TXST Track-and-Field Star Ja’Shaun Lloyd Dominates Sun Belt, Aims for NCAA Nationals

With Merritt’s coaching, Lloyd’s 110-meter hurdle time has improved throughout the season as he has adjusted to the collegiate hurdle height of 42 inches. That’s three inches taller than the hurdles Lloyd cleared last year en route to a Texas state high school championship with Corsicana High School. Lloyd’s goal is to run the 110-meter hurdles in the 12-second range, shaving tenths of a second from his personal best of 13.41.   

“Ja’Shaun’s freshman year has been very, very good so far,” Merritt says. “He’s exceeded all expectations. He’s actually run faster than I did as a freshman, which is interesting. In the 110 hurdles, I ran 13.47 as a freshman. He’s already run 13.41. That’s incredibly good for someone learning how to negotiate the senior height [42-inch hurdles].”  

Frazier agrees. Hired in 2022, Frazier now has four years of recruitment under his belt, allowing him to fully shape the Bobcat team for success in this year’s conference and NCAA championships.   

Last year, TXST sent 21 athletes to the West region meet, and four advanced to the national finals. This year, 23 Bobcat athletes are advancing to the regional meet, setting a new school record for the number of individual qualifiers.   

Lloyd is a central part of that.  

“The great thing about Ja’Shaun is he’s focused on winning as opposed to focusing on times,” Frazier says. “And I think that goes a long way because that means you’re a competitor. He’s just trying to find a way to be the guy out in front. Just don’t fall—finish your race.” 

Lloyd grew up in the town of Kerens, about 15 miles east of Corsicana, along with his twin brother, Ty’Shaun Lloyd. Ty’Shaun is also a talented sprinter on the Bobcat track team.  

Ja’Shaun says his uncle required all children in the family to play at least one sport, and he played basketball as a youngster. When he was 9 years old, his uncle brought him along to watch a track meet.  

“I’m just sitting there watching the relays and the 800. I’m like, ‘Oh, this is cool.’ And then they started bringing out barriers, and I was like, ‘Oh, what’s that?’ That immediately piqued my interest. It was the first time I’d ever seen someone hurdle. And I was like, ‘Oh, I want to do that.’”  

A couple of months later, the Lloyd twins joined a youth track club, and over the years they became standout runners. By the time he was a high school senior, Ja’Shaun won the UIL Texas State Championship in both the 100-meter hurdles and the 300-meter hurdles. The following summer of 2025, he placed first in the 110-meter hurdles at two of the nation’s most prestigious youth meets—USA Track and Field’s Under-20 Championships and Nike Outdoor Nationals.  

Coach Merritt was aware of Lloyd based on his success, and he knew the young hurdler could flourish at TXST. But first the coach faced the challenge of recruiting against the likes of national powerhouses LSU, USC, and Tennessee.   

“I presented Texas State as an extension of myself,” Merritt says. “I sold Texas State to the best of my ability, but I also sold myself because I have a lot of experience in the field. Who better to learn from than someone like me who’s done it at the highest level, who’s been at every single level of the sport from high school to college to professional?”   

Merritt describes Lloyd as an “intellectual hurdler.”   

“You have to describe things for him because he wants to understand it on a deeper level,” Merritt says. “That’s how I was when I was an athlete, and so we connected on that level.”  

Lloyd says he received interest from multiple schools, but he chose TXST because of its family feeling.  

“When I got here for my visit, I got to see how the team interacted with each other and how they interacted with Coach Aries,” he says. “That really grabbed my attention because I went to another school and it was just dead out there. But I felt like this school would take care of me, my coaches would take care of me.”