In the first week of the 2007 college football season, when the little-known Division I-AA Appalachian State Mountaineers beat Michigan, the winningest Division I-A program ever, many called it one of the greatest upsets in the history of college football.

Just one month later, though, Stanford’s monumental 24-23 upset of USC on Saturday has left the pundits searching for words, trumping the Mountaineers’ victory in almost every way.

Although Appalachian State’s victory came seemingly out of nowhere, the Mountaineers were not out-matched the way the Cardinal were.

Appalachian State was a four-touchdown underdog; Las Vegas odds-makers had Stanford listed as a 41-point dog entering Saturday’s game. Appalachian State’s quarterback led his team to a I-AA national title in 2006; Stanford started a signal-caller who’d thrown three passes in his entire collegiate career. The Mountaineers led the Wolverines nearly the entire game before holding on for the victory; the Cardinal spotted the Trojans 200 yards of offense and never led until the game’s final 49 seconds.

Here are some of the numbers, figures and tidbits to put Saturday’s shocking upset in perspective:

• As a 41-point underdog, Stanford pulled off the biggest upset (in terms of point spread) in the history of college football.

• Perhaps Coach Jim Harbaugh was right when he said, “I don’t know if there’s ever been a game where a team was a 40-point underdog and playing with a quarterback making their first start.”

• The 24-23 stunner was USC’s first home loss in 35 games. Ironically, the Trojans’ last home loss also came at the hands of Stanford ... six years ago, in September 2001.

• Saturday’s defeat marked the first USC home loss in 24 Pac-10 games.

• Stanford’s win was its first against a top-ranked team (the Trojans were No. 1 in the USA Today coaches’ poll) since the Cardinal won 36-31 at Notre Dame on Oct. 6, 1990 — 17 years to the day before this year’s squad scored its improbable victory.

• The Cardinal needed consecutive fourth down conversions to pull off the upset. Tavita Pritchard connected with Richard Sherman on fourth-and-20, before winning the game with a fourth-and-goal pass to Mark Bradford on the next set of downs.

Ultimately, Saturday’s win begs the question: how great of an upset is this? Where will this weekend’s miracle go down in college football history?

Only time well tell, but for now it appears that Saturday’s unlikely win was the greatest upset in Stanford football history, Pac-10 history and maybe, just maybe, all of college football history.