It was really no surprise to anyone that St. Xavier won the Ohio Boys State Swimming Championship. What was surprising was Wyoming High School, with a total of only 5 boys finished 3^rd in the meet and was the only other Cincinnati area high school to finish in the top ten. What was even more of a shock was that this accomplishment went unrecognized in the Cincinnati Enquirer. The only mention in the Enquirer of Wyoming’s performance was a quote by Jim Brower, St. Xavier’s coach. Isn’t that ironic.

The Wyoming High School Boys Team has gone from not scoring a point in 2000 to 9^th place in 2001, 4^th place in 2002 and 3^rd place this year. What has St. Xavier done the last 4 years? They finished 1^st place every year as expected.

I’m sure you remember that in 2000 you were planning a story on the Wyoming High School Swim Team. Your story was going to focus on four freshman boys. However in interviewing the Coach (Christienne King), she made it clear that the story needed to be about the whole team, not just the freshman boys. Christienne King called Julie Engebrect to complain. Julie explained that the story needed an angle and that angle happen to be the four freshman. Coach King still didn’t want the story done. Julie subsequently told you to trash the story.

What’s the angle with St. Xavier winning their 5^th straight title? Isn’t that what they are expected to accomplish.

Granted, the Wyoming High School Boys Swim Team didn’t win, but placing third is as great an accomplishment as winning when you only have 5 swimmers that qualify for the state meet and have to contend with Division I powers like St. Xavier and Upper Arlington.

You opened the door with an angle a few weeks ago when you wrote an article about how the Senior Boys decided to sacrifice possible individual titles by only swimming 1 individual event and instead swimming on 3 relays. Their plan was to gain more points for the team. They accomplished their goal at individuals’ expense.

The Wyoming Boys Swim Team have accomplished a lot in the last 4 years. Those same 4 freshman boys set goals four years ago and they did as good as anyone could expect in the shadow of St. Xavier. Seniors Michael Byrnes, Jonathan Henkel, Ryan Koscianski, Dan Schrider and Junior Phillip Roebuck have re-set all the Wyoming High School records and the four seniors finished off their high school careers with a 3^rd place finish at the state meet. I think they meet their goals!