Nebraska’s all-time wins leader took a chance on Hampton. The community rewarded him with 40 years of hoops success.
GYMS AND SCHOOLS AND OFFICES ACROSS NEBRASKA — It all happened by chance for Jerry Eickhoff.
The building of a program. The support of a community for 40 years. The wins that he never really wanted to talk about.
Yeah, Jerry Eickhoff’s first love was football at Dawson-Verdon High School.
“I really liked to be aggressive and hit people,” Eickhoff said. “But, we played all the sports in high school – football, basketball, baseball in the summer. But, I think football was my first love.”
After graduating from high school — the state’s winningest basketball coach never played in the state tournament — Eickhoff got a degree from Peru State, student taught in Bellevue and applied for a job in the small town of Hampton for the 1969-70 school year. Population 400, or thereabouts.
He got the job. Picked basketball and volleyball to coach because he, “didn’t want to deal with all the football equipment.” And, then, he never left.
Forty-five years after he started, and six after his last game as a head coach — fittingly at the 2009 state tournament — his legacy still lives.
The Early Years
It was pre-Title IX in 1970. And in the winter, Eickhoff lived in the Hampton Auditorium. He coached both volleyball and boys basketball. Yes, volleyball was a winter sport and the state girls basketball tournament was still seven years away.
“We had volleyball practice at 6:00 in the morning everyday,” he said. “And then basketball practice was after school. We’d never get away with that today.
“The girls played volleyball before the boys games, so we would play volleyball, take the nets down and then play basketball. It was crazy.”
He thought he might not survive his first season. Thirty-six boys wanted to play basketball and Eickhoff didn’t have room for all of them in the tiny Auditorium. He asked the school board if he could cut the roster to 24 players. In Class D. In Hampton.
“That was one of the hardest things I ever did,” he said. “We never had to do it again and I am thankful for that.”
But there was that whole basketball thing that didn’t take off. Eickhoff’s first unit started 1-6. They played their last game in the district final losing a hard fought game to eventual state champion Shickley. They finished 10-8.
“After awhile, those kids really bought in to our system,” he noted. “I worked their tails off. I think the first time we played Shickley it was a 30-point game and then in the last game it was a 10-12 point game.”
Shortly, the Hawks would start to get Eickhoff’s style of up-tempo offense and disciplined defense. The 1971 and 1972 teams advanced to district and regional finals. In 1971, the Hawks lost five times. Four to undefeated state champion Benedict.
Have you seen Hoosiers? In Benedict, the gym was like Cedar Knob’s. Small. A balcony to watch the game. A purgatory, if you will. The Eagles took full advantage with a front line that was 6-4, 6-4, 6-5. Their 1-3-1 was a nightmare.
“We couldn’t get it across half court against them half the time,” Eickhoff said. “But we played them tough. Our kids gave them everything they could.”
A Breakthrough
Dean Troester is about as successful as they come. The Chief Financial Officer at one of the most successful trucking companies in America – Crete Carrier in Lincoln, Nebraska. And, Jerry Eickhoff’s first great point guard.
He was a freshman in 1970-71, Eickhoff’s second year, the team that couldn’t get past Benedict. By 1973, his junior season, Hampton was as good as anyone in Class D. Remember, the class back then was roughly 140-150 schools. The Hawks rolled through the Crossroads Conference, and eventually survived Yutan 42-40 in the state finals.
Both coach and player remember like it was yesterday. The game was played directly before the Class A battle between Omaha Westside and Lincoln Northeast. With the NU Coliseum packed the Class A fans each took a side.
“We got dressed on a handball court, I remember that,” Troester said. “I mean the place was packed. It was at capacity – 7,000 or 8,000 whatever it was. And it was hot and noisy. I remember Mark Olson really being the guy that led us that game.”
Olson, one of just three players that Eickhoff coached who were named all-state twice, would get a late rebound after Yutan’s attempt at a tie that sealed the victory.
“The Northeast fans, they got there early and took our side and they cheered for us,” Eickhoff recalled. “I had never been in a gym louder than that. Yutan had a shot at the end and Mark (Olson) got the rebound with about four seconds left and he just threw up in the air as high as he could. That was a great atmosphere.”
Given Olson and Troester – and a band of others – were coming back the Hawks expected big things the next season. Things were on track in 1974. Troester recalls the Hawks averaged nearly 85 points per contest and gave up just over 40 points.
“Most of the time, we’d play the first quarter and half the second quarter,” Troester said. “And then a couple of minutes after halftime. That’s it. Our seventh and eight players averaged eight or nine points a game.”
When they Hawks arrived in Lincoln to play Paxton in the first round of the state tournament, their winning streak was 51 games in basketball and 19 in football. With Adams and Falls City Sacred Heart playing after Hampton, the doors at Lincoln East were locked two hours before tip.
“My brother didn’t get in to watch, I know that,” Troester said.
He missed what some call one of the greatest games in high school state tournament history. But, it was Paxton, behind a 41-point performance from Don Peck that upset the Hawks 88-82. Troester can recall that one as well.
“Man, I can still tell you about that whole game,” Troester said. “They took Olsen out of the game. He played about 12 minutes with foul trouble. We shot 62 percent for the game and Paxton shot 68. I remember just being beat at halftime. We were down 49-47. I thought, we don’t give up this many points in a game.
“But, you know, looking back on that game I remember it being really fun to play. It was a game we never should have lost.”
It’s one of the few that haunted Eickhoff.
“We couldn’t stop Peck, I think he missed two shots,” Eickhoff recalled. “It was a heck of a game, our kids fought their butts off. We had the 51-game winning streak; that probably was one of the toughest losses of my career. That group should have and could have won the state championship. That’s the way basketball is, you just never know.”
Something else stuck out to Troester from that game. As they shared a locker space with Sacred Heart that day, a school official congratulated them on their positive behavior after the game. A 51-game winning streak over, who knows how most would have reacted. But, you don’t kick stuff over and trash a place when Jerry Eickhoff is your coach.
“It was pretty quiet in that locker room,” Troester said. “But that letter was one thing I remember well.”
It would be 13 years before Eickhoff would return with a team to Lincoln. But, the Hawks were not without great teams. In 1977, they finished 21-2, but lost to Polk in a regional final. In those 13 seasons, the Hawks lost to an eventual finalist seven times in the postseason, while playing the always rugged Crossroads Conference. The conference won four state championships during that time.
“You had to show up every night in our conference ready to go,” Eickhoff said. “What was so much fun about central Nebraska was that was what people did. In the wintertime, farmer’s weren’t busy and they were watching their kids play basketball. The pride was evident in all the small towns.”
Troester was willing to tell anyone who would listen in that time frame: “The guy is going to set the all-time wins record. I don’t know how many people believed me.”
Back to Lincoln
Myron Parsley was sitting in a hotel room in Dallas, Texas.
His Doane College golf team was set to play in a college tournament on Monday, against teams from the south, who have been playing much more than his Tigers. Parsley’s squad has been successful in recent years in the Great Plains Athletic Conference, but they were going be playing on a course that hosts a PGA tournament every year, the TPC at Las Colinas.
Parsley said part of the reason he took his team down to Texas to face such a rugged test was because of lessons learned from his old basketball coach.
“One thing Coach Eickhoff always focused on was his players getting better,” Parsley said. “We are here in Dallas to get better and compete. Even though, we don’t expect to win this tournament we do always expect to get better. I think he always thought getting better and working the fundamentals was more important than winning.
“But, don’t let his demeanor trick you. Coach Eickhoff loved to compete.”
Those 13 years were up when Myron Parsley was a junior in 1987. And, Eickhoff had his second two-time all-state player in the shifty guard. In 1986, the Hawks had lost a heartbreaking district final game to Beemer who would advance to the state final losing to Hampton’s conference mate Exeter.
In the pre-wild card days, Parsley energized a town. His 25-footer at the buzzer gave one-loss Hampton a win over unbeaten Palmer in the sub-district final in Aurora. They enacted revenge on Beemer in the district championship. When the Hawks beat Spencer 50-45 at the state tournament it began a four-year run of finals appearances and a 12-2 record in Lincoln.
It was that first semifinal win against Sandhills, that Parsley said was his best memory from those years. Even though, they lost the next night to Sterling and won the D2 title in 1988. That win was special.
“We made no bones about our goal being to get coach back in the state finals,” Parsley said. “To get that win and get back into the finals was pretty special for us.”
He’d have no such luck in the 1987 final on another buzzer beater — his 18-footer coming up just short as time expired giving Sterling a 57-56 win. When the Hawks dropped to D2 in 1988, there was little stopping them in the smaller class.
The Crossroads Conference had four teams at state in 1988, two were in D1 and the Hawks entered with a 17-4 record, all losses to teams in upper classes. The small school field was no match for the Hawks’ second title under Eickhoff as they won by 20, 14 and 14 points.
It was much the same in 1989 when Eickhoff’s son Trent was a senior. The Hawks were even more dominant as they finished 24-1 winning state tournament games by 28, 22 and six points over Hildreth in the finals.
“Trent was a nice player,” his father said. “He had good height at 6-4 or 6-5, didn’t need to score a lot, his biggest asset was his passing ability. He was a point guard playing post. He made the team a lot better, but he had a lot of talent around him.
“Coaching your own kid and having a kid who is unselfish, that makes it a lot easier to do. That’s who Trent was, he was a good player.”
How much was Trent Eickhoff respected in 1989? He was a first-team all-stater, but only averaged 11 points per game. He lost 12 games in his high school career.
Hampton’s 1990 class also advanced to the D2 final, losing to Falls City Sacred Heart in the finals to complete a four year run of 91-10. But, the 1989 team would be Eickhoff’s last title. He still had 20 years of lives to change.
The Ups and Downs
Benji Hoegh sits in his office at York Elementary School on Monday morning. As assistant principal, that’s where you wind up on Spring Break. School will be in session tomorrow.
Another of Coach Eickhoff’s point guards, Hoegh made sure that Hampton didn’t have another 13-year drought when they qualified for state in 1993 and 1994. Two teams made up of players who worshiped the guys that ruled the Hawk gym from 1987-1990.
Those two trips to Lincoln always came with the most work, when teams got nine days off between district finals and the state tournament.
“That is the thing I’ll still remember to this day,” Hoegh said. “He worked us like dogs before the state tournament. It was terrible, but you went to the tournament and you knew no one would have worked as hard as you did. That helped us a bunch.”
The 1993 Hawks might have surprised even the coach, coming off a lackluster 11-9 season in 1992. With just two seniors — Hoegh was a sophomore — the Hawks advanced the the D1 semifinals losing to Cedar Rapids and finishing 21-4. The class belonged to Adams anyway, they routed the Tigers 80-48 in the finals and had most everybody coming back in 1994.
Everyone was back for both Hampton and Adams in 1994, but the Hornets led by Super-Stater and Nebraska recruit Chad Ideus were top-ranked all season. They beat No. 2 Falls City Sacred Heart (the state football champs) in the sub-district final and Lincoln was to be a coronation.
Eickhoff had other ideas. Like a game plan that included three pages on 6-7 Ideus’ tendencies. A second-team all-class selection as a sophomore and a first-teamer as a junior and senior, Ideus had season averages of 21.9, 26.7 and 26.9 his final three season as a prep star.
“They had won it the year before,” Eickhoff remembered. “We threw a whole bunch of junk defenses at them. It was one of the greatest games I was ever involved in, because Adams was so respected and most people thought they would win the whole thing.”
Hoegh — all 5-11 of him — went for 25 points and 22 rebounds and Eickhoff’s team had defeated the Hornets 73-70. The next night, with an elusive fourth title in their grasp, the Hawks led Humphrey St. Francis 67-64 with under 30 seconds left. But a missed free throw and turnover led to a pair of Flyer baskets and a 68-67 title game victory.
“When you are on such a high and you have to come back it can be tough,” the coach said. “St. Francis played really well and our kids battled right until the end. That was a game, I didn’t sleep for three nights after that one. It was tough.”
The years went on. The NSAA invented the wild card as a qualification tool. And, Hampton continued to face tough opponents in district finals and just missed the tournament.
In 2008, wild card in hand and with that all-time win record on the line the Hawks got it for him in Lincoln when Dylan Bamesberger — his dad was in the 1990 class — hit a 3-point shot in the corner of Lincoln East for a 45-44 win over Bruning-Davenport to tie the record at 648. It was the same floor where Paxton had pulled of their upset 34 years prior.
“It’s everything,” Bamesberger told the Grand Island Independent at the time. “We’re guaranteed two more games. One more win until we get coach Eickhoff the state record. We want to get that accomplished.”
They did. In the first year for the consolation games, they ran over O’Neill St. Mary’s 58-35 for win 649. The next year would be his last and the Hawks would advance to Lincoln, losing to Ewing in the first round. He finished 670-229; just over 74 percent. Dean Troester had called his shot.
Eickhoff Notes
- All-state players under Eickhoff: nine (12 total seasons, three named twice)
- Total players in Nebraska history that scored 1,550 career points: 144. Total that played for Eickhoff: zero
- Record at the state tournament: 20-7. Six title game appearances; three champions and three runner-ups
- Eickhoff was an assistant football coach at Hampton throughout the 1970s. In 1976 and 1977, Hampton played in the first two NSAA state playoffs. Their 1976 title game loss to Wheatland was the first overtime football game in Nebraska history.
All in the Family
It’s the Sunday before the 2015 state tournament and Cameron Hudson — principal and boys basketball coach — is getting ready for the busiest week of the year. He has led his alma mater High Plains — they were Polk-Hordville when he graduated — to the state tournament for the fourth straight season. Last year they were in the finals.
Four years in a row. Sound familiar?
He has a resource again this week if he needs it, his father-in-law is Jerry Eickhoff. And, he’s had an influence on a Hudson long before he became a coach. It was when he was courting Eickhoff’s daughter, Holly.
“I must have been a freshman in high school,” Hudson said. “He sits me down and he says, ‘I was scouting you and another coach said you like to get on your teammates a little bit.’ I was shocked, but he was right. To this day, I carry that with me. I try to instill that in my players.
“We want people to say that the kids from High Plains are always a class act.”
Hudson has enjoyed what he calls an “ace in his pocket” if he ever needs it and it’s rare when family time doesn’t turn to some sort of basketball talk.
“With all the coaching he still does, he has a full plate,” Hudson said. “But, if I am ever having trouble figuring stuff out, he is there to help. He has a pretty good idea of who we are and what we are trying to do. Still, I’d rather coach against him than have him watch.”
They coached against each other 20 times. Ten wins each. On Thursday, Eickhoff will watch. High Plains play Amherst at 3:45 in the Class D1 quarterfinals, in search of a title that still eludes them.
This Week at State
Tanner Hudson is wrapped up in state tournament week on Monday afternoon.
He’s scored more points than anyone in this week’s state tournament field. His 638 points and 24.5 points per game average is 99 points better than Nebraska walk-on recruit Johnny Trueblood’s – the Elkhorn South senior averages 23.4 points per game. But, Hudson is a junior. On a new team called Riverside.
Hudson attends Spalding High School and the past two seasons he has played in the state tournament when he team was co-oped with Spalding Academy. They advanced to the state finals his freshman year before losing in double overtime to Wynot. Last year, they lost to High Plains in the semifinals and finished fourth. Their game against Falls City Sacred Heart last year would be their last tournament game together.
Except now, Hudson is doing it over again. And his buddies are from Cedar Rapids. They won four games last year, but with Hudson the Chargers are 18-7 and the fourth seed in the D2 field. He’ll get another shot at Falls City Sacred Heart on Thursday night. One of his coaches and mentors will be there watching – Jerry Eickhoff.
They met after Hudson’s freshman year and last year’s Team Nebraska 16U squad – you’d expect ‘team’ in anything Eickhoff coaches – went 36-7 during the summer against mostly elite competition from across the nation. They won a national tournament in Ames, Iowa and finished in the top-four of the prestigious Kings of Court Classic.
“We mostly have kids from the Heartland Athletic Conference who wanted to get together and play,” Eickhoff said. “I do it for nothing and we go out and compete and we compete pretty damn well.”
Also on Team Nebraska is Hudson. And he said his game has improved every season since working with Eickhoff.
“He is the best,” Hudson said. “That first year, he really drilled the fundamentals in us. But, now, he has helped our whole team. He wants us to be the best we can be as players. He put in a system for us with a few simple guidelines and we go play. He trusts us to make good decisions on the floor, but he can sure draw up a play if we need it.”
And, he has had a big impact on Hudson’s new role with for Riverside.
“This year has been a great experience for us,” Hudson said. “Coach Eickhoff has helped me to become a better player and here with (Riverside) Coach (Joe) Imus, I have learned to step up and be a leader on this team. We’ve realized what all of us can do together. It’s been fun.”
Friday night at 8:45, they’ll be a coach in the bleachers at Lincoln Southeast. He’ll be watching another one of his players on a state tournament run like so many of those other Hampton teams. “I think he has been to every one of my state tournament games,” Hudson said.
Be Prepared
The lasting impact for all of Eickhoff’s players was that they never felt like the other team was going to know more than they did when they took the floor. It’s all pretty simple. These quotes were not prompted. The players were asked what still sticks out to them today from playing basketball at Hampton
Said Troester: “I thought 40 years ago, he scouted better than anyone in that time and he probably scouted better than anyone does today. We always knew what the other team was going to be doing.”
And, Parsley: “We didn’t scrimmage very much in practice and we were drilled in the fundamentals. And, we didn’t realize at the time how prepared we were. We knew every tendency of every team we played. And, that allowed us to do so many things. We changed defenses almost every time down the floor. I don’t think you see that much today.”
And, Hoegh: “If you ask me for one word about Coach Eickhoff, it’s preparedness. We knew what everybody was going to do. Everybody. And, he didn’t have Hudl. It was all live scouting. He prepared us to play better than anyone else could have.”
The math says Jerry Eickhoff coached somewhere in the range of 600 players in 40 years at Hampton. His words to his players, were never about winning and losing, but about being the best you can be with your talent. That legacy lives on, well after the wins and losses are done being counted. It lives on this week at one more boys state basketball tournament.
