Wilde continues to defy the odds

If you lined up the 15 competitors in the women's high jump at the Big Sky Championships two weeks ago and were asked to choose a potential winner, Montana's Erin Wilde likely wouldn't be the first choice.

The sophomore from Whitefish stands at 5-8. She's shorter than most of her competition with a build that looks more like that of a distance runner than a high jumper. That's just the surface level. If you knew what she has been through to get to this moment, what is happening inside her back, you would be shocked to find that she could even jump in the first place.

It's part of what made it so impressive when Wilde easily outclassed her competition, passing multiple heights and needing just a single jump to seal a title. She's just a sophomore, but her trophy case already features three conference titles – two outdoor and one indoor – and the Montana school record.

"The feeling of being the smaller person, an underdog that people don't believe in, then they see you jump and you just hear, 'Wow.' That pushes me to be a better person and a better athlete," Wilde said.

Wilde now heads to Fayetteville, Ark. for her second straight appearance in the NCAA West Region First Round meet. She's scheduled to jump on Saturday at 1:00 p.m. (MT), where she will once again line up against some of the best athletes in the country. If you were going to count Wilde out, then you haven't been paying attention.

She started in track and field at a young age. Her father Kirk had participated in the sport growing up, and he got all of his kids started in the Junior Olympics program in Whitefish. His specialty, the high jump.

It seemed to make for an easy pairing of a father-daughter team. But Wilde, admittedly, was stubborn. "I was the one sibling that wanted to beat all the others but also just wanted to be different from them," Wilde said.

She chose long jump and triple jump, and found success from an early age. She also ran cross country and sprinted, participating in practically everything that she could get her hands on.

The success came early and often in the long and triple jump. "You could just see that she had that spring in her step early on," Kirk said of his daughter. But she still resisted the high jump up until the seventh grade.

Finally, Wilde caved and asked her father to teach her his ways. She picked it up quickly, just as he expected she might. Kirk coached both the middle school and high school teams for Whitefish. Erin cleared 5-0 as an eighth grader, which would have been the best mark on the varsity team.

But that's when things took a turn for the worse.

At a school physical, the nurse asked Erin why she hadn't marked down on her sheet that she had scoliosis. "Because I don't," she informed the nurse. But the back pain that she felt as a child wasn't because of growth spurts, as she suspected. It was scoliosis, and a severe case of it.

Scoliosis is a sideways curvature of the spine, and it's measured in severity based on the degree of the curve. In Wilde's case, her back resembled an S, with one curve measuring 50-degrees and the other 30-degrees. Anything over 40 degrees in considered severe, according to the Cleveland Clinic.

The family went to several doctors to see what kind of treatment could be done. Wilde put on a back brace to help try and stabilize it, but everywhere they went they received the same advice. She would need a spinal fusion, where a surgeon would fuse the bones of her spine together and use metal rods to hold it in place.

"We wanted to try to let her enjoy the remainder of her high school athletic career. We didn't want to cut it short before it started," Kirk said. "(The doctors) all said she could do some athletics, but they were things that didn't require the same level that she had."

She could be a goalie in soccer perhaps, but jumping in track and field, playing basketball, the things that she really wanted to do? Slim chance.

"My dad researched everything. He didn't want me to lose the mobility in my back because I always knew that I wanted to be an athlete," Wilde said. "It's definitely harder for people who have rods, you can't move your spine, and that was terrifying for me."

They put her on a waiting list for the surgery, but continued to research other options to see if there was anything out there that wouldn't limit her ability to compete in sports. That's when Kirk found information on a procedure called "vertebral body tethering."

In the U.S., the treatment wasn't FDA approved. Overseas, however, it was a much more common option for scoliosis, particularly in athletes. Instead of a rod fused to the spine, the treatment consists of a few small screws placed onto the spinal curve. They then thread a cord through the screws and tighten it, straightening the spine in the process.

The fix was less immediate, but would also allow Erin a much greater chance of continuing her athletic career. Kirk proposed the treatment to his daughter.

"He would always ask me for my opinion first because he told me, 'This is your back, and your life.' He would always be there for me, but he wanted me to know what he thought the best decisions were," Wilde said.

They agreed that this would be the best course of action, and Wilde headed to Philadelphia to get the operation at the Shiners Children's Hospital. She had the surgery on her 14^th birthday, and missed a month of school her freshman year as a result.

It took a toll both mentally and physically. "Before surgery, I was 5-4 and 106 pounds," Wilde said. "After surgery, I was 5-6 and 86 pounds. I lost a lot of weight and wasn't very healthy."

But when she was finally cleared to fly and made it back to Whitefish, Wilde wasted no time putting her new back to the test. She picked up a basketball and was practicing within weeks of returning from Philadelphia, and she would play for the Bulldogs that winter.

When it came time for track season, Kirk wondered what events, if any, his daughter would be able to compete in. He asked plenty of questions with the surgeons, consulting them when she wanted to try something new. If she could handle the pain, she had the green light, they informed him.

"She fought back into basketball season that winter after surgery, but she was weakened as anybody would be," Kirk said. "Come track season, I thought the jumping events with all the hardware in her spine would be a challenge. But the surgeons told us she could do anything that she wanted to try to do."

She did much more than try. Wilde went to the State A meet in long, triple and high jump. She finished in the top 10 in all three events just six months after her surgery. In high jump, Wilde finished as the runner-up by clearing 5-2.

As the weeks and months went on, Wilde grew stronger. Her lung was deflated as part of the surgery, and that, combined with the hardware in her back, made cross country difficult, but Wilde wanted to do three sports. She signed up for volleyball in the fall, and continued with basketball.

By her senior year, Wilde started to feel like herself again. She won the high jump event at the State A meet that year with a mark of 5-3, and placed third in the long jump with a distance of 17-2.75. She also ran as part of two state champion 4x100-meter relay teams.

When it came to pursuing the sport in college, there was still uncertainty. She wanted to remain close to Whitefish to be near family and friends, and had made up her mind that she was going to attend Montana.

But the coaching staff that she had been talking with had all left, save Lindsey Hall. Hall helped recruit Wilde, who then met with Doug and Erica Fraley when they were hired to take over the program.

The rest, as they say, is history.

Doug Fraley took over as the head coach. His wife, Erica, as the vertical jumps coach. Both had incredibly successful athletic careers and knew what it takes to reach the highest levels of the sport.

Erica lost her eye as a child in a car accident but still proceeded to have a career in pole vault in which she won two Big 12 Championships and represented the USA at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing.

If there was anyone who could understand what Erin was going through and help her overcome it, it was Erica. The two have formed an incredibly tight bond.

"So grateful for the coaching that Erin fell into really," Kirk said. "This match that happened, specifically when Erica became Erin's coach and Erin became her protégé. It's just been awesome to witness and has been clear to me that Erica is such a next-level coach. Both Fraley's are so experienced and accomplished and know what it takes to be a great athlete because they've been there. It's incredible to watch Erin's growth as an athlete, a student, and a human under Erica's leadership."

Erica took Erin under her wing. In the 2023 indoor season, Wilde improved at her first three meets to reach a height of 5-6.5. But at the Big Sky Championship she would clear just 5-3.75. She finished eighth and scored a point for Montana, still an impressive accomplishment for a freshman.

The outdoor season came and Wilde continued to get stronger. She started at 5-3 in the first meet, then 5-4, then a big jump in California for a new PR of 5-7.25.

Entering the Big Sky Championship meet, Wilde was seeded third. There was some excitement of a potential podium finish, but she would be jumping against some veterans of the conference. Expectations weren't exceptionally high.

Wilde cleared her first attempt. Then her second. Then her third. It wasn't until she reached the 5-8 mark that she missed, and even then she cleared on her second attempt for a PR. She went over again at 5-9.25, jumping herself to not only a Big Sky title, but also a trip to the NCAA First Round.

"I had no idea I was going to win that meet," Wilde said. "Even when I won, I still didn't know. I sat down next to Erica and she had to let me know that I had won. It's a big dream come true and I wanted to carry it on."

She placed 38^th in the entire West Region a few weeks later, and carried the momentum into what has been a big 2024 season. Wilde rolled through the indoor season, jumping at least 5-7 in five of the six meets. She won half the meets that she entered and was in the top three in every single outing.

In Spokane, Wilde claimed her second Big Sky Championship with an indoor PR of 5-8.5.

An impressive season becomes even more astounding when you know what Wilde had been going through. The tether in her back had broken, at what point she is unsure. Pain had returned during her freshman year and continued into her sophomore season. Over Christmas break, she went to Michigan to meet with a specialist.

She attended a "scoliosis boot camp" and started a new physical therapy routine that would help strengthen her core and straighten her back.

"When it broke, I had a lot of pain last year, but we dealt with it," Wilde said. "The trainers and everything, Zach (Wisniewski) has helped me so much. The rehab that I do now and everything I've learned from the rehab camps that I've gone to, I'm never going to stop trying to make it better."

She didn't lose any steam during the outdoor season. After a slow opening in the first meet, Wilde would go on to clear at least 5-7 in five straight meets. She sat on the regional bubble entering the final week of the regular season.

Her mark of 5-8.75 (or 1.75m) would likely get her into the 48-woman field. But with conference championships upcoming, her coaches decided to have her jump in the final home meet of the year to try and improve on that mark.

At the Tom Gage Classic, she cleared her opening bar on the first attempt and then made it through with a single miss to reach 1.76m. If she could get even that slight improvement, they were going to shut her down for the day and start preparations for the Big Sky meet.

When she cleared on her second attempt, Wilde wanted to keep going. Erica Fraley gave her one attempt at the next bar, which would be a school record. It's all Wilde needed.

She soared over it on the first attempt, popping back to her feet on the mat and celebrating with her teammates. Wilde's jump of 5-10.5 had locked up her spot at the NCAA First Round and also broke a 30-year old Montana school record.

It gave her plenty of momentum heading into the Big Sky Championship meet. There are no sure things in track, but Wilde was close to one in Bozeman. 12 athletes were already eliminated from the competition by the time she entered. She needed just one jump to claim the title, clearing at 5-5.75. She would add another bar with ease before bowing out at 5-8.75.

She will jump on Saturday afternoon in Fayetteville, looking to add another chapter to an impressive story. In 2023, she surprised everyone, including herself, with the Big Sky title and the trip to regionals. This year, she's been on a mission to get back to this point all season long.

"Last year I was super nervous, but so excited. It was a big thing for me, I was excited even to just be on the plane," Wilde said. "Now I'm going to calm down, not get too nervous before and just jump my best and hopefully it will carry me on to further things."

The event features the 48 best jumpers in the West, which includes NCAA record holder Lamara Distin of Texas A&M and her mark of 6-5. Wilde is tied for 24^th in the region at her school record mark. The level of competition will hopefully bring out the best in the Grizzly sophomore.

"She has just been lights out as far as consistency. It's going to be fun to watch Erin get in there with the really, really good high jumpers that are in the West Region in a situation that is conducive to jumping high," Doug Fraley said. "We're hoping she will take the excitement of that moment and add it to what she's been doing all year. If she does, there's a chance for a really good result."

Her family will be in attendance. Kirk watched his daughter pick up a basketball weeks after returning home from a surgery. He's seen her climb podium after podium in her athletic career. He is proud of what has come, and knows that there is no limit to what his daughter might achieve.

"I certainly can't put any limits on her career. I know that she's hungry and that she understands that there is more out there," Kirk said. "You never know what's around the corner, but for right now we're going to go to Arkansas and enjoy that meet."

She didn't know if she would ever be here. It was hard to imagine, as she sat in a hospital room on her 14^th birthday, that an athletic career of any kind could be in her future.

"It hit me when I found out I had scoliosis. I didn't think I'd get here," Wilde said. "I wanted to, but there was a lot of doubts. It always goes back to when I was a kid and knew I wanted to be better and to make myself proud. I'm definitely doing so, but I'm also definitely not done."

There is a certain confidence to Wilde that was born out of hardship. She is the best, it's what she has always demanded of herself. When the 48 women line up in Arkansas, and the jumpers head toward the pit, it would be easy to bet against Wilde. You would only be adding fuel to an already raging fire.

"I had high expectations for myself as a kid and a lot of people told me I couldn't," Wilde said. "I had so much love in my life, but there were definitely points where people told me, 'You're not going to be able to do this.' I think now I can say that I shut them up."

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