June 1, 2005

COMMERCE - Five Texas A&M University-Commerce Lions earned All-America status after their competition at the NCAA Division II Track and Field Championships at Elmer Gray Stadium in Abilene last Thursday through Saturday.

Lion sophomore sprinter Delrick Taylor earned two All-America honors as he placed fifth in the 100 meter dash in a time of 10.63 seconds and was the second leg of the Lions eighth place 4x100 meter relay team.

Taylor, who qualified for the 100 finals with a season-best 10.47 dash in the preliminaries, actually gained fifth by one one-thousandth of a second with a clocking of 10.628 to Abilene Christian's Marvin Bien-Aime at 10.629 in sixth.

The 4x100 team of senior Tommie Jemerson, Taylor, freshman Greg Strickland and sophomore Danny Cobbin earned All-America with a season-best of 40.60 seconds in placing eighth. Freshman Levi Ogana ran the anchor leg in the preliminaries before pulling up in open 100 prelims.

Lion senior Marques McCullough went out in style, competing in both the shot put and discus. He recorded a personal best of 54 feet, 1 inch in the shot last Friday to place 11th. In most seasons, that would have been an All-American mark, but with the top three competitors in the event bettering the meet record, it was not to be.

McCullough was 14th in the discus with a toss of 160-0, just missing a season-best.

Lion senior Steven Stevens battled in the hammer throw on Saturday, placing 10th in the competition with a toss of 183-1.

The track and field championships closed the 2004-05 athletic year for A&M-Commerce.

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