By Woody Woodrum
The November 10th blog entry about the winless streak the '69 Thundering Herd broke (0-26-1) made me recall a similar streak at Marshall.
When Marshall joined the Southern Conference in 1977, the Herd went 0-26-1 in the league, only tying Western Carolina 13-13 in 1980 on freshman Barry Childers’ 59-yard field goal (still the longest in NCAA history for a freshman). MU finally broke through in 1981 with a win at Appalachian State.
For a team that improved to 2-8 on the year, there was a Huntington Police escort into town from the Hurricane (West Virginia) exit and 3,000 or so people waiting for the team at 18th Street in front of Gullickson Hall.
When coach Sonny Randle was asked if the monkey was off Marshall's back, he replied: "That was no monkey. That was King Kong!"
Woody Woodrum, is the senior editor for the Herd Insider publication and co-host of the Insider Sportsline talk show on WRVC/SuperTalk 94.1FM in the Tri-State (West Virginia, Ohio and Kentucky).
No comments:
Post a Comment