Marquette Track & Field: Wally Ellenson Finishes 5th In The High Jump At The 2015 NCAA Outdoor Championships

With a top clearance of 2.19 meters on Friday night, Marquette's very own Wally Ellenson finished fifth in the high jump at the 2015 NCAA Outdoor Track & Field Championships.

Ellenson's night was going extremely well until the bar lifted to 2.22 meters.  After passing on the first height, the junior from Rice Lake, Wisconsin, cleared the next four heights on his very first attempt.  In high jump, ties are broken by having the fewest missed jumps, so Ellenson had put himself in excellent position by not missing a jump through five heights.  When things reached 2.22 meters, though, Ellenson ran into difficulty.  He missed on all three of his jumps at that height, ending his competition.  Ellenson's first miss at 2.22 meters was his first unsuccessful leap in eight attempts, as he made all of his jumps at the Regional preliminaries and won the Big East high jump title previous to that.

Ellenson came close to clearing 2.22 meters, barely brushing the bar in his first two tries.  Ultimately, though, he wasn't able to clear it, leaving four competitors still in the field after he was eliminated.  Texas Tech's Jacorian Duffield and Mark Adkins switched their placements from the indoor national championships, with Duffield coming out on top this time with a winning leap of 2.28 meters.  Had Ellenson stayed in the competition long enough to surpass Duffield, he would have set a new Marquette school record, surpassing his own mark of 2.28.

The season is not over for the freshly minted three time All-American, though.  Ellenson will be back in action in two weeks back out at Historic Hayward Field in Eugene, Oregon, when he competes in the U.S. Track & Field Outdoor Championships.

We'll wrap up with video of Ellenson clearing 2.19 meters, via the Marquette Track & Field/Cross Country Facebook page: