Highland’s Floyd Whitaker advanced to the NCAA Championships with a clutch final-jump PR in the triple jump Friday.
Whitaker, a senior at Oklahoma, jumped 53-4 ½ on his 3rd and final attempt at the NCAA West Prelims at Bryan Stadium in College Station, Texas.
That ranks him 13th among U.S. men this year, according to the World Athletics database.
Whitaker needed to jump 52-1 ½ to make his way into the top 12 who advanced to next month’s NCAA Championships at Hayward Field in Eugene. His first two jumps were 51-0 ¼ and 51-5. But he increased his PR from 53-1 ½ from two weeks ago in Lexington, Ky., to 53-4 ½ and finished as the 5th qualifier out of the West Regional.
Only one jumper in the East Regional in Jacksonville on Friday surpassed Whitaker’s 53-4 ½, which means he goes into Eugene as the No. 6 seed. That jumper was Theophilus Mudzengere of South Carolina, who jumped 53-9.
Whitaker will compete in the NCAA triple jump final at Hayward Field at 5:10 p.m., Friday, June 13. He’s now within two inches of the South Jersey alumni record of 53-6 ½ set by Shawnee graduate Greg Foster in Flagstaff, Ariz., on May 14, 1988. Foster’s son Greg, a junior at Princeton, will also be in Eugene competing in the long jump after placing 4th in East Regionals on Wednesday.
Whitaker is now 5th on the all-time New Jersey alumni list. The record is 54-9 ½ by East Orange’s Norm Tate in Stuttgart, Germany, in 1970. Tate, an Olympian and three-time U.S. champion, is now an assistant coach at Rowan.
Whitaker, who began his college career at Minnesota, placed 9th in the indoor triple jump in March in Virginia Beach with a 52-2.
54-9 ½ … Norm Tate [East Orange], July 16, 1970, Stuttgart, Germany
54-7 ½ … Eric Bethea [Piscataway], June 7, 2019, Austin, Texas
53-7 ¼ … Devon Bond [Trenton], May 5, 2012, Lubbock, Texas [+1.5]
53-6 ½ … Greg Foster [Shawnee], May 14, 1988, Flagstaff, Ariz.
53-4 ½ … Floyd Whitaker [Highland], May 17, 2025, Lexington, Ky. [+0.9]
From the Backstretch by Reuben Frank 