Women's track team shines in A&M-Commerce Invitational

The Texas A&M University-Commerce track and field teams excelled in the A&M-Commerce Invitational on March 26, with the women's team winning first place in seven individual events and one team event and the men's team finishing with four individual first place wins. The women's team also had a player qualify for state in high jump.

"So far it's been good; we are only in the field events obviously," women's head coach Sara Davis said. "We have a young lady, Whitney Hargraves, who just provisionally qualified for state."

Hargraves, the junior jumper from Pleasant Grove, provisionally qualified for state with a long jump of 18-11. The women's team filled the podium in long jump with senior Breana Anderson-Burton finishing second with a distance of 17-11 ¼ and junior Starasia Childs rounding out third place with a distance of 17-07 ¾.

This was not the only dominance of the podium the women's team saw Saturday. They also took top-three in shot put, led by senior La'Shara Jefferson's 12.76m. Freshman Abigail Leaupepe-Tele placed second with 12.52m and freshmen Shirlia Lyons finished third with 11.36m. The Lions women's team also finished one-two-three in the discus throw, with the same ladies placing in the same order.

"Pretty decent season, it has been better than last year," senior Makesha Brewer said. "I know one of them (an athlete from the visiting team) got disqualified provisionally in the long jump on the girls side so we'll probably do pretty decent. I think we'll do pretty well, we have seen all these teams before."

The women of the Lions track and field team excelled in team events as well as the individual victories. They placed first in the 4x400 relay race with a combined time of 4:01.78, beating their competition by over eight seconds. They also placed second in the 4x100 meter relay race with a combined time of 49.01 seconds, just over two seconds behind first place.

"We are getting off to a pretty good start," Davis said. "We are going to be in Arlington next week for the really big meet with the Division I schools."

While the women's team prepares to participate in Arlington, Texas next week, the men's team will be looking at how to improve their performances. They struggled on their home turf Saturday, winning only four first place individual events, three second, and four third place finishes.

"It's a small meet, so it's about as good as it gets," freshman Bobby Strebeck said. "So far I'm in fourth, so I'm doing alright. We're looking pretty good, we have most of our set teams ready to go and we are hoping for the best. It'll be the first time our ‘A' teams are on the track this year."

Strebeck finished sixth in the long jump at 21 ½ feet and a first place finish in the high jump at 1.93m. The men's hurdles teams also fared well at this meet. Sophomore Craig Shelton took second place in the 100m hurdles with a time of 15.37 and junior Demetrius Holmes and sophomore Akeem Jackson took second and third in the 400m hurdles. The men's team events went well for the Lions, with two teams in the top five in the 4x400m relay.