First and Ben

 By Ben Anderson      Sun Belt Conference Tournament seedings are on the line Friday night when Marshall men’s basketball welcomes the Appalachian State Mountaineers.      The Herd currently is on a three-game winning streak and sits fifth in the conference and one game behind starting the fourth round of the tournament. The Mountaineers are sixth and trail the Herd by one game.      Marshall enters at 18-12 (11-6), coming off an 83-66 victory against Old Dominion. Appalachian State is 17-12 (10-7) after a 61-59 loss against Georgia Southern.      The matchup marks the second time this month that the two teams will square off. Marshall won in Boone on Saturday, 69-59.      Marshall leads the all-time series against Appalachian State 35-20, with the Thundering Herd leading in Huntington 19-5.      Leading the way for the Herd is Obinna Anochilli-Killen, who ranks second in the nation in total b...

 By Ben Anderson      Marshall Track & Field aims to bring home gold for the third consecutive conference championship meet when it travels to Birmingham Alabama Monday for the Sun Belt Conference Indoor Championships.       Leading the way for the women’s team entering the meet is graduate senior cross country runner Kylee Mastin, who broke the women’s school 1k record with a time of 9:21.31 in the David Henry Valentine Invitational in Boston over the weekend.       Marshall cross country head coach Caleb Bowen said that taking Mastin to Boston was to bring her a challenge that she will have to face at the Sun Belt Conference Indoor Championships.      “The David Henry Valentine Invitational is literally the biggest and most competitive meet in indoor track,” Bowen said during an interview with First and Ben. “When we sat down right before and right after Liberty (Open) we knew that she needed some extra hel...

 By Ben Anderson      Early turnovers haunted Marshall Women’s Basketball as it fell to the Coastal Carolina Chanticleers 66-57.      The Chanticleers quickly jumped to 8-0 in the first two minutes following back-to-back steals.       “We could have not started the game worse,” Marshall head coach Juli Fulks said during the postgame news conference. “It was a really tough start. We didn’t have the intensity we needed so they jumped us on a couple of turnovers for layups right away.”      The Thundering Herd would find itself down by eleven at the end of the first quarter as the Chanticleers led 20-9.      Marshall jump started its offense in the second quarter, outscoring Coastal Carolina 17-14. The Herd got as close as it would to tying the Chanticleers getting within two in the second quarter off a bucket by Aislynn Hayes with 4:16 left in the half to make it 25-23.      The Chanticleer...

 By Ben Anderson      Marshall football Wednesday welcomed its first signing class under head coach Tony Gibson at national signing day.      The Thundering Herd is coming off a season where it finished 10-3 and won the Sun Belt Conference Championship. After the season ended, the Herd was forced to withdraw from its bowl game after over 30 players entered the transfer portal after former coach Charles Huff left to take the job at Southern Miss.      The Herd under coach Gibson introduced 62 new players to the team including 48 transfers and 14 high school signees.       Coach Gibson says that recruiting in the state was a big emphasis during the process.      “One of the eleven full-time coaching staff members have a tie from the state of West Virginia or Marshall University,” Marshall head football coach Tony Gibson said. “Our first time we were allowed on the road because of the dead period was a few...

 By Ben Anderson      Marshall men’s basketball made a comeback to get within two points after trailing by as much as 20, but it was not enough as the Herd fell Thursday 86-81 against Georgia State.       The game started hot in the advantage of the visiting Panthers, making seven of its first eight shots and    taking a 11-5 lead.      Marshall then turns on the intensity as Mikal Dawson would hit four trifectas in a span of two minutes as Marshall would go on a 14-4 run to take a 24-20 lead with 11:52 remaining in the first half.       “It was a good run, but we shot 30 threes in 66 shots,” Marshall head men’s basketball coach Corny Jackson said in his postgame news conference. “That’s probably too many, even though we made 12. I want to see us attack the basket a bit more and get to the line.”      The Panthers quickly responded by outscoring Marshall 33-11 in the final 11:25 of the fi...

 By Ben Anderson      This past weekend, Marshall Track & Field broke numerous school records in the Hokie Invitational at Virginia Tech University.      Leading the way for the men’s team was freshman sprints runner Micah Cotes, breaking the men’s indoor 300-meter dash record with a time of 34.54 on day one of the competition.      Director of Track & Field and Cross-Country Keith Roberts said that Cotes' work ethic is what stands out about him the most.      “That entire meet he was like an iron man,” Roberts said in an interview with FM88 Sports Ben Anderson. “[He] did four events day one with a school [record] but then finished day two with a great split on the four by four. His mentality is like that every day comes in and goes to work and he really wants to be great and take it to the next level and when people do that, it's great to see them reap the benefits of the work that they put in.”    ...

 By Ben Anderson      Marshall men’s basketball aims to extend its winning streak to four games on Thursday when it welcomes the Georgia State Panthers to the Cam Henderson Center.       The Thundering Herd earned its first road win of the season during its most recent four game stretch and hasn’t looked back since.      Marshall enters the contest at 13-9 (6-3) and ranked 5th in the Sun Belt Conference. Georgia State is 7-14 (3-6) and ranked 12th in the league.      The Herd is coming off a 71-67 road victory over the Georgia Southern Eagles. The Herd is 10-2 at home this season. The Panthers aim to end a four-game skid and earn its first road win of the season where they are 0-7 on the season.       The contest marks the sixth overall meeting between the two programs and the second in the past two weeks. On Thursday, Marshall defeated Georgia State in Atlanta 92-79. Marshall leads the series 5-1 ...