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Wolves showcase depth, one to seven

Patrick Slack
Posted 2/22/17

BIWABIK - Ely knew its team was deep going into the state meet.

But this deep?

That was a surprise to even the Wolves.

It was a day of complete domination as Ely won the girls Nordic skiing …

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Wolves showcase depth, one to seven

Posted

BIWABIK - Ely knew its team was deep going into the state meet.

But this deep?

That was a surprise to even the Wolves.

It was a day of complete domination as Ely won the girls Nordic skiing state championship at Giants Ridge in Biwabik, with perhaps no greater indicator of the team’s depth than junior Evelyn Bercher.

Bercher, skiing in her second state meet, finished 89th overall individually in 37:40.2, the top No. 7 skier in the team competition.

Not only that, Bercher’s time was fast enough that she would have been a top-three skier on eight of the other 15 teams in the field.

Another testament to the Wolves’ depth was how hard Bercher and the Wolves’ skiers had to work just to keep their spots in the varsity lineup.

“This season was just super fun,” Bercher said. “I was competing the whole season for those last couple spots on the team, so that was super fun and really exciting.”

That daily competition, while challenging, helped spark big improvements.

“Competing for those section team spots is stressful, but I think it motivates me to work even harder during the season, which was really nice.”

The payoff of crossing the finish line, and being told the Wolves were state champs, was immense.

“I just started crying,” Bercher said. “The rest of the team was there crying. It was kind of unbelievable. It was really exciting.”