USTFCCCA Release
NEW ORLEANS, La. – The U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association (USTFCCCA) has announced that six members of the Tigers’ Track & Field program have earned All-American honors following their qualification for the NCAA Division I Indoor Track & Field Championships this past March. The six individuals include Devon Brooks, LaFranz Campbell, Marcus Parker, Laurie Barton, Andrea Foster and Rebekah Smith.
These are the first NCAA Division I Indoor All-American honors for Brooks, Campbell, Parker, Foster and Smith. For Barton, this is her second indoor All-American honor. Barton’s first was earned at the 2018 indoor national championships as a member of Virginia Tech’s distance medley relay.
Brooks and Campbell were respectively ranked No. 11 and No. 12 in the NCAA for the 60-meter hurdles entering the national championships. The two ran the fourth and fifth-fastest times, respectively, in program history following their excellent performances throughout the season. Campbell finished fourth overall in the event at the ACC indoor championships with Brooks just seven-hundredths of a second behind in fifth. This was the third time Clemson has had two men qualify for an indoor national championship meet in the event in program history, with the prior occurrences happening in 2001 and 2013.
During this past season, Parker became Clemson’s eighth all-time individual qualifier in the men’s indoor 200 meters. Parker experienced a historic season in the event, running the No. 3 mark in program history at the Tiger Paw Invitational. His time of 20.70 at the meet made him finish the indoor season ranked No. 6 in the NCAA and No. 8 in the World. In his five races at the 200-meter distance this season, Parker went undefeated. At the season opener on Dec. 7, Parker set Clemson’s lone school record during the campaign by running 33.20 in the 300 meters.
This is just the third time in men’s program history that All-American honors have been earned in the 60-meter hurdles and the 200 meters in the same season. The first two occurrences happened at the 1999 and 2000 indoor championships.
Barton and Foster made Clemson the only school with multiple athletes in the women’s 800 meters for this year’s indoor national championships. The two were set to enter the meet following their 1-2 sweep of the event at the ACC indoor championships, with Barton winning the event in a season’s best time of 2:04.04 and Foster earning a new personal best with her result of 2:04.98. The results at the meet made Barton the fourth-best performer in program history, while Foster is now tied for sixth-best on the program’s all-time list. Barton and Foster also rank fourth and fifth, respectively, on the all-time list for the women’s 1,000 meters following their performances early in the season.
This is the second time in program history that two women have earned All-American honors in the event in the same season. The first occurrence was in 2018, as Kamryn McIntosh and Fellan Ferguson combined for second-team All-American honors.
Rebekah Smith earns All-American honors in the women’s 60 meters after running the fourteenth-best time in the country with her mark of 7.23 which she ran at the LSU Twilight as well as during the preliminary round of the event at the ACC indoor championships. Smith’s mark served as a personal best and made her the No. 3 performer in program history for the event. Following Smith’s performance at the LSU Twilight on Feb. 21, she was named the ACC Women’s Track Performer of the Week.
This is the first time in Clemson’s history that All-American honors have been earned in the women’s 800 meters and 60 meters in the same season.
In accordance with the decision made by the USTFCCCA Board of Directors, all athletes declared as a part of the post-medical scratches start list have earned All-American honors for the indoor season. There is no distinction of first-team, second-team or honorable mention with this year’s recognitions. A total of 671 honors were handed out to 119 different institutions on Tuesday.
