She is patient when she is racing and when in a tight spot she can find lines and make moves that are really beyond her experience.””

Paula Anderson, former coach

GIANTS RIDGE—For a tiny school, Ely regularly wields a big footprint when it comes to Nordic ski competition in Minnesota and they proved it once again when they delivered the second state girls individual champion in six years here on Thursday.
Senior Zoe Devine, a standout Nordic skier for Ely since the eighth grade, edged Duluth East’s Lydia Kraker by a tenth of a second to claim the state individual title in the pursuit competition.
That it was a photo finish was no surprise, as Devine held a narrow two-second advantage coming off the morning’s classic race, the first of two parts in the pursuit competition, which combines skills in both classic and freestyle skiing.
Devine acknowledged that she prefers the classic portion of the event, in which she had dominated at Section 7 meets all season long.
While she was edged in the freestyle portion by Kraker and Greta Hansen of Math and Science Academy, her two-second advantage from the day’s earlier race made the difference.
Devine said she was never content to sit on her narrow edge from the morning’s race.
“I treated it like no cushion at all,” she said. “In this race and with all these fast skiers, I just took out of the gate knowing they’d be right with me. So, I just went for it.”
She said she was a bit nervous while waiting in the pen to start the race, but she was pleased with the fresh snow and cold conditions, which she felt worked to her advantage.
Experience also helped. It was Devine’s fifth trip to the state Nordic ski meet and it showed at the very end as she lunged her right foot forward at the finish line, likely shaving that critical tenth of a second off her time. It was a veteran move and it likely handed her the state title.
The immediate aftermath of the afternoon race was emotional for the top racers, many from Section 7, who had competed against each other all season long and got to know each other well. Devine and Kraker embraced just past the finish line, in relief and mutual admiration. As the rest of the Ely girls team crossed the finish line they surrounded Devine as well, basking in the excitement of the performance of a lifetime.
Devine said Duluth East, in particular, had provided the kind of stiff competition that helped others in the section hone their skills. “They’re the best in the state and have been all season,” she said. Indeed, Duluth East swept the girls team competition, topping second-place Stillwater by a whopping 24 points.
Unlike most high school competition, Nordic skiing is a single class, which leaves tiny schools like Ely competing against some of the largest schools in the Twin Cities and surrounding suburbs. But Devine, who said her senior class has about 50 students, enjoys that extra level of competition. “It’s honestly just fun, because they don’t always know about us, but we’ve put our name on the radar,” she said. “I think by now most of them know us.”
While Devine had finished sixth overall last year in the state tournament and was clearly one of the state’s premier girls Nordic racers as the season got underway, she said she never imagined she’d be sitting at the top of the sport when the final race had been run. “I was not expecting this at all,” she said.
But her former longtime coach, Paula Anderson, who had been watching Devine all season, had a feeling. “Her success during the last two weeks of the season put her on a trajectory which reminded me of Erin Bianco,” said Anderson, noting Ely’s previous girls individual state champion back in 2017. “Of course, anything can happen at state and many, many things have to go right, but it was just a thrill to watch it play out the way it did for her.”
Anderson, who coached Devine through her junior year, said the young prodigy had her breakout year as a freshman, when she finished 12th at the state tournament, a mark she topped two years later when she finished sixth.
Anderson was there to cheer Devine on for the classic and freestyle races.
“I saw her on the second to last hill [in the freestyle] and wondered how it would play out at the end, knowing that they would try to get around her at some point and out-sprint her at the finish,” said Anderson. “As expected, Lydia [Kraker] and Greta [Hansen] got around her on the flats on the top of the last hill before the plunge into the stadium.  She entered the finishing stretch in third place, and out-sprinted them to the line, winning by a toe touch.  Good thing she knows how to lunge.  She said she wasn’t thinking at all at that point, just racing, and the lunge was an instinct. It worked and was very exciting.”
Devine’s current coach, Todd Hohenstein, said they had practiced that last sprint to the finish over the past couple weeks as Devine prepared for the tournament. While she was focused on honing her skills, and was clearly going to be a contender for the title, Hohenstein said he doesn’t think that was her primary focus. “I don’t think Zoe was thinking much about finishing in the top spot. She and most of our skiers are just out there pushing to be the best they can be.”
While Devine was first across the finish line, she finished third in the freestyle based on time, completing the 5K course in 14:45.3. Yet her classic time, of 15.23.3 was more than seven seconds faster than Kraker, who had finished fourth in the morning’s race, giving Devine the title.
Anderson called Devine a very calm and smart racer. “She does get nervous, but she doesn’t show it much and it doesn’t affect her racing. She is patient when she is racing and when in a tight spot she can find lines and make moves that are really beyond her experience.”
While Devine was in a class of her own this season, Anderson said the support of her teammates is important. “She has stated that it is much better when she is there with the entire team, rather than as an individual.”
Devine will have a new team when she next takes up competitive skiing. Thursday’s state title marked the end of Devine’s remarkable high school Nordic career, but she won’t be hanging up the skis any time soon. She has committed to ski for St. Michael’s College near Burlington, Vermont. While Devine also qualified for state three times in cross country running, she said she plans to focus solely on her skiing for at least her first year of college, where she is likely to continue her tradition as a standout athlete and student.