Ashland, Ore. – The UBC Thunderbirds garnered a pair of fifth place finishes at the Cascade Collegiate Conference Multi Event Championships hosted by Southern Oregon University.
In the final decathlon event Friday, Sam McGee ran sub-five minutes in the grueling 1500 metres for the first time to finish with a personal best point total of 5885.
Alessandra Ionescu-Zanetti repeated her 2025 fifth place finish in the heptathlon, improving her performance year-over-year by 473 points for a total of 4216, just 19 shy of her personal best set at last month's UBC Open.
McGee improved three places and exactly 800 points from his freshman season result at last year's CCC multi event meet.
Holding down seventh place through five events, McGee put forward personal best results in both the 110 metre hurdles and the 1500 to move up to his eventual fifth place finish out of 16 total competitors.
Beginning the ten event grind with a season best 100 metre dash time of 11.16 for a fourth place finish, McGee also claimed fourth in pole vault (3.50 metres) and the 110 hurdles (16.42).
McGee closed out both days with lifetime bests, ending Thursday with a 52.97 in the 400 metres for seventh to go along with another seventh in the 1500 metres Friday afternoon in a time of 4:59.81.
The sophomore from Vancouver produced five total personal best events including a top long jump of 5.97 metres.
Oregon Tech's Eli Stevens claimed the conference decathlon crown with a margin over 550, his point total reading 6684 by the time all was said and done.
Eastern Oregon's Lizzy Grandle took conference gold in the heptathlon with a point total of 5160, 763 ahead of second place Claire Nichol from Trinity Western.
Ionescu-Zanetti's best of the seven events over the course of the two days came via a 5.32 metre long jump, second place among the 15 competitors.
The junior from Berkeley, California finished top five in every event save for javelin, claiming third in the 100 metre hurdles (15.41), and a personal best 800 metre time of 2:28.18 for fourth. She claimed another fourth place in shot put (9.24m) and fifth in both the 200 (26.97) and high jump (1.46m).
Her four points garnered as a result of the fifth place finish will count towards UBC's team total for next month's Cascade Collegiate Conference Championship, as will McGee's four on the men's side.
The conference meet takes place May 8 and 9 in La Grande, Oregon while the 2026 NAIA Outdoor Track and Field National Championships are slated for May 20-22 in Asheville, North Carolina.
CCC Multi Event Championship Results
