South Central region honors for Fred Kerley, Lindon Victor, Pat Henry, and Alleyne Francique

EUGENE – Region honors presented by United States Track & Field Cross Country Coaches Association were announced on Sunday and Texas A&M earned four honors for this outdoor season.
 
Aggie seniors Fred Kerley and Lindon Victor were recognized as South Central Runner of the Year and Field Athlete of the Year. Texas A&M head coach Pat Henry was named men's South Central Coach of the Year while Alleyne Francique garnered men's Assistant Coach of the Year.
 
Kerley and Victor both broke collegiate records this outdoor season and were part of the Aggie national team title during the indoor season.
 
Breaking a 25-year-old record in the 400m, Kerley ran 43.70 in Austin during the quarterfinal of the NCAA West Preliminary rounds. The previous collegiate record of 44.00 was also set in Austin by USC's Quincy Watts during the 1992 NCAA Championships.
 
During the SEC Championships, Kerley threatened the collegiate record with a 44.09 performance in the prelims. He bettered the SEC meet record of 44.29 set by LSU's Derrick Brew in 1999. In the SEC final Kerley claimed the title in 44.30. So far this season he has produced the No. 1, 3, and 9 performances on the all-time collegiate list.
 
Another collegiate record Kerley was part of this spring came as the lead-off leg of the sprint medley relay that clocked 3:11.94 during the SEC Relays. Kerley has also run second leg of the Aggie 4x400, supplying sub-44 second splits, as Texas A&M produced four world-leading times in winning titles at the Texas Relays (3:01.74, 43.5 split), SEC Relays (3:00.74, 43.7), SEC Championships (3:00.72, 44.1) and NCAA West (3:00.69, 43.9).
 
Victor heads into the NCAA Championships this week in Eugene as the defending decathlon champion. His 2017 outdoor campaign opened with a collegiate record score of 8,472 points at the Texas Relays and included the best ever first day score by a collegian at 4,516 points.
 
During the SEC Championships, Victor defended his conference title and improved his meet record while also adding points to his collegiate record with an effort of 8,539 points. This time Victor also produced the best ever second day score by a collegian with 4,174 points.
 
On the all-time collegiate list, Victor has generated four of the top seven performances over the past two seasons with his scores ranking 1, 2, 6 and 7.
 
In his 13^th season with the Aggies, Coach Henry's squad claimed its second men's SEC Outdoor title since joining the league in 2012-13 and also won the inaugural SEC Relays held this season at LSU. Texas A&M men have been ranked No. 1 in the USTFCCCA national team computer rankings since the end of April.
 
The Aggie men qualified 26 entries in 18 events for the NCAA West Preliminary round and advanced a national best 18 entries in 14 events for the NCAA Championship weekend, June 7-10, in Eugene.
 
Francique is in his ninth season as an assistant coach with Texas A&M. Coaching the middle distance group, he produced a pair of SEC 800m champions with freshman Devin Dixon and sophomore Jazmine Fray. Both Dixon and Fray anchored sprint medley relay efforts that produced collegiate records during the SEC Relays. Francique also assisted with coaching Victor in the decathlon as well as the 4x400 relay.