THE OFFICIAL SITE OF
Levelland High School Athletics

There is no special strategy, nor a particular routine before throwing. Myles Johnson just simply competes. The Levelland senior earned a state bid after placing second with a throw of 50-feet, two inches, in the shot put during the Region I-4A track and field meet on Friday at PlainsCapital Park at Lowrey Field. Johnson entered the meet with a personal best seed mark of 47 feet, 10 ¾ inches, which he set during the area meet a week ago. He upped the ante Friday. Lobos coach Ty Byrd said it’s the best mark he could find in school records. “It just came out of nowhere. I’m still in shock,” Johnson said. It wasn’t that long ago when Johnson was just starting out as a sophomore and throwing around 35 feet. He’s worked on his technique and is reaping the ultimate reward of going to the Class 4A state meet May 11 at Mike A. Myers Stadium on the campus of the University of Texas in Austin. Field events are set to begin at 8 a.m. While the big stage of the state meet may be intimidating, especially for someone going for the first time, Johnson is looking forward to the experience. “Usually, I just like to stay cool and don’t let anything affect me. Just keep to myself,” he said. Lamesa’s Genesis Coker closed out her season with a sixth-place finish of 35-9 in the triple jump, while Snyder’s Christian Escobedo was fourth in the 3,200-meter run with a time of 10:06.24. Estacado high jumper Symphony Brown was ninth with a mark of 4-8. She will have one more chance to go to state, though, as a member of the Lady Matadors’ 1,600-meter relay team. The group made it out of Friday’s preliminaries with a second-place finish of one minute, 44.42 seconds. The squad’s 400-meter relay had the fastest preliminary time of 48.15 to reach Saturday’s finals. Za’Kaja Neloms (12.16 seconds) and Ty’Trice Conor (12.40) will have a full plate as the two both made the 100-meter dash finals in addition to being on the two relay teams. Malaysia Payton, who runs the second leg of the 1,6100 team, will compete in the open 100 after posting a preliminary time of 12.46. Aaniya Hawkins will try her hand at two finals events after making it in the 100-meter hurdles (16.09 seconds) and 300-meter hurdles (49.16). Eboni Adams earned a finalist spot in the open 200 with a preliminary time of 26.24. On the boys side, the Matadors also made the 400 finals with a top time of 42.48. Individually, RJ Steele stayed alive by finishing seventh in the 110-meter hurdles prelims (16.02 seconds). The Golden Tornadoes’ James Rodriguez posted a second-best preliminary time of 15.13 seconds to advance to the finals in the high hurdles, but missed the 300-meter hurdles finals by 0.15. Teammate Zakari Quintanilla ran a 10.97 in the 100-meter dash and 22.12 in the 200 to make the final day of regionals.

THE OFFICIAL SITE OF
Levelland High School Athletics

LEVELLAND’S JOHNSON THROWS PR FOR STATE BID

ALEXIS CUBIT

Lubbock Online | 4/27/2019

PHOTO CREDIT: Levelland Athletics