The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1931-03-06
ELY SWIMMERS
TIE STATE MEET
AFTER TIEING FOR STATE HONORS
THE ELY BOYS WERE NOSED
OUT BY RULES GOVERNING
SUCH AFFAIRS - EXCELLENT
WORK DONE.

Tough breaks lost the title for the
six boys representing Ely at the state
meet. With all six placing in the pre-
hminaries Friday afternoon, our boys
did very well. After leading our near
est opponent by five points in the pre-
iminaries. and everything seemed to
be coming our way for the finals Sat-
wday, it looked pretty good for our
boys. However, Saturday was another
day and early predictions seemed all
wrong Strange as it may seem, on
several occasions, Lady Luck turned
against us and blasted all hopes for
a championship.
Fourteen schools and academies were
entered with one hundred and twenty
five contestants. Twelve schools placed
in the preliminaries and it was one
grand battle for honors in the finals
Saturday Very close races marked
both preliminaries and the finals
The team standings after the pre-
liminaries Friday were as follows: Ely
Is points; Hibbing 20 points; Blake
Academy 10 points; Chisholm II points;
Washburn Il points
The final standing Saturday was:
Ely % points; Hibbing % points; Blake
81 points; Chisholm II points; Wash
burn IA points.
According to the rules, in case of
tie for first place, the team with the
most first places shall be awarded the
title. Hibbing had twice as many
entered as Ely and as they had won
two first places, the Hibbing team was
warded the championship This marks
the second time that Hibbing won the
title in this manner. In 1927 they were
tied with Shattuck
Joe Pucel proved to be nearing his
form Of last year by winning the
fancy diving. Pucel was second in the
preliminarieS. Leonard Kun placed
third Friday but did not do so well
Saturday in the finals and went down
one notch, placing fourth. This was
the first time a grade boy was entered
in the meet and his placing drew COM
ment from Coach Crisler.
Aired Kittila, without doubt the
best 2O0-yard swimmer in the state at
the present time, unfortunately missed
entirely the push off in the last turn
of the 22O-yard rare and was nosed
out by one inch. Il not for this mis-
hap the boys would have returned
champions.
Urho Elfving was defeated for the
first time this year in the 40yard free
style event. He was first in the pre-
liminary race Friday but lost by inches
in the finals He placed second both
days in the 100-yard free style and it
is worth mentioning that both Nc
Laughln of Hibbing, the winner, and
Elfving swan in faster time than was
registered by the University swimmers
earlier in the day.
John Bonnnier swan a great race in
the 220-yard on both days He placed
third in each instance. He appeared
to be tired IN the medley and although
he had a lead of Is feet over his op-
ponent from Hibbing when they en-
tered the water, the Hibbing man
gained steadily and tied the race at the
finish Our medley team placed in
tie with Hibbing for second place.
Swimming on our team were Kittila,
back stroke; Tuomikoski, breast stroke;
BONNER, crawl
Urho Tuomikosh, Freshman this
year, made very good showing in
the breast stroke, he placed fourth both
days. He also swan very good race
in the medley covering his stretch in
1:16.1 which is new Ely record for
this race, the former record was 1853
also held by him.
Joe Pucel, in addition to getting
large gold medal, was given special
prize, the Gopher Annual for 1880, by
H O. Crisler The boys brought home
a total of ten medals