Morgantown's Irene Riggs has been named the 2021 Gatorade Female Cross Country Runner of the Year for West Virginia, making her a repeat winner of the award. Riggs was dominant in the regular season and capped that with a 35 second victory on a sloppy State Meet Course in 18:24. She followed that with an 8th place finish at the Eastbay South Regional with a time of 17:22, which is the 3rd fastest time recorded by a West Virginia female on that course. This made her one of the rare West Virginia qualifiers for Nationals. She upped her performance on the more difficult National course in San Diego, where she finished 14th (3rd among South Regional qualifiers) in 17:48.5.
A complete press release can be found at the Gatorade POY site.