Episode 348: Coach Brian Wheatley (North Linn's Girls Basketball Pressing System)

Championship Vision Basketball Podcast

Brian Wheatley Bio

Brian has been married to his wife Melissa for 20 years and they have 4 children. Ben, who was a 4 sport athlete at North Linn and is now a freshman at Kirkwood studying criminal justice. Meghan, a senior who participated in cross country, basketball, and track in high school. She will attend UNI next year to study kinesiology and continue her cross country and track career. Braden, a freshman and Brennan, a 6th grader. Both of the younger boys are following in the footsteps of their older siblings, involved in various sports and activities.

Brian graduated high school from Estherville Lincoln Central in 1996, where he played for Coach Mike HIlmer. He received his education degree at the University of Northern Iowa in 2000. He began his coaching career at North Linn in 1999 as a boys basketball assistant coach for Mike Hilmer, who had relocated to North Linn. After 5 years as an assistant boys coach, he became the head girls coach in the 2003-04 season. The year prior to Brian taking the girls program, the North Linn team finished 0-22.

His current coaching record is 397-90 with 9 state tournament appearances including a Class 2A state championship in 2020 and a 1A state championship in 2024. North Linn also finished as state runner up in 2015 and were state semifinalists in 2014, 2022, and 2023. North Linn has won 20-plus games in 14 consecutive seasons. In those 14 seasons, North Linn has a record of 320-32. The Lynx have played in 13 straight regional finals and have also won 10 of the last 12 Tri-Rivers conference championships.

He has been named the state coach of the year by the Iowa Basketball Coaches Association 4 times and state coach of the year from the Iowa Girls Coaches Association 3 times. In addition he has been named conference coach of the year 9 times, IBCA Region coach of the year 10 times, and IGCA District coach of the year 9 times. Brian was also awarded the Don Logan service award by the Iowa Basketball Coaches Association in 2021 for his contributions to the game.

Brian has served on the IGHSAU Basketball Advisory committee, has been a board member of the Iowa Basketball Coaches Association for 13 years and served as president of the organization in 2015. He also assists in the selection of the Iowa Girls Coaches Association All District and All State basketball teams and will be coaching the 1A select team in the Larry Niemeyer All Star games tomorrow. He also coaches middle school baseball and middle school football and was named the Class A middle school coach of the year in 2022..

Brian would like to thank his family, especially his wife Melissa, for supporting all the hours, weekends at youth tournaments and all the other offseason work it has taken to build the program. He would also like to thank his long time assistant coach Kevin Goedken for all his contributions over the years along with Mike Hilmer for all he learned playing for him and coaching along side of him as well. Brian would like to thank all of the youth coaches in community members in the North Linn community for helping in the development of the players. Finally, a special thank you to the iGCA for this very humbling honor, especially be inducted along with this great group of coaches and officials.

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