MARION, Ind. – For the third straight year the UBC Thunderbirds women are NAIA Outdoor Track and Field National Champions!
Accumulating 137 total points, the 'Birds secured their fourth straight title in as many trips to the national meet (having missed the 2021 season due to COVID restrictions) with a 54 point margin of victory, the largest such gap by any champion in 25 years.
The UBC men's team entered the final day of the championship in Marion, Indiana as part of a heated battle with a handful of teams and finished in third place for the second time in the last three years, amassing 48 total points, 14 behind the runners up from Marian (Ind.) and just 16 back of Cumberlands who secured their first ever NAIA banner.
"Today was amazing," said UBC head coach
Laurier Primeau who oversaw his sixth team Track and Field NAIA Championship this week while being named Women's Coach of the Year for the fourth time. "On the women's team, those results on the track were just remarkable. Race after race we outperformed our ranking and that's one of the things that I really look for as a metric – can we finish higher than what we came in seeded, and that just kept happening. And not to take anything away from the men, they were in tough with some great competition and we got beat by some really good teams. It's not like we lost it, we got beat, and hats off to Cumberlands and to Marian."
The day started as good as it ended for the T-Birds as UBC took the championship win in both the men's and women's 3000 metre steeplechase.
Dylan Uhrich took home UBC's first men's steeple title since John Gay's third straight gold in 2018. Uhrich showed off his impressive kick, finishing in 9:03.26, topping the podium at the NAIA Championships for the first time having earned a bronze in the steeple two years ago.
Kiana Gibson's time of 10:31.23 saw the senior Thunderbird win by a margin of more than 11 seconds, securing another ten points.
Elysse Fleming earned the bronze with a personal best time of 10:45.15, nearly seven seconds better than her heat time Thursday which itself was a PB of more than 21 seconds.
Following the steeple, Gibson's day was far from over, however, as the Ottawa product was back on the track for the final event of the day – the grueling 5000 metres. Not only did Gibson re-up for her team, she managed yet another championship race, compiling 20 of the team's 137 total points within a matter of hours.
Gibson's 5000 metre winning time of 17:15.54 saw her cross the finish line 15 seconds and change ahead of her teammate,
Amelia Pfohl who picked up another eight points with her silver medal performance. The T-Birds earned a combined 21 points in the one race alone as
Zoe Doorenspleet also earned All-American status with a sixth place time of 17:38.77.
The men's 5000 metres served as the final race of the meet for UBC and was a solid one at that with
Andrew Davies and
Jaiveer Tiwana finishing third and fourth, respectively. Davie's bronze medal time of 14:33.75 was less than three seconds behind the winner. Tiwana ran a remarkable last lap of 58.13, gaining four spots in the final 400 metres.
To no one's surprise, one of the T-Birds' biggest events of the day – and the meet for that matter – came courtesy of the women's 1500 metre final.
Holly MacGillivray won UBC's first ever women's 1500 with a time of 4:20.19, more than two seconds faster than her 2023 final which saw her claim second.
Katelyn Cotterell (4:25.67) and
Sarah MacGillivray (4:30.20) finished third and fourth, respectively to pick up another 11 points between the two of them with both running personal bests when it mattered most.
Rachel Mortimer found herself atop the podium in the women's 800 metres with a blistering 2:05.55, a new personal best of nearly three seconds.
Abby Ylipahkala took home the silver medal in 2:10.32 for another UBC 1-2 finish with another PB to boot.
Competing in his first NAIA national championship,
Lyle Lo set a personal best in men's triple jump with a top leap of 14.91 metres.
By the end of the day, not only had the T-Bird women impressed with their point total, but also by the methods in which they did so.
"Even last night when we were doing final projections – and those were projections on projections – we were still off by about 15 or 20 points relative to what we earned," said Primeau. "I thought we were going to get 110 to 120 and kudos to those women who just battled hard and came to championship race."
While both teams come home from a tremendous week in Indiana, a number of performances were key to securing those impressive point totals, many of which outperformed their pre-meet rankings.
"I was really proud of Dylan, I thought he did a great job of being patient in that race and then kicking when it was important," said Primeau. "
Andrew Davies, to do a 5K/10K double, to do 20,000 metres in three days is not easy on the legs and we don't ask that of many people. He was more than willing to do it.
Kiana Gibson doubling up in the steeple and the 5K. A lot of results I'm super impressed with and proud of. A lot of our power-speed field events we got on day one or two. When I think of
Rebecca Dutchak and that outstanding personal best to win the heptathlon,
Michelle Dadson with a big personal best in the hammer to win third. That happened so many times for us – I'm really happy."
The 2024 Track and Field season closes with yet another championship for the T-Birds and a pair of teams who made their coaches, teammates, families and friends incredibly proud.
FULL RESULTS
