Published: 11:18 AM, 10/20/2009

Last updated: 12:52 PM, 11/17/2009

By: Steve Behr Sports Editor

SPARTANBURG, S.C. - Brian Quick has seen his share of good and infamous moments at Appalachian State.
He blocked one of the two field goals in the Mountaineers' 34-32 victory over Michigan, but also dropped a touchdown pass in the game. He's made one acrobatic catch after another, often for touchdowns, but folks not so familiar with the Mountaineers may remember him as Armanti Edwards' roommate when the quarterback hurt himself mowing the lawn one fateful August day. Edwards slipped, cut his foot, and missed the Mountaineers' season opener against East Carolina.
But Quick, a redshirt sophomore, is fast becoming known as  the Mountaineers' home run hitter. He's learning that there's more to receiving than just going to the end zone and outjumping the unfortunate defensive back, who is usually six inches shorter than the 6-foot-5 Quick, for the ball.
If nothing else, Quick demonstrated that, teamed with Edwards, he can dominate Wofford's secondary. Quick caught eight of Edwards' passes for 181 yards and two touchdowns in the Mountaineers' 44-34 victory. One was a 58-yard strike with 6:48 left in the game that gave Appalachian State its final margin of victory.
"I fake the quick stop and I go," Quick said of the play. "I release. Armanti did a good fake, I stopped and then I passed the DB. He slipped and fell, which left me wide open. I just had to run. I wanted to look back, but said no because Armanti told me to keep running, so I kept running."
Appalachian State's coaching staff helped Quick by flanking him by himself on one side of the formation, while putting three receivers on the other side. That forced the Terriers to either cover him one-on-one with a cornerback, or if they wanted to double cover him, leave another receiver in single coverage.
Quick said Edwards was telling Quick to read what the Terriers were doing defensively, especially when they were in that formation.
"That's what they told me on the sideline, Richie (Williams) and Armanti," Quick said. "They told me to go out there and look a the coverage before you line up. I told them the first couple of times I lined up and looked at (Edwards) and he said 'Look at the coverage this time. You're one-on-one out there,' and I didn't know. He got on me and started yelling at me and I said 'I'm sorry Armanti,' and he didn't want to talk at the time. So I had to show him that I was ready to play this game."
"We finally got those guys kind of where we wanted them," Mountaineers coach Jerry Moore said of Wofford's secondary. "They were having to single him up out there and there is a lot of field. He's a big target and he's a hard worker. He's getting better all the time. His expectations are getting better."
Moore also feels that Quick's confidence  gets better with every week.
"When you have some back-to-back games like that, your confidence level begins to soar. Now what he has got to go is go back and work harder than he's ever worked."
Edwards was effective in finding several receivers Saturday. He completed 24-of-37 passes for 415 yards, no interceptions and the two touchdowns to Quick. Edwards completed six passes to CoCo Hilary for 96 yards and six more to running back Devon Moore for 38 yards.
Last week, Edwards found Matt Cline eight times for 107 yards. On Saturday, Cline caught three passes for 41 yards. The passing game allowed the Mountaineers to overcome a 34-20 deficit and overtake the Terriers by outscoring them 17-0 in the fourth quarter.
"I told the players on the team that this is not (just) me," Quick said. "We all played a good game. As a receiver, as a quarterback, as an offensive line and as running backs, we all did good as a team. We know how to face adversity and when we're down, we know what we have to do to come back and win."
"We're doing some good things in the throwing game right now," Moore said.

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