Becker Football's Dwight Lundeen Announces His Retirement

BECKER (WJON News) -- One of the best men to ever coach the sport of high school football has announced he is retiring. Becker's Dwight Lundeen says next year will be his last leading the Bulldogs. He officially told his coaching staff on Tuesday night, but he says he started talking about it with his family about a year ago.

Lundeen says he's approaching 80 years old and it's been a great run, but it's time to move on to the next chapter of his life, whatever that may be. He says he'd like to do everything special in the program one last time, and then step aside.

Dwight Lundeen

He says that, after going 5-5 this season and leading the team to the section championship game, he's excited about the prospects for next year - his 57th season at the helm.

We have a big 9th-grade class that was undefeated; they are coming in with 30-some kids. I would say right now we'll probably have 110 kids in our varsity programs in grades 10, 11, and 12 next year. I think we'll be able to find 22 really good football players to start, and then have great depth next year.

Lundeen says he's returning 75 players from this year's team. He says he always tries to play at least 40 kids in the first quarter of every game. His son is his offensive coordinator.

Dwight Lundeen

He was hired by the school in 1969 and tasked with starting the football program with just 17 players on the team.

The day we moved into Becker in 1969, the population was 365, and now we're over 5,000, so it's been a nice growth.

With 417 wins, Lundeen is the second-winningest high school football coach in Minnesota, only behind Verndale's Mike Mahlen, who has 437 career wins.