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Time Machine: Trailblazer Molly Bolin
Iowan was one of the first to play women’s professional basketball
Molly Bolin, a tremendous Iowa basketball talent, tried repeatedly to play professional basketball in the 1970s and ’80s, but the sport failed to attract enough fans to keep the early women’s leagues going.
It was “sometimes frustrating” to “still be fighting the same battles getting the women’s pro game started up,” she said in a 1984 interview with the Des Moines Register. But, the 26-year-old added, “I really believe it’s eventually going to catch on.”
The NBA finally backed creation of a women’s professional league in June 1996, with league play starting in 1997. The Women’s National Basketball Association now has 12 teams. And with Iowa’s superstar guard Caitlin Clark joining the WNBA this year, attendance at the women’s pro games likely will be headed up.
But they stand on Molly’s shoulders.
Moravia girl
Bolin grew up in Moravia, in south-central Iowa, where she starred on her high school’s six-on-six, half-court team as Molly Van Benthuysen.
In 1975, she went to Grand View College in Des Moines and adjusted to the five-player, full-court style of play. She excelled, scoring more than 1,000 points in each of her two college seasons.
During her sophomore year at Grand View, she married Dennis Bolin. She graduated with an associate degree in telecommunications.
Pro ball
Bolin had been recruited to play at Grand View by coach Rod Lein, who became coach of the Iowa Cornets, a new professional women’s team based in Des Moines and Cedar Rapids. He called Bolin to try out.
She was the first player signed to the Women’s Professional Basketball League (WBL) in the U.S. on June 29, 1978.
The new WBL had eight teams: the Iowa Cornets, New Jersey Gems, Milwaukee Does, Chicago Hustle, Minnesota Fillies, Dayton Rockettes, New York Stars and Houston Angels.
From the start, Bolin was the focus of the league’s promotions that portrayed her as a sex symbol. She also gained attention for her fast play and repetitive baskets, earning the nickname “Machine Gun Molly,” a name she didn’t care for.
The Cornets were featured in a movie, which was intended to promote women’s basketball, during their first season. “Dribble” (later renamed “Scoring”) was about a competition between men’s and women’s teams. The movie was a flop.
The Cornets opened their first season Dec. 15, 1978, at Minnesota. The first home game at Vets Auditorium in Des Moines followed on Dec. 18.
The Cedar Rapids half of the Cornets’ franchise was owned by Cedar Rapids trampoline entrepreneur George Nissen. But the Cornets’ first game in Cedar Rapids had to wait until the new Five Seasons Center was ready to open. More than 3,500 fans watched Jan. 27, 1979, as the Cornets defeated the New Jersey Gems in the first athletic event in the arena.
The Cornets ended their first 1978-79 season with 21 wins and 13 losses. The 1979-80 season saw 24 wins and 12 losses.
Financial woes spelled the end of the Cornets. The league itself folded in 1981 following financial troubles, unpaid salaries and the murder of Nebraska player Connie Kunzman.
Bolin holds the league’s record for the most points scored in a single game (55) and the highest single-season scoring average (32.8).
Bolin played with the San Francisco Pioneers in 1981. She was home in Moravia in May 1981 waiting for the basketball season to start when the Pioneers folded.
Iowa 5-on-5
Bolin returned to Iowa in 1984 to play at Carver-Hawkeye Arena. Her team of former college, pro and World Cup players lost to the women’s Olympic team, 75-59, in a doubleheader that also featured the men’s Olympic team against NBA stars.
While she was in Iowa, Bolin advocated that Iowa change from its traditional 6-on-6 game to 5-on-5, which it did in 1993.
“Sooner or later, the level of play develops, and 5-on-5 is a more developed game,” Bolin said. “As the level of play develops, these girls are going to be keeping the same brand of quality basketball full court.”
Bolin was inducted into the Iowa Girls High School Athletic Union Hall of Fame on March 16, 1986. It was a highlight for a woman who had already been featured in Sports Illustrated and had appeared on national sports news shows.
Trying again
In 1986, Bolin was the assistant commissioner of the new National Women’s Basketball Association, headquartered in Charlotte, N.C.
In August, she came to Des Moines to announce that the NWBA’s Pride of Iowa team would be one of eight in the league and play its games at Vets Auditorium in Des Moines. Other teams would be in Atlanta, Ga., Austin, Texas, Charlotte, N.C., Knoxville, Tenn., Monroe, La., Orange County, Calif., and Richmond Va.
The salary cap for the league was $18,000 per season. But the NWBA was dead by February 1987, never playing a game. Again, finances were the culprit.
In 1989, Bolin married John Kazmer, a former Division I basketball player for Long Beach State, and they ran a basketball camp in Palm Desert, Calif. In 2006, when the WNBA was turning 10, the Kazmers were invited to the WNBA All-Star Game.
In 2023, Molly Van Benthuysen Bolin Kazmer was in Dallas for the NCAA Final Four game when the Hawkeyes defeated national champion South Carolina, 77-73, putting them in the national championship game against LSU.
“Machine Gun Molly was here? Didn’t even know that,” Coach Lisa Bluder said after that game, recalling that she’d watched Bolin play with the pioneering Cornets.
Comments: D.fannonlangton@gmail.com
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