DOUGLASVILLE, Ga. — Brian Herrien completed his comeback. He reached his goals last week, but it finally became official on Tuesday.
New Manchester High School assistant principal Shawn Bissell said Herrien’s transcripts finally became official around 11 a.m. on Tuesday morning. Herrien signed with UGA and becomes the 21st member of the signing class at UGA.
He didn’t have the best start to his high school academic career, but he wanted to play for UGA more than anything. That allowed him to improve his ACT score some two points and have just one “C” grade along with all “As and Bs” during the final two years of his school career.
New Manchester head coach Myron Terry had a most appropriate comparison for Herrien’s classroom comeback.
“This was being down 21-3 late in the third quarter and we didn’t have the ball,” Terry said. “It looked bleak. You just punted and haven’t gotten a first down all game. Then you get the first one. Then you get a score. Then you get a strip sack and return it. That’s when his test score popped. Then he just kept rolling from there. Everything that was working against him, he wasn’t going to let it stop him.”
UGA signee Tyler Simmons, a close friend of Herrien, made it to the ceremony.
“I’m proud of him man,” Simmons told DawgNation. “He worked really hard for this and seeing it all pay off is a great feeling. Growing up we both wanted to sign to a Division-1 school and not only did we both get that chance, we get to experience it together. Now it’s just a matter of keeping that chip on his shoulder and drive of wanting to be great because it’s going to be a lot of competition, but it’s going to be fun.” Jeff Sentell covers UGA football and UGA recruiting for AJC.com and The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Follow him on Twitter for the latest on who’s on their way to play Between the Hedges. Unless otherwise indicated, player rankings and ratings are from the 247Sports Composite.