BELLEVILLE, Ill. – The Webster University women's cross country program had six runners and head coach Dan Graber named to the St. Louis Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SLIAC) 2010-19 All-Decade Team that were announced Thursday by the league office.
 
Webster has a league-best seven overall selections to the 18-member All-Decade Women's Cross Country Team. In addition to Webster's seven selection, Greenville was next with four selections, whole Principia had three selections and Westminster had two selections. Fontbonne and Spalding each had one selection each.
 
To be named to the All-Decade Team, the selections were made using a system that awarded points based on All-Conference selections. In addition, any player receiving the top individual award during a season (Runner of the Year) earned a selection. Additionally, coaches were picked based on Coach of the Year accolades won during the decade. Graber, who is the second Webster coach to earn a SLIAC Coach of the Decade honor as men's soccer coach Mike Siener was honored last week, took home the Decade Coach of the Year honor thanks to earning the last three Coach of the Year honors after leading the Gorloks to three consecutive SLIAC titles. In fact, Webster had four Coach of the Year honors in the decade as Graber's predecessor, Dusty Lopez, earned the SLIAC Coach of the Year in 2011.  



During the last 10 seasons, Webster closed the decade by winning three consecutive SLIAC titles and won four overall titles in the decade as they won the titles in 2011, 2017, 2018 and 2019 and were runners-up in 2010 and 2016. Webster's four league titles in the decade were the most by any school in the league in the decade as Greenville won two titles in 2014 and 2016, while Principia won titles in 2010 and 2012. Westminster and Spalding took home league titles in 2013 and 2015 respectively.
 
Along with their success on the course with four league titles and two runner-up finishes, that success was parlayed into recognition for Webster's runners as the six Gorlok runners on the SLIAC 2010-19 Women's Cross Country All-Decade Team earned a combined 20 All-SLIAC honors, including earning a combined 17 First-Team All-SLIAC accolades and two athletes, Holly Goegen and Heather Heisse were each four-time All-SLIAC honorees. Two of the All-Decade selections Valerie Martin and Kalleigh Linthicum were SLIAC individual champions and SLIAC Runners of the Year as Martin took home both honors in 2015 and Linthicum won both honors in 2019. In addition, four of the All-Decade selections earned a total of nine SLIAC Runner of the Week accolades.
 
Here are Webster's seven SLIAC 2010-19 All-Decade Women's Cross Country Team selections.
 
Dan Graber (2013-present) | Coach
Since becoming Webster's coach in 2013, Graber has led the Gorloks to three consecutive SLIAC titles to close out the decade and also finish as the league runner-up in 2016. Along with winning three league titles, Graber has also been selected as the SLIAC Coach of the Year in 2017, 2018 and 2019. Along with winning three league titles, Graber has helped the Gorloks become one of the top women's cross country programs in the SLIAC. Since his arrival, Graber has seen his squad improve their showing at the NCAA Regionals as they went from placing 31st in 2014 to earning an 18th place finish in 2019.

Holly Goergen (2014-17) | Phoenix, Ariz.
In her four years as a Gorlok from 2014-17, Goergen was a four-time All-SLIAC selection, including being a three-time First-Team All-SLIAC selection in 2015, 2016 and 2017. She recorded six Top 10 finishes, including a third place finish at the 2017 SLIAC Championships en route to helping lead the Gorloks to their second-ever league title. She posted nine career Top 20 placements, was a Runner of the Week in 2016 and earned the Webster Athletics' Inspiration Award in 2016-17. She also has two of the Top 5 all-time 6K times in program history as her time of 23:09 at the 2017 NCAA Regionals is third in school history and her time of 23:17 at the 2017 SLIAC Championships is fifth all-time in program history.
 
Heather Heisse (2010-13) | Silex, Mo.
In the first four years of the decade, Heisse earned All-SLIAC honors all four years as she was a first team honoree in 2011, 2012 and 2013 and was a second team selection as a freshman in 2010. Recorded a third place finish at the 2013 SLIAC Championships and was also sixth in 2011 and seventh in 2012. Holds the school records in both the 6K and 5K as she ran a school record 6K time of 22:37 at the 2013 SLIAC Championships and her school record 5K time of 19:11 was set at the 2012 Missouri S&T Invitational. In fact, she has three of the school's five all-time top 5K times. Heisse recorded four Top 10 finishes in her career and had nine Top 20 placements.
 
Meghan Illig (2014-17) | St. Louis, Mo.
Illig ran in in the middle part of the decade and in her four years as a Gorlok, she was a three-time All-SLIAC honoree, including earning first team honors (2015, 2016, 2017) all of those three years. Along with earning three All-SLIAC accolades, she was also named a nominee for the NCAA Woman of the Year in 2017-18, a CoSIDA Google Cloud Academic All-District selection in 2017-18 and was selected as the Webster Athletics Scholar Athlete Award in 2017-18. Additionally, she earned two SLIAC Runner of the Week honors in 2017 and was a two-time member of the SLIAC Fall All-Academic Team in 2015 and 2017. Throughout her career, she had four Top 10 finishes and a school-record tying 11 Top 20 finishes. She also holds two of the top 10 6K times in the program's history with her time of 23:17 at the 2017 NCAA Regionals and her time of 23:32 at the 2017 SLIAC Championships.
 
Kalleigh Linthicum (2017-present) | Lake St. Louis, Mo.
The only current Gorlok that was named to the SLIAC 2010s Women's Cross Country All-Decade Team. Linthicum has been a three-time All-SLIAC honoree, including earning first team honors in 2018 and 2019. During the 2019 season, Linthicum became just the third Gorlok women's cross country runner to win the individual title at the SLIAC Championships and that individual title helped her earn the SLIAC Runner of the Year accolade. Along with being the league's individual champion in 2019, she also took home four SLIAC Runner of the Week accolades, set a school record in the 4K with a time of 15:11.4 at the Western Illinois Early Bird and recorded a school-best finish of 54th place at the NCAA Midwest Regionals as she ran the fifth fastest time (23:45.5) in an NCAA Regional in school history. Through her first three years as a Gorlok, she has had six Top 10 finishes, including a school record tying four Top 10 placements in 2019 and has also had three career Top 20 finishes and owns two of the top nine 6K times in school history. 
 
Valerie Martin (2014-16) | St. Louis, Mo.
One of the top women's cross country runners in school history, Martin was a three-time First-Team All-SLIAC selection and was the league's overall individual champion at the 2015 SLIAC Championships. Along with winning the league's individual title, she was the SLIAC Runner of the Year in 2015 and the SLIAC Newcomer of the Year in 2014. She was also a three-time member of the SLIAC Fall All-Academic Team and a two-time SLIAC Runner of the Week in 2015. Additionally, she took home the Webster Athletics President's Award in 2015-16. In her time at Webster, Martin had seven Top 10 finishes and 10 Top 20 finishes and currently holds the school's second fastest times in both the 5K (19:30) and 6K (23:07). Her 5K time was set at the 2015 Louisville Classic and the 6K time was set at the 2015 SLIAC Championships.
 
Meredith Sowers (2016-19) | Rolla, Mo.
Another solid four-year runner for the Gorloks, Sowers competed over the final four years of the decade and was a three-time First-Team All-SLIAC selection as she was honored in 2017, 2018 and 2019. Additionally, she was a three-time member of the SLIAC Fall All-Academic Team. As a Gorlok, Sowers placed seventh, third and fifth respectively in the SLIAC Championships in 2017, 2018 and 2019. In her time at Webster, Sowers, who was the NCAA Woman of the Year nominee this year and was also named the recipient of the 2019-20 Webster Athletics Chancellors Award, had four Top 10 and four more Top 20 finishes.