Jacksonville State pulled off an improbable comeback victory on the road Thursday night, beating Sam Houston 35-28 in overtime at Elliott T. Bowers Stadium in Huntsville, Texas.

Logan Smothers’ 24-yard touchdown pass to Sean Brown on the second play of overtime provided the winning points for the Gamecocks, who improve to 4-1 overall and 2-0 in Conference USA. JSU then stopped the homestanding Bearkats on four straight plays to end the game.

“Were you not entertained?” Jax State coach Rich Rodriguez said. “To make so many mistakes and come back and win a game like this, that’s really neat.”

Here’s video of the winning touchdown:

Sam Houston (0-4, 0-1) led 21-7 at halftime and 28-20 with 1:11 left before Jax State drove 75 yards in eight plays with no timeouts to tie the game. Smothers hit Perry Carter on a 28-yard touchdown pass with 13 seconds to play, then found Quinton Lane in the back of the end zone for two points to make it 28-28.

The Gamecocks erased the two-touchdown deficit on Smothers’ 31-yard pass to Michael Pettway midway through the third quarter, and then his 16-yard scoring run with 8:44 to play. However, Alen Karajic’s extra point clanked off the left upright, and Sam Houston still led by one.

The Bearkats seemed to put the game away after a Jax State fumble at the 20-yard line with 4:11 remaining, with back-up quarterback Trapper Pannell running in from a yard out on fourth-and-goal for an eight-point lead. However, Smothers completed six of eight passes on the tying drive, with one of the incompletions coming when he spiked the ball to stop the clock on the play just before the touchdown.

“The last drive was phenomenal,” Rodriguez said. “Logan Smothers had a phenomenal drive and our wideouts and skill guys did a phenomenal job in that last minute. It just showed a lot of guts and a lot of heart on our guys.”

Smothers — a Nebraska transfer in his first season with the Gamecocks — completed 16 of 28 passes for 197 yards and three touchdowns, while also rushing for 37 and another score. JSU’s Malik Jackson ran for 129 yards, including a 26-yard touchdown in the first quarter.

The Gamecocks won despite getting outgained 435 yards to 393, going just 3-for-12 on third down and committing three turnovers. They had turned the ball over only once through their first four games of the season.

Safety Fred Perry led the Jax State defensive effort with 14 tackles, two forced fumbles and two quarterback hurries. Linebacker Quae Drake added 10 tackles, 2.5 tackles for loss and two pass breakups.

Sam Houston’s Keegan Shoemaker threw for 228 yards and two touchdowns, a 56-yarder to John Gentry in the first quarter and a 22-yarder to Noah Smith in the second. Pannell ran for two short touchdowns for the Bearkats, like Jacksonville State a first-year FBS program.

Rodriguez is now 14-4 in two-plus seasons at Jax State, where he has yet to lose a conference game. The Gamecocks went 5-0 in the ASUN in 2022, their last year in the FCS ranks.

Jax State plays the second of five straight mid-week games next Wednesday at Middle Tennessee. That game kicks off at 7 p.m. and will be televised by ESPNU.