The Interscholastic skating-races held at the St. Nicholas Rink last week were contested at too late a day to allow of proper comment in this issue of the Round Table. Mention of them, therefore, will be reserved until next week.
Ice polo has begun to be played among the Boston schools, the first game of the season having been held in the last week of December. There were several matches on the 21st of that month, Stoneham High defeating Wakefield High, 1-0, English High First defeating English High Second, 2-1, and Somerville High defeating Medford High, 5-0.
A few days later Arlington High met Cambridge High and Latin, and took them into camp, 2-1. Arlington's team-work was far superior to that of the Cambridge men, and although the latter tried all sorts of changes in their team, they were unable to withstand the fierce rushes of their opponents. The same afternoon, on Spy Pond, Arlington met Winchester High, and scored another victory, 3-0.
This Arlington H.-S. team is undoubtedly a very strong one, and is putting up good polo this winter. On January 3 they met Cambridge Latin, and defeated them, 6-0. Arlington's especially strong point is in passing.
A very unsportsmanlike dispute has arisen between two schools of the Worcester County South Football Association. Both the North Brookfield H.-S. and the Southbridge H.-S. claim the championship of the League in football, and so eager is each to write the word "championship" upon its school banner that each seems to have lost its head in the discussion. As to which school is entitled to this rather empty honor I am not prepared to determine, although both parties have laid rather lengthy arguments before me, but it would seem that North Brookfield has the better claim.
A game was played early in the season between these two schools, in which a member of Southbridge H.-S. acted as referee. His decisions proved unsatisfactory to the North Brookfield players, and a squabble ensued. As I understand it, the game was left undecided, with the score favoring Southbridge. Later it was arranged that a second game should be played by these two schools. It was played, and North Brookfield won, 4-0.
If this contest was held to settle the question that arose over the first game, then the first can have no bearing on the championship, and the final game alone counts as a championship game. But the defeated players cannot see it this way, and the result is that both schools are claiming everything in sight, and their mathematicians are juggling figures to prove the case. This is one of the evils of the "championship" system.
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The Graduate.