Ryan Herring played his high school football and won a state championship in 1993 with his father, who was the head coach of the Oxford state championship team. His dad, Robert, was the head coach at Oxford from 1985-98, winning eight region championships and all three of the schools state titles.

His first head coaching job came in 2006 at Shelby County. Over the course of the next six seasons his teams finished a combined 40-15 with three playoff appearances.

Herring moved on to Lincoln for one season before returning home to Oxford in 2013. He coached winning teams during his tenure at Oxford, finishing 50-21. They also qualified for the playoffs in all but one year.

But at the end of the 2018 season, after leading Oxford to a 10-3 season, Herring stunned everyone when he announced that he would be leaving to take the head coaching job at Pierce County, Georgia.

He had coached there before in 2002-2003 as the teams defensive coordinator.

Herring in just his second season as head coach at Pierce County led the Bears to the state championship in Class AAA. In 2023 he repeated the feat as Pierce County again won a state championship.