Marshall University Athletics
AskeD&AnswereD: Q&A With Marshall AD Christian Spears
8/23/2024 3:00:00 PM | General
2024-25 initiatives the focal point as new sports year begins
HUNTINGTON, W.Va. – Marshall Athletics is pleased to present the August 2024 edition of AskeD&AnswereD – an inside look at intercollegiate athletics with Marshall Director of Athletics Christian Spears.
In this periodic segment, Spears will answer questions pertaining to the ever-changing world of intercollegiate athletics and the impact those changes have on the direction and future of Marshall University.
Q: As we start a new sports year, let's reflect on what was an exciting 2023-24 sports year. What moments stood out to you the most from 2023-24 and how much momentum do those moments help build going into 2024-25?
CS: We had a lot of them, right? We remember the Virginia Tech sellout. It was fun to win that game – and boy, was that a cool moment – something I think our fans will remember forever.
Seeing men's soccer finish the regular season No. 1 in the country and earn the No. 1 overall seed for the NCAA Tournament, winning 18 matches and a Sun Belt Championship twice with the regular season and the tournament and seeing what Chris did with those student-athletes in getting to that point, that was a pretty cool moment.
Then, of course, what Women's Basketball did. You know, 27 years ago, we found ourselves in an NCAA Tournament and it took all of that time to get back to one, and just watching the interaction with our student-athletes who experienced the championship season – some of those kids with multiple coaches and now they're on their third - and (to see) where I think we can go with that team and how we can just become the best team in the Sun Belt if we do everything right. Those are three moments that really stand out.
Q: With a new chapter beginning with 2024-25, give some insight as to the planning and implementation process for Marshall Athletics in order to achieve great things within competition and community initiatives during a calendar year.
CS: We do something called 'The Game Plan' that we do every single year. It is essentially a one-year strategic plan. We get input from our head coaches – 'Hey, what do you want the Game Plan items to be in your area' – and what do you think we as a department need to do. I also ask the Champions Advisory Board - a group of successful alums and donors who care about our program to help us understand what they'd like to see happen in our athletic department and programs. They give us great feedback.
Our own internal team comes up with good ideas that we try to implement within a year, everything we want to do in one year. The key to The Game Plan is that it has to be an initiative or item that we can complete in a year.
I always ask myself three simple questions: (1) Does this help our student-athletes have a remarkable experience on an initiative that we are trying to pull off? (2) Will it help us win on an initiative that we are trying to pull off? (3) Does it better connect us to our community on an initiative that we are trying to pull off? If those three things are all 'Yes', goshdarnit, it feels like we should get those done!
We have had over 100 things on our Game Plan each year that we've been here and our team has risen to the occasion to complete all of those items each year. That's pretty special and I think it will work again.
Q: In 2023-24, Marshall Athletics unveiled its Fans First initiatives, which saw great success in engaging Marshall fans with the various athletic programs. For 2024-25, that is being taken a step further with the "Fans First, Fans Forever" initiative. How does "Fans First, Fans Forever" build on last year's initiative while also bringing the athletic department closer to university initiatives?
CS: Part of our philosophy is trying to get our kids to love and commit to what they are doing, especially in the way college athletics is currently going. The transfer portal creates a new and unique dynamic and creating athletic programs that your student-athletes love and that they are committed to is our internal goal to make sure we have this remarkable experience.
We take that same level of commitment within our community. Let's not take for granted the fact that we have unbelievable people who care about this program, who come to our games, who support our student-athletes. So how do we make sure that our fans are first and that our fans feel like they are loved and we're committed to them? We need to create vehicles and initiatives that allow them to have awesome experiences at our venues.
No matter the outcome. If you come to a game and enjoy the experience, things are going to go well and you're going to have a good time and your family should be a part of it. Our student-athletes will rise to the occasion, so give us a chance to create a remarkable experience for you. I love the fact that our external team, our marketing areas, our ticket staff is trying to create 'Fans First, Fans Forever.' We don't control everything and that makes it hard, right, but what we do control, we can make as awesome as humanly possible, and that's what we're going to try to do this year.
Q: One of Marshall's upcoming new initiatives for the 2024-25 year is its "Safe To Stay With The Herd" initiative. Where did this initiative start and what changes will it bring to Marshall Athletics events that fans need to know about?
CS: We've been doing it our way for so long and now we have Campus Carry legislation that the state of West Virginia passed, and we have to be more mindful of what it takes to manage a venue and bring people in to an arena or a football stadium to make sure that every participant that comes into the venue is safe and secure, so we're going to have to do some things that all the other teams and stadiums that we visit do now.
Quite frankly, they've probably been doing it for two or three decades, some of them, so we have to catch up to what everyone else has been doing. We started that early a couple years ago with our Clear Bag policy and now we're going to venture into scanning through detections to make sure everyone who comes into our venue does so with the knowledge that they will be safe, that's it's going to be a great environment and they are going to watch an awesome game. It will be a change, but we'll navigate that change together with our Public Safety group and do so in a way that appreciates our fans and allows all of us to have the safest, most enjoyable experience at each and every one of our athletic events.
Q: Another cool initiative that was just announced includes HerdZone+. I know this is one that everyone is excited about. What can you tell us about HerdZone+ and what it will deliver to fans to bring them closer to Marshall Athletics?
CS: That 7-minute, 30-second Herd Knocks (episode), that was pretty good, right? We have a very talented Creative team that got really excited about doing something that gives the inside look of what happens in our athletic department to our fans and community that care about us.
It's very different than what you are going to see out in the marketplace. You are behind the scenes now, behind the curtain. You're in the huddle, you're in the locker room, you're with our coaches and experiencing the same things that our student-athletes experience.
There are people trying to do that, but maybe not the way that we're going to do it. It's a reasonable price-point, reasonable connection and managed through our website on a simple vehicle to utilize – I, myself, signed up the other day and watched Herd Knocks. I know B.A., I know our strength coach, but to see why he does what he does from his perspective was interesting. I think our fans will love the content that they are going to get from HerdZone+.
Q: One of the athletic highlights each year is the end-of-year nomination process for national recognition. Recently, this included in-state product Abby Herring being Marshall's nominee for the NCAA Woman of the Year Award. What did Abby mean to Marshall Athletics and how great of an honor was it for her to end her career with this distinction?
CS: There's no one who deserved that nomination more than Abby Herring. What she was able to accomplish in her time here at Marshall was extraordinary – it truly was! First times – things that have never happened before: (1) We hosted a cross country meet for the first time in decades – they couldn't remember the last time and (2) To see Abby qualify for the NCAA Championships – our first-ever female cross-country student-athlete to do that.
The success she had with breaking records and the person that she's become – academically, athletically, connected within our community – it absolutely embodies what the NCAA Woman of the Year nomination should be. It's the quintessential no-brainer and she's such a special kid. We got to know her really well throughout the year. She runs through the neighborhood that I live in and I'd see her and say, 'Hey, what are you doing out here?' and she'd answer 'I'm just doing my run!'
She's just such a good person. I actually got a call from the Notre Dame head coach who I was together with at Southern Illinois – he was our coach there and he's now the head coach at Notre Dame. He said, 'Where in the heck did you find this Abby Herring? That's a special kid! I looked at her times in high school and where she is now and the way she's developed is truly extraordinary, so tell Caleb (Bowen) he's doing a great job because she went from here as a high school athlete to here as a collegiate athlete. That's exactly the type of development you want to see – not just in her athletic ability but her total person. She's a proud Daughter of Marshall and We Are proud to have her as one.
For all the latest information about Marshall Athletics, follow @HerdZone on Twitter and Instagram.
To follow all Thundering Herd sports and get live stats, schedules and free live audio, download the Marshall Athletics App for iOS and Android.
---HerdZone.com---
