It’s Preview Time!
With the outdoor track & field season licking off, it’s time to spotlight the top athletes who could dominate this spring. We’ve based our projections on performances from the 2025 outdoor season, results from this past winter campaign, and some inside knowldege.
Here we feature the boys’ jumping events, which include the long jump, triple jump, high jump, and pole vault.
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LONG JUMP
How do you follow up a season in which you break a state record and cap it off with a national title? We’ll find out this spring with Jalen Moseley of La Salle Academy, who accomplished both of those feats in this event.
The Rams’ gifted junior and indoor state titlist was virtually untouchable in his specialty. He claimed his state crown with a leap of 23-11.75 and surpassed the 24-foot mark three times during the season. That included a record-breaking jump of 24-3 at the New England Championships, eclipsing his own state mark set just three weeks earlier.
It was also at New Englands where he suffered his lone defeat—albeit a controversial one. With that setback behind him, Moseley responded in emphatic fashion, stunning the field by capturing gold at the New Balance Nationals in mid-March.
Where do you go from here? We’re predicting some big things from the La Salle standout, who always performs at his best when the pressure’s at its peak. Historically, long jumpers tend to reach greater distances during the outdoor season. With that in mind, is it really so far-fetched to imagine the versatile junior eclipsing the 25-foot mark? Under ideal conditions, we’re not ruling it out for Moseley, who also splits time as a standout baseball player during the spring.
The Rams’ star, who was second to Barrington’s Caleb Satisfield at last year’s outdoor states, is one of two returnees from that meet. Teammate Antonio Bearden was sixth overall.
Bearden was fourth at the State Meet this past winter with a PR of 21-6.5. He’s among several other leapers that have a chance to fill the podium. Those athletes include Satisfield, Rogers’ Derel Lloyd, Cumberland’s Matt Fontaine, and Barrington’s Patrick Trainor, who all have bests of more than 22 feet.
TRIPLE JUMP
Graduation hit this event hard, as five of last year’s state meet podium finishers have moved on, including the top two—Hunter Schobel of Pilgrim and Daniel Akan-Disu of St. Raphael Academy.
The top returnee based on distance is third-place finisher Diego Rocchio of The Prout School. The Crusaders senior closed out his 2025 season in impressive fashion, placing fifth at the New England Championships with a career-best leap of 45-1.5, an improvement of more than a foot.
Rocchio earns the early-season nod as the favorite to strike gold at the state meet, though the competitive picture will become clearer as the season unfolds. For now, several athletes are worth keeping an eye on, including Oluwadamilar Adebayo of Classical (43-2), Derek Lloyd of Rogers (41-10.5), Jon Richardson of Juanita Sanchez (41-3), Nathan Dorsey of Smithfield (41-1.5), and Kevin Barker of Toll Gate (41-1).
HIGH JUMP
The spotlight in this event falls squarely on Satisfield.
Satisfield enters as the defending champion after a superb year that was highlighted by a milestone performance – clearing seven feet at the Class B Championships. The Eagle senior is a dynamic multi-sport athlete, who also starred on the basketball court this winter, earning MVP honors while leading his team to a state title.
inal outdoor campaign, making him a formidable presence once again. He won last year’s State Meet by clearing 6-6, which matched his previous best prior to his seven-foot breakthrough.
La Salle’s Moseley, another multi-sport standout, captured the recent indoor state title by matching his personal best of 6-6. He is not expected to compete in the high jump at the championship meet, instead focusing on the long jump, a relay, and defending his state titles in the 110m and 300m hurdles.
Other top leapers include West Warwick’s Zachary Morgan, North Kingstown’s Cole Shotwell, and Prout’s Diego Rocchio. Rocchio and Shotwell, last winter’s state runner-up, have both cleared 6-4. Morgan, who soared to a personal-best 6-7 to win the Southern Division title last May, typically hovers around 6-2, but proved at the divisionals in 2025, that he’s capable of a breakthrough performance when it matters most.
POLE VAULT
Will a breakout star emerge in this event this spring?
Right now, it’s anyone’s guess who will come out on top at the State Meet, with most of the top vaulters clustered in the 11-6 to 12-6 range.
La Salle’s Judah Mullings is the early-season favorite after clearing a state-leading and personal-best 12-6 to win both the Class A and State Meet titles during the indoor season.
Barrington’s Kelly Hill showed consistency throughout the winter, reaching a best of 12-0 to win the Headley Division title and clearing 11-6 on four other occasions, including a runner-up finish to Mullings at the State Meet.
Other contenders include La Salle’s Stotwell, who owns a personal best of 12-1 from last year, and Smithfield’s Michael Farland, who cleared 12-0 in 2025. Both recorded season bests of 11-6 during the indoor campaign.
