Marshall football player shot in the back released from hospital

Good news out of Huntington as a Marshall football player who was shot over the weekend has been released from a local hospital.

According to The Herald-Dispatch, freshman defensive lineman Dante James Walker took a bullet to his lower back on Saturday night while walking the street:

According to Huntington Police Chief Hank Dial, Walker told police he had been walking along 10th Avenue with a friend when they heard shots fired and he was shot in the upper right part of his back. Police were notified of the incident when he arrived at an area hospital under his own power.

It’s not often you hear of a person getting shot and then going to the hospital on their own without assistance but football players are certainly a bit of a different breed when it comes to these sorts of things.

“We are aware of a shooting involving a Marshall student-athlete, who we expect to make a full recovery,” Assistant Athletic Director for Media Relations Jason Corriher told the paper.

A three-star recruit who was once committed to Arkansas, Walker was expected to play a big role for the Thundering Herd as a freshman this season in boosting depth along the defensive line. Those concerns of seeing the field are taking a back seat to him getting fully healthy after this incident however.

Marshall open their 2019 campaign at home against Virginia Military Institute on Aug. 31.