North Linn rolls past Easton Valley as Mike Hilmer picks up 500th-career coaching win

TROY MILLS — The postgame speech over the public-address system Tuesday night at North Linn High School was given by longtime assistant coach Travis Griffith and contained a pretty funny opening line.

“He’s only 417 wins behind his father now,” Griffith said.

That is true. Bob Hilmer is Iowa’s all-time winningest boys’ basketball coach with a 917-347 record in 56 varsity seasons.

But his son ain’t too shabby of a head coach himself. A 103-21 blowout of Easton Valley was Mike Hilmer’s 500th career win.

He’s only the 48th varsity coach to achieve that milestone, joining Dennis Geraghty and Bill Fleming right at 500 even. Former Cedar Rapids Washington Coach Don King is next at 501.

“I found a letter I had sent 10 years ago when I applied for another job,” Mike Hilmer said. “We decided to stay here. One of the reasons we decided to stay here was because of how great our parents were and how great our kids were. That’s pretty much what I told the kids in the locker room after the game. That’s why we’re still here. We have parents that understand and let you coach, we have players who let you be intense and get on them to get the best out of them.

“They understand that. We emphasize this, probably the number one thing about them is their character. They’ve been signing an alcohol and drug-free pact for 10 years, and, as far as I know, no one has violated it in season That’s stuff that means a lot. Winning 500 games just means I’ve been coaching 33 years. Mathematically, you’re going to get there eventually, you know what I mean?”

Well, not necessarily, Mike.

Hilmer is 500-238 in his 32nd season as a head coach. He began his career at Lincoln Central High School, a small school in Northwest Iowa, and then moved to Estherville-Lincoln Central when those schools’ programs combined.

It has been 25 years at North Linn and an infinite amount of magic. Hilmer is 435-142 at the school, including 209-8 in the Lynx’s last 217 games.

North Linn has qualified for the state basketball tournament seven years in a row and has made a championship game a record six years in a row, including two titles. Simply incredible stuff from a small public school.

“I don’t think that’s possible,” Mike said of perhaps someday matching his dad’s wins record. “But I still really enjoy coaching, and I want to keep doing it. I’m taking some superintendent classes right now, will be done with that at the end of next year.

“So I don’t know if that’s something that I’ll pursue. It just kind of depends on if it’s the exact right job or whatever.”

This North Linn team does a lot of what its immediate predecessors did, mainly going on lightning-quick large offensive runs and winning by large margins. This was a 32-13 game after the first quarter, with a 34-0 run helping make it a 68-16 Lynx lead at the break.

It was 84-16 after three quarters.

Senior forward Ty Pflughaupt had 33 points and 13 rebounds for North Linn in its season opener, making 16 of 17 shots from the field. Mason Bechen added 16 points, Cole Griffith 15 off the bench and Hayden Schmidt 12 off the bench.

North Linn shot 16 of 31 from 3-point range. It doesn’t have the true inside presence of graduated Tate Haughenbury (now at Kirkwood Community College), but it can shoot it and get up and down the court in a flash. Especially considering last year’s Class 1A champion Grand View Christian voluntarily moving up to 2A this season, who knows if this NL team can make it eight straight state tournament trips and seven straight state championships games.

“We have a lot of shooters,” Pflughaupt said. “They come in and are ready to shoot all the time. That’s our strength.”

“One thing I’ve focused on with these guys,” Hilmer said. “The ability is there, it’s just the focus. We’ve got a lot of guys who used to be role players, and now they all, all eight of them in the rotation, have to be players for us.”

By the way, Bob Hilmer was in attendance for Tuesday’s game, as were several former Lynx players who played for Bob and Mike at the school.

“I still say that I’ve learned more from him in the last five years than he did from me in all those other years,” Bob Hilmer said of his son. “It’s just a different ballgame now.”

North Linn 103, Easton Valley 21

AT TROY MILLS

EASTON VALLEY (21): Jeremy Weispfenning 3-9 1-2 9, Justin Weispfenning 2-6 0-0 5, Aiden Eickert 1-3 0-0 3, Bryar Haring 0-3 0-0 0, Nolan Sandholt 0-5 0-0 0, Stephen Norem 2-5 0-0 4, Keagan Lee 0-3 0-0 0, Easton Rathje 0-2 0-0 0, Austin Thomson 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 8-36 1-2 21.

NORTH LINN (103): Ty Pflughaupt 16-17 0-0 33, Jake Van Etten 1-4 0-2 4, Drew Ries 4-9 1-2 10, Mason Bechen 7-14 0-0 16, Breckyn Betenbender 3-8 0-0 8, Cole Griffith 5-5 0-0 15, Hayden Schmidt 4-7 0-0 12, Cael Benesh 2-3 0-0 5, Bradyn Bistline 0-0 0-0 0, Cade Garman 0-0 0-0 0, Waylon Raue 0-0 0-0 0, Braden Wheatley 0-0 0-0 0, Nolan Woods 0-1 0-0 0. Totals 42-68 3-4 103.

Halftime - North Linn 68, Easton Valley 16. 3-point goals - Easton Valley 4-22 (Je. Weispfenning 2-6, Ju. Weispfenning 1-5, Eickert 1-3, Haring 0-2, Sandholt 0-2, Norem 0-1, Lee 0-3), North Linn 16-31 (Pflughaupt 0-1, Reis 1-3, Bechan 2-5, Betenbender 2-6, Griffith 5-5, Schmidt 4-7, Benesh 1-2, Zimmerman 0-1). Rebounds - Easton Valley 14 (Two by multiple players), NorthLinn 39 (Pflughaupt 13). Total fouls - Easton Valley 6, North Linn 5. Fouled out - None. Turnovers - Easton Valley 36, North Linn 6.

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