Longtime West Central football coach Steve Milder leading North team in 50th Iowa Shrine Bowl

CEDAR FALLS — With the 50th annual Iowa Shrine Bowl set to kick off at the UNI-Dome Saturday at 4 p.m., it’s appropriate that one of the game’s head coaches boasts an equally long tenure.

West Central Coach Steve Milder, who will begin his 51st year coaching high school football this fall, is leading the North squad in Saturday’s all-star game.

“I thought about it and with it being the 50th anniversary I thought that was really, really special and I wanted to do it this year if I did it,” Milder said.

Despite his excitement, Milder acknowledged that having coached 8-player football since 2008 gave him some hesitation.

“I asked for a week (to consider it) because having coached 8-man football for 14 years, I’m a little bit out of the loop of what changes have been made in the 11-man game,” Milder said. “I coached 11-man football for 36 years, but it’s been awhile.”

Given that unfamiliarity, Milder quickly got to work on choosing his staff.

Six assistants include Linn-Mar’s Tim Lovell, Derrick Elman of Humboldt, Spencer’s Jim Tighe, Chad Beermann of Waukon, Waterloo Columbus’ Brad Schmit and Erick Walkingstick of Akron-Westfield.

“You have to go back a year ago (to) when I was starting to ask people to be assistant coaches and Chad was the only coach on my staff that I knew,” Milder said. “The rest of these coaches I went by word-of-mouth of other coaches I have a lot of respect for and it was tremendous advice I received.

“I’m impressed every day by what we get done.”

When it came to picking a team, Milder relied on those assistant coaches.

Among the 46 North squad members are a number of athletes from Eastern Iowa, including West Delaware’s Kyle Cole, Cedar Rapids Kennedy’s Jeron Senters, North Linn’s Austin Hilmer, Cedar Rapids Washington’s Noah Allen, Linn-Mar’s Luke Gaffney and Owen Thomas of Monticello.

Gaffney, Southeast Valley’s Aaron Graves and Landyn Van Kekerix of Boyden-Hull/Rock Valley represent the North’s future Iowa Hawkeyes.

“The quality young men that we have here is just outstanding,” Milder said. “Kids are respectful, they’re hardworking and we have some talent. Probably don’t have as much overall team speed as the South (squad) does, but we got some pretty good football players.”