Photo Courtesy of Hillcrest Academy Yearbook

The sixth biggest story in Hillcrest Academy sports from last year happened on the soccer pitch. As mentioned in our No. 7 story on the countdown Thursday, Hillcrest Academy won their first Southeast Iowa Superconference soccer championship since 2019 last season. As part of that journey, another longer journey came to an end, as longtime head coach Marcus Miller won his 300th career match. The victory was a 2-1 decision against Danville on April 18th in which the Ravens wore special Liverpool Red kits to honor their head coach.

Miller has been on the sidelines for 31 seasons at Hillcrest Academy, formerly Iowa Mennonite School. He entered the year with a 295-198-10 record, holding a 67% winning percentage. His teams have finished with a winning record 19 times, at least 10 wins, 15 times and 15 wins five times. The top total was 19 wins in the 1997 season. Miller has led the school to the State Tournament six times; 1996, 1997, 1998, 2000, 2018 and 2019, winning the State Championship in 1997. Miller was also named Southeast Iowa Superconference Co-Coach of the Year in 2024. He is a multi-time winner of the award.

Next week, we continue our countdown of the top stories in Hillcrest sports from the last year when we hit the top five with a look at head basketball coach Dwight Gingerich’s climb up the all-time state wins list.