South grad Abby Herring shines as Marshall runner

HUNTINGTON -- Parkersburg South graduate and Marshall University thinclad Abby Herring will be the first runner to compete in the women's NCAA Division I 6K national cross country championships for the Thundering Herd, which is set to get underway at 10:20 a.m. Saturday at Panorama Farms in Charlottesville, Virginia.

Herring, who extended her season by placing fifth during last Friday's Mid-Atlantic Regional, became the third thinclad in Thundering Herd history to advance to the NCAA D1 cross country national championships.

Parkersburg native Kim Nutter was the first Marshall University runner to reach nationals in 1979. Matt Schiffbauer also accomplished the feat in 2011 for the Thundering Herd.

"Going into regionals this year I knew that there was a chance that I could make it to nationals, but it definitely wasn't guaranteed," admitted the former Patriot. "I just tried to stay close to that front pack from the gun and hold on for as long as I could.

"Walking away from this meet, I'm extremely happy with a ticket punched to nationals and a PR (19:52.4). The entire women's team performed well with personal records all around and a 15th place finish. Representing Marshall these past five years has been an absolute joy and ending my career at the national meet is the perfect way to finish."

Herring, who was a four-time state qualifier at Parkersburg South and earned all-state after a fourth-place showing in 2015 as a freshman, finished runner-up last month en route to earning first team All-Sun Belt Conference honors.

"Where we have not had too many athletes make the national meet, this shows it is possible," admitted Thundering Herd head coach Caleb Bowen. "Abby is a girl from Parkersburg South.

"She is a local West Virginian. Hopefully, it shows more and more West Virginians that they can do great things, and hopefully our team as well."

Coach Bowen added of Herring "as a coach this is one of the coolest accomplishments. It's awesome. She's developed amazingly and put in a lot of hard work.

"It's really cool to see people see the benefits of doing all the hard work. Abby's just a leader and she shows it by example."

Herring said it was "kind of weird" to be getting so much attention, but admitted of the feat "it's really special.

"My achievements are for the team. Even coming out of high school you don't have to be anything special to do great things in college."

HerdZone.com contributed