Charity Griffith Wins National High Jump Championship

AUSTIN, Texas - - In the final hours of competition in the 2022-23 Ball State competition calendar, the Cardinals had two athletes within reach of the school's first national championship since 1999. Senior high jumper Charity Griffith claimed that honor and junior Jenelle Rogers slipped from third to fifth in the heptathlon, after clinging to first place earlier in the competition.

Ball State earned two top-five finishes at the NCAA Outdoor Championships which concluded Saturday in Austin, Texas. Griffith's national title in the high jump is the fifth national championship by a Ball State athlete and the first since LaTasha Jenkins won the 200-meter dash in the 1999 NCAA Outdoor Championships. Ball State has never won a team national championship but owns three individual titles in swimming (Patricia Bergman in 1970 & 1971) and now two in track & field.

Griffith stunned the high jump field while blowing past her own personal best and school-record mark of 1.85 meters, eventually clearing 1.93 meters (6-4) while the rest of the competition failed to get past 1.90. Griffith coasted through her first three heights and, after her first miss, cleared 1.87 to break the Ball State record. With only four jumpers left, including top contenders Lamara Distin of Texas A&M and Elena Kulichenko of Georgia, Griffith took two tries again to clear 1.90. As the field failed at 1.90, Griffith then cleared 1.93 to extend her lead and triumphantly win the title.

For Griffith, it is her third top-five NCAA finish in the past 12 months – finishing fifth at last year's NCAA Outdoor Championships and fifth again in the Indoor Championships.

For Rogers, it was her first trip to the NCAA Championship field and, for much of the two-day heptathlon competition, it appeared she may earn a surprise win, too. She took the lead after the heptathlon shot put, the third event Friday evening, and she extended it after Friday's 200 meters and Saturday afternoon's long jump. To that point, Rogers finished each of the first five events in ninth place or better. But the javelin, the sixth event, was her downfall, finishing 20th and slipping to third place overall. She ran a personal-best 2:21.55 in the 800 meters in the final event, but the 10th-place 800 finish saw her slip to fifth overall.

Rogers' 6,018 heptathlon points set another school record and her finish in the heptathlon was the best ever by a Ball State athlete. Rogers became the 10th All-American in program history and joined Griffith among just four athletes in Cardinals history to finish in the top five of their respective event.

It was the first time in school history that Ball State produced multiple outdoor All-Americans in the same season and the first time two Cardinals earned top-10 finishes in the NCAA Outdoor Championships.

Charity Griffith Wins National High Jump Championship

Players Mentioned

Jenelle Rogers

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