Jordan Wenger was camping with his family when his phone lit up with a text from a number he didn't recognize. The message was from a college track coach at a school he had barely heard of. He almost didn't reply.

Good thing his mom talked him into it.

That text — sent out of the blue by Oral Roberts University jumps Coach Tre Manning — set in motion a chain of events that has turned a Colorado Springs kid into one of the most promising high jumpers in the country. As a sophomore, Wenger sits third nationally and carries the indoor Summit League championship on his shoulders heading into what he hopes will be a deep run at the NCAA Outdoor Championships.

A Reluctant Convert

If you had told Jordan Wenger in his freshman year of high school that his future was in track and field, he would have laughed. Basketball was his world. His father coaches the sport and teaches at the Classical Academy, the private charter school in Colorado Springs where Wenger grew up running the halls and watching practice. The family breathed hoops.

Track, by contrast, was almost accidental. Wenger competed, improved and kept improving — even though his focus and his heart remained on the hardwood. But somewhere around his junior year, an uncomfortable truth began to surface: he was better at the event he barely practiced than the one he worked at every day.

"It bothered me that I was better at track than basketball, even though I didn't work on it as much."

— Jordan Wenger

The reckoning came quietly. College track is a year-round commitment, he knew, which meant a choice had to be made. Basketball had been a constant companion, a piece of his identity shaped by his father's influence. Letting it go wasn't easy. But the scholarship opportunities in track were real, and the ceiling felt higher. He made the call.

The Visit That Changed Everything

When Coach Tre Manning reached out, ORU wasn't on Wenger's radar. He had visits lined up at bigger programs — including University of Colorado, where he watched a game from the sidelines while Shedeur Sanders orchestrated the Buffs' resurgence. It was a glamorous afternoon. But something about the ORU visit stuck with him in a way the glitter of Boulder couldn't replicate.

The difference was personal attention. Where larger programs bundled recruits together in groups, Coach Tre Manning structured the entire ORU visit around Wenger alone. Every meal, every tour, every conversation — tailored specifically to one athlete. Wenger noticed. He also hadn't expected to be walked into chapel, a reminder that this school's identity runs deeper than its athletics. Coming from a faith background himself, it resonated.

He committed to ORU. (The dorms, he later discovered after some frantic online research, were not exactly the luxury apartments featured in the virtual tour. But he got over it.)

Building an Edge Without the Resources

Wenger is under no illusions about the gap between ORU's facilities and those of the power programs he competes against. There is no dedicated indoor high jump apron. During the winter months, Coach Tre Manning has gotten creative — salvaging turf torn up from the AC, rolling it out in the Chapman facility, fashioning a makeshift runway where a proper one doesn't exist. It works. But it isn't Arkansas.

Rather than dwell on what isn't there, Wenger has built his edge in the margins — specifically, in the tendons and ligaments most athletes ignore. Every day, beyond scheduled weights and practice, he performs Achilles tendon strengthening exercises. It's unsexy, unglamorous work. But he points to the elite jumpers at the top of the sport and sees a pattern: thick, bulletproof Achilles tendons that let them explode off the ground with elastic efficiency, over and over, all season long.

"If I can focus on the little things, I feel like they're going to turn into bigger things."

— Jordan Wenger

The approach reflects his entrepreneurial mindset — an area that extends beyond the track. Wenger is an entrepreneurship major and already has two ventures in early stages: an online car accessories business and a marketing and ad campaign strategy company. He chose the major in part because it integrates disciplines, but also because he simply cannot picture himself in a conventional job. He wants to build things.

The Mental Game

High jump has a uniquely brutal psychological structure: you always end on a miss. Every single competition concludes with a bar you failed to clear. For a competitor as driven as Wenger, learning to live with that has been its own discipline.

His solution is conversation. After meets — even the good ones — he needs to decompress by talking through what happened. Last year, that meant late-night sessions with his roommate and fellow high jumper Kellen, the two of them sitting up past midnight unpacking every jump. This year, his wife has taken on much of that role.

Married at 19, Wenger describes his wife as the grounding force that helps him hold perspective. When he jumped a personal best of 7'2¼" at a meet earlier this season, then missed his attempt at 7'5", the disappointment was real. She reminded him what he had accomplished, not just what had slipped away. It's a small thing. It makes a large difference.

The Road to Nationals

The path forward is clear and the stakes are real. After capturing the indoor Summit League title, Wenger has his sights locked on making the NCAA Outdoor Championships — something that eluded him last year when he narrowly missed qualifying out of regionals.

This year carries a different kind of pressure. The 7'2¼" mark he posted earlier in the season has raised expectations and raised the floor. Making a return trip to regionals without replicating that performance would mean watching Nationals from home. The cushion that came with being an unknown freshman is gone.

He's fine with that. Asked which Olympics he expects to compete in, Wenger didn't hesitate. The answer was immediate, confident and unembellished: all of them.

There was no camping trip required to see that one coming.
 

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