Ely Legion baseball head coach Tom Coombe picked up his 650th win as the Ely team won a trip to state with a 6-0 victory over Proctor on Saturday.
At the State Legion Banquet on Thursday, Coombe was inducted into the American Legion Baseball Hall of Fame for the state of Minnesota.
Coombe started his career in 1994 as Ely’s head coach and has coached 33 seasons in Ely.
“It’s an honor, but, at the same time, I think it just goes to show what kind of program we have,” said Coombe. “And it’s not just one group of guys that came through and had a bunch of success. It’s gone decade after decade after decade and just so many players that have come through that have that have contributed to that. And so many good teams.”
Coombe credited his players, assistant coaches, the community and a special group of people.
“And such great support as well from the entire what we call the Ely baseball family. And it really is. It really is. I think if you are a parent of a kid who plays baseball and you live in northern Minnesota, I think you’d want them to live in Ely or maybe Grand Rapids.
“You know you’re going to have both a spring and a summer program that go above and beyond. If you like baseball, you want to play games, you want to develop, in this neck of the woods, I think Ely or Grand Rapids is where you want to be,” said Coombe.
And it isn’t just Coombe who will be getting some much-deserved recognition. His long time assistant coach Frank Ivancich will be recognized for his role as the Ely High School head baseball coach.
Coombe broke the news on the Ely Echo’s Pulse of Ely podcast on Wednesday.
“In January, Frank will be inducted into the Minnesota State High School Baseball Coaches Hall of Fame. So I’m going into the Legion one tomorrow night. And Frank is going into the high school one in January, and, you know, I couldn’t be happier for him, just for what he’s done with the high school program and a number of state tournament berths, third in the section this year, second last year.
“It seems like Ely High School is in the final four of the section just about every year. And again, in terms of what he’s done with a small school, high school baseball program year after year after year, Ely is right there. So, it’s a testament to what he has done,” said Coombe.
Ivancich is just one of the assistant coaches Coombe has had over the past 33 seasons.
• Shane Thielke, now coaching and is a principal in Fergus Falls, MN.
• Patrick Farha, who was an ad salesman at the Ely Echo at the time.
• Ray Podominick, who had a couple of different tenures and also coached at Vermilion;
• Jay Wetzel, who played for Ely and in addition to coaching worked on the field for the Ely Baseball Association.
• Josh Weckman, the high school coach in Roseau, MN. Coombe said having Ivancich involved in the summer program has been a key part of Ely’s success.
“If you’re going to have a good program, I think you have to have some connection between the high school program and the summer program. Kids have a good summer and that leads them into the following spring. And then they have a good spring and that leads them into the ensuing summer.
“And the coaches are on the same page as well. I think that means so much. And we’ve got guys like Jim Wittrup, who’s an assistant with the high school, he’s been our Junior Legion or prior to that VFW coach for 25 years.
“Aaron Donais is Jim’s assistant. He played for us and now he’s been an assistant to the VFW slash Junior Legion program for 15 years. Corey Lassi spent a number of years.
“And then again, all these guys are guys who came up in our program, played here, and then ended up coaching. Max Gantt has worked on the field and now he coaches our age 14U team. He’s a high school assistant coach, and then there’s Derek Johnson who played in the program when Frank coached Legion more than 30 years ago and now he has a son in the program and has been such a valuable help to us, both in the summer and during the high school season. So there are all these connections between the high school program and the summer program.”
It’s that connection, both for kids and for coaches, that has helped to make Ely successful on the diamond.
“You see some communities where kids may not play in the summer or not all of them play. We don’t have that issue here in Ely. Our high school players are playing summer baseball. And I think that’s one reason why we win,” Coombe said. Ely has become a mecca for summer baseball tournaments and in addition to a cadre of community volunteers, the coaches are pitching in as well.
“We kind of call ourselves at times the baseball mafia. You come to the baseball field in Ely in June or July. You’re going to see Nancy Widmer in the morning selling tickets to see Dave Ziegler later on in the afternoon selling tickets. You might see me in the ticket booth a time or two.
“You’re definitely going to see Frank at the concession stand. He’s there from morning to night. You’re going to see Max Gantt raking or grooming the field between games.
“Same for Aaron Donais. You’re going to see Aaron Donais or hear his voice up in the press box. So yeah, it’s a lot of the same people and it’d be remiss if I didn’t also salute what a great group of parents we’ve had come through.
“We have such a supportive group, a core group that are there every weekend, work in those tournaments, participating in fundraisers, doing whatever is needed to help, to help support the program, providing rides, you name it, bringing in water or Gatorade when it’s 90 degrees and just some folks, they’ve bought in to our program as well.”
Coombe reflected on his years coaching American Legion baseball and what has stuck with him.
“The best part is when you have a successful team like we’ve had this year, and to hear from so many of the guys who played previously. “There’s a network of Ely alumni. And I’ve heard from dozens in the last week about our team. And they’re cheering this group on.
“They were part of successful teams in the past, and it goes back even prior to when I was coaching. I mean, the guys that were here in the 60s and the 70s, guys like Jim Zgonc, and Mike Turnbull and Pete Marsnik. Those are guys who played 50, 60 years ago, yet still have a connection to the Ely Baseball program.
“Jim Stukel was at our championship game on Saturday when we beat Proctor for the title. He was there watching. So to hear from those people and then so many of the guys that I’ve coached, you know, makes it gratifying.”
This weekend marks the 14th time a Coombe-coached team has advanced to the state tournament.
“We had two that were fortunate enough to move on to play in the regionals. They don’t have that anymore for division two. We beat a team from Las Vegas. We beat a team from Kansas.
“And then the names, you know, the late Josh Mathson for one, Tim Scott, Tyler Blomberg, Adam Randalls, Jeff Richards, Bill Planton, those three were on a team that went 31-4 in 2001. Josh Mathson was part of a team with Corey Lassi, Timmy Scott, Josh Weckman, that team that went 28-2 and finished second in the state in 2004.
“And then you look to that 2011, 2012 era, guys like Wes Snyder and Louis Gerzin and Greg Helget and Sean Fisher and Nick Matthews. I’m going to probably forget somebody here, the Bernsdorf brothers, Alex Koschak who came to one of our playoff games in Proctor last week.” But he admitted there were plenty of teams that didn’t advance to post-season play that he has fond memories of the players and games. “In 2013 we didn’t make it to the state tournament. That might have been one of the best teams I ever coached. We just did not have a good weekend in Deer River, where the district was that year and we finished second, lost to a real good team from Taconite in the finals, but, that’s a team if they could have gotten to the state tournament, could have won it, but you don’t, that’s part of baseball. The best teams don’t always win.”
Coombe said the updates and remodeling being done at the field this year will help set the stage for future tournaments and trace back to Ely hosting the 1980 American Legion World Series.
“If Frank was here, he’d probably tell you the same thing. We grew up when Matty Stukel put on the Legion World Series in 1980 and there were tournaments here, various state tournaments in the 80s, and then it kind of dropped off a little bit.
“Frank and I went to the cities and bid on a state tournament in the late 90s and we got it. And that just kind of set off a new era at the ballpark.
So we’ve had eight or nine different state or regional tournaments in the last 25 years, all of them have made a huge economic impact, bringing teams from all over the state here for those events. And we’ve been fortunate enough to leverage that into some needed repairs at the field.”
Those improvements include a new scoreboard and raising $100,000 for new lights 20 years ago.
“Billy Erzar was very pivotal in getting us an IRRRB grant that helped solidify the stadium at one point.
“I think it was three years ago, I called Senator Hauschild, and he was coming to Ely for the 4th of July parade, and he met Frank and I at the ballpark, and we walked through and told him some of the things that were needed. We were just trying to keep this facility as a top notch venue for baseball, and lo and behold, there was a $250,000 award from the state, specifically for the baseball field, and then $5 million for the school athletic complex. About $1.6 million of that will go into the baseball complex here over the course of the next few months.
“If you drive by, you’ll see it’s being completely leveled and resurfaced. There’ll be all new grass. There’ll be a new viewing deck on the first base side. There’s going to be a new concession stand and restroom building, some new batting cages were constructed.
“Duluth has the DECC, Hermantown has their arena and Virginia has the Iron Trail complex.
“Our baseball field, that’s our equivalent. That drives people to Ely so many weekends in the late spring and throughout the summer.
“Thanks to our legislators, both Grant and Roger Skraba, who went to bat for us in St. Paul, and Jeff Anderson, the lobbyist for the school, certainly had a key role in that as well.
“Hopefully long after I’m gone, the ballpark will continue to be a place for baseball and to bring people to Ely,” said Coombe.
The coach tipped his hand a bit into what he had on the lineup for his acceptance speech.
“The plaque is going to have my name on it, but it is an award for Ely baseball. It is an award for what the Ely baseball community has done for the last 30 years, number one, to keep and maintain a program, to have it at a high level, to do the extras like the tournaments and to bring people to Ely. And then the success on the field is kind of the icing on the cake.
So it’s an award for Ely, that’s how I feel about it. And just happy to accept it. And, again, just love that Frank is going to be getting that high school award at the same time.
“There’s a lot of great baseball people in Ely, and, as Frank and I have picked up the torch after the Merle Luncefords and Matty Stukels and George Marsniks, someone’s going to come along and hopefully keep doing that here in 30, 40 years from now. They’ll be talking about state tournaments and baseball success. That would make me really happy.”
