MORGANTOWN — In its 37th year of honoring the nation’s best high school athletes, Gatorade announced Monday that Morgantown High’s Irene Riggs is the 2021-22 Gatorade West Virginia Girls Cross-Country Runner of the Year.
She won the award last year, as well, and is the second MHS runner to claim the Gatorade West Virginia Girls Cross-Country Player of the Year (Lea Hatcher, 2019-20).
The award, which recognizes not only outstanding athletic excellence, but also high standards of academic achievement and exemplary character demonstrated on and off the field, distinguishes Riggs as West Virginia’s best high school girls cross-country runner. Now a finalist for the Gatorade National Girls Cross-Country Runner of the Year award to be announced in February, Riggs joins an elite alumni association of state award-winners in 12 sports, including Lukas Verzbicas (2010-11 & 2009-10, Carl Sandburg High School, Orland Park, Ill.), Megan Goethals (2009-10, Rochester High School, Rochester Hills, Mich.), Jordan Hasay (2008-09, Mission College Preparatory Catholic High School, San Luis Obispo, Calif.) and Chris Derrick (2007-08, Neuqua Valley High School, Naperville, Ill.).
Riggs, the 5-foot-7 junior, won her second-straight Class AAA state meet last season with a time of 18:24.88, breaking the tape 34.81 seconds ahead of her next-closest competitor and leading the Mohigans to a first-place finish as a team. Riggs took eighth at the Eastbay South Regional Championships and finished 14th at the Eastbay Cross-Country Championships, to earn All-American honors.
Vice president of her class at MHS for three years, Riggs has volunteered locally as part of fundraising campaigns to benefit the WVU Medicine Children’s Hospital, and she has donated her time as a youth swimming coach.
“Irene is a gifted athlete with a tremendous work ethic,” MHS coach Mike Ryan said. “She is willing to train on her own in the off-season and finds time to do the little things.”
Riggs has maintained a weighted 4.13 GPA in the classroom. She will begin her senior year of high school this fall. The Gatorade Player of the Year program annually recognizes one winner in the District of Columbia and each of the 50 states that sanction high school football, girls volleyball, boys and girls cross-country, boys’ and girls’ basketball, boys’ and girls’ soccer, baseball, softball, and boys’ and girls’ track & field, and awards one National Player of the Year in each sport. The selection process is administered by the Gatorade Player of the Year Selection Committee, which leverages experts including coaches, scouts, media and others as sources to help evaluate and determine the state winners in each sport.
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