 minutes. But the Chants kept the Panthers off the scoreboard on their two drives in the fourth quarter.

“At the end of the day the game’s about points, so we made the plays it took to win the game,” Johnson said. “We’re not happy giving up 34 points, but at the same time we made the plays it took to win the game.”

CCU struck first with a 32-yard Biscardi field goal. Payton was 2-for-2 on the opening drive for 44 yards, including a 37-yard pass over the middle to Malcolm Williams.

Georgia State reached the CCU 27 on its opening drive but pressure from Johnson forced a 10-yard intentional grounding call on quarterback Dan Ellington that pushed the Panthers out of field goal range.

Coastal took a 10-0 lead when Marable took a pitch to the right side on a third-and-1, cut upfield behind a block by backfield mate Marcus Outlow and raced 80 yards to the end zone 9 minutes into the game.

Two plays after a 26-yard punt return by Ky’Jon Tyler with a 15-yard penalty on the Panthers tacked on, Payton hit Williams streaking down the middle after a fake handoff in the backfield for a 25-yard touchdown pass to give CCU a 17-0 lead.

Georgia State got on the board with 2 minutes left in the first quarter on a 36-yard touchdown reception by Hart, an All-American who created 5 yards of separation from freshman cornerback Derick Bush in single coverage with CCU blitzing.

Georgia State pulled within a touchdown with a 15-play, 75-yard scoring drive that was capped by a Seth Paige 1-yard scoring run with 3:08 left in the first half. A mishandled snap led to a failed extra point and CCU took a 20-13 lead into halftime.

Two big scoring runs by Georgia State gave the Panthers a 27-20 lead just 3:15 into the second half.

On the first offensive play of the half, Tra Barnett raced 75 yards for a touchdown, and on the fourth play of GSU’s second possession of the half, Ellington ran 42 yards on a keeper.

“Honestly it was just about manning up,” Johnson said. “We were getting gashed but a lot of it was missed tackles and things of that nature. It wasn’t anything we weren’t prepared for. It was the simple fact of are we going to make this play or not.”

Coastal tied the score with a Tyler 28-yard run on an end-around option that capped a six-play, 75-yard drive, and a failed trick play by Georgia State gave CCU a chance to regain the lead.

The Panthers attempted a reverse that was fumbled by receiver Devin Gentry in part on a hit by Johnson, and C.J. Brewer recovered at the Panthers’ 47. But an Outlow fumble at the Panthers’ 15 ended a scoring threat.

A 42-yard Barnett touchdown run gave Georgia State a 34-27 lead, and an Alex James 3-yard touchdown run 5:14 into the fourth quarter tied the score and completed a 12-play, 57-yard drive.

Coastal converted 9 of 14 third downs, many via a Payton run or throw.

“He seemed to get a little more confidence the longer he was out there,” CCU coach Joe Moglia said. “He’s still inexperienced, he still makes mistakes, some of his reads and some of his decisions maybe weren’t as good as what they needed to be. But he is a very good football player, a very good athlete, and he worked hard and wound up doing a great job especially for his first start.”

The Chanticleers, now 2-2 in the Sun Belt Conference, host Appalachian State (5-2, 3-1) next Saturday.

“We really needed that win desperately,” Marable said. “We needed that win to be bowl eligible, now we have momentum to beat App. State.”

This story was originally published October 27, 2018 at 5:16 PM.