Iowa City West receives hoops honors

IOWA CITY – Two basketball state championships in one year. And it's still getting better.

The Iowa City West boys' and girls' basketball teams are one of 20 high schools nationally being honored on the MaxPreps Tour of Champions presented by the Army National Guard. Head coaches Steve Bergman and B.J. Mayer accepted the national ranking trophies last night at West's auditorium.

“I had no idea,” Bergman said. “I thought, ‘Wow. That's a big deal.'”

The Trojans boys finished No. 28 and the girls ranked No. 69 in the national rankings from MaxPreps, a leading online high school sports stats and news source that ranks more than 20,000 prep hoops teams.

 West became only the fourth school in Iowa history to win both the boys' and girls' basketball titles in the same season, following Winfield-Mount Union (1995), Iowa City High (2008) and Sioux City Heelan (2010).

 The Trojan boys' team beat Sioux City East, 67-52, in the championship game to win their fourth state title. They finished 26-0.

 The West girls beat Ankeny, 61-52, to win their first state championship to complete a 25-1 season.

 “It's just another accolade to give recognition for our girls,” Mayer said. “We're excited to receive this reward.”

 MaxPreps and the Army National Guard have honored the nation's elite high school sports programs since 2005, when 10 football teams were celebrated in the MaxPreps Tour of Champions.

Since then, the tour has grown to recognize 50 football teams, 20 basketball teams, six volleyball teams and beginning this year, six girls' soccer teams.

 “You've done an incredible job,” Iowa National Guard Col. Steve Altman said during West's spring sports banquet. “This just didn't happen.”

 It's the first time in the seven-year existence of the award that the boys' and girls' teams from the same school were honored on the same night, according to Chris Magnuson, MaxPreps territorial manager.

“That's unbelievable,” Bergman said. “The girls were great and my boys were pretty good, too.”