Baxter’s Luther ready for next challenge on gridiron

When Rob Luther announced publicly on social media that he was stepping down as Baxter head football coach, many thought the long-time ball coach was retiring from the sport.

And it was a bit awkward and uncomfortable keeping his future quiet while things got settled on both sides.

But Luther never really considered retiring. He just kind of knew his time at Baxter was winding down.

“I knew it was the right time,” Luther said. “I couldn’t be in the weight room over the summer because of the retirement and IPERS stuff. I got the juice back for a while, but it just felt different. I felt like the old guy who was just hanging on. I need rejuvenated.”

This is year one of Luther being retired as Baxter High School Principal. He was not allowed in the building for a short time even as the football coach because of IPERS.

He didn’t go into this past season thinking it would be his last. But he figured it out pretty quickly that it was probably going to be it.

And right before Christmas, Luther got an opportunity he just couldn’t turn down.

While subbing at Ankeny High School, he received a text from a friend that would eventually lead to his latest role as the offensive coordinator for the Ankeny Hawks.

“It’s kind of fate. My wife and his wife were teaching partners for 10 years and Jeff Bauer subbed for us in Baxter about six years ago,” Luther said. “He was a top scout for the New York Jets when Rex Ryan was there. Our families knew each other. His daughter baby sat our kids.

“We stayed in touch and then he got a job in Ankeny when Rick Nelson got there. I was subbing in Ankeny recently, and he shoots me a text to ask if I was in the building. Then he asked me to come to his room at lunch. He then told me his offensive coordinator had left and another offensive coach left and he wanted to know if I had any interest.”

The soul searching began there. Luther started to weigh his options but had already thought about contacting some bigger schools after the holiday break anyway.

In the end, he decided to take the job at a high school which is located in his backyard.

“I always thought when I came to Baxter in 1997 that it would be a two-year stop, and I would get back into the Des Moines area,” Luther said. “Baxter is a great place to be, and I just never had a reason to leave. I had some offers and some opportunities, too.

“This year at Baxter felt a little off. I wasn’t in the building. I love our kids, and I’m glad I coached this senior group, but I knew it was probably time.”

Jeff Bauer is the head football coach at Ankeny High School. The Hawks are coming off a 6-5 season in which they reached the Class 5A quarterfinals after playing one of the toughest schedules in the state.

Ankeny also won at least nine games in each of the four previous seasons, hoisted the state championship in 2020 and finished as the runner-up in 2021 and 2023.

Luther is tasked with calling the offensive plays and playing a role in setting up an offensive staff that goes eight deep.

He also returns to the 11-man game after guiding the Baxter Bolts at the 8-man level the past eight seasons.

“It’s a different world. I can tell that you after just a couple of weeks,” Luther said about coaching at the 5A level. “Being a head coach is so much work from organization, uniforms, purchasing and getting camps ready. It was perfect because I was tired of doing that and now I just get to coach ball at one of maybe the seven or eight schools in 5A that can win a state championship every year.”

Luther’s coaching career spans 35 years so far. He began his run at Van Meter before spending three seasons as the offensive coordinator at Des Moines East. His first head coaching job came at Woodward-Granger where he spent two seasons.

Luther was brought to his alma mater, Collins-Maxwell, by his high school football coach. He spent one year as the Dean of Students there before being brought over to Baxter by former superintendent Neil Seales.

The football program and other athletic teams were under the tag of CMB during Luther’s time in those districts. He coached at CMB or Baxter from 1997 to 2024.

“I will remember the relationships. I’ve had multiple guys come back who played for me to coach with me,” Luther said. “Some of my best friends in the world are guys I hired or met on the football staff.”

Two of those former players who joined Luther’s coaching staff were Josh Russell and Braydon Aker, who both were on two of Luther’s best teams.

Russell played on Luther’s very first CMB team in 1997 and Aker was an all-state quarterback on the first Baxter Bolts 8-man squad that finished 8-1.

Neither of those teams made the playoffs though.

“My first team in 1997 was loaded,” Luther said. “We tied for the district championship. Our only loss was to Pleasantville, but we lost out on a coin flip because only eight teams made it back then. That team was really good.”

The 2017 Baxter squad which went 8-1 did not make the postseason because the Bolts started 8-man play during the middle of the Iowa High School Athletic Association’s two-year cycle.

But they were originally told they’d be part of the postseason if they were good enough. That still doesn’t sit well with Luther even today.

“I think we were a Dome team if we were eligible,” Luther said. “We beat Midland that year, who was a semifinal team. And we weren’t full strength in the one game we lost. We were really good that year.

“The 8-1 8-man team was a regret because I was told we would be able to play in the playoffs. They went back on that. We still would have played 8-man and did what we did, but that was a tough pill to swallow.”

Aker led 8-man with 2,615 passing yards and led all of the state with 52 passing TDs that season. He also rushed for 647 yards and 16 scores and added 43 tackles, 10 tackles for loss and 5.5 sacks on defense.

He went on to play collegiately at Iowa Western Community College and Wartburg College before joining Luther’s staff a few seasons ago.

“It was surreal to have someone who coached me from when I was in the fifth grade all through high school respect me enough to take my input as one of his assistant coaches,” said Aker, who played for Luther from 2014 to 2017. “To be able to share a sideline with him and ask for my input on certain things meant the world to me.”

Luther’s overall coaching record is something like 165-130. He coached eight CMB squads to the postseason and five of those teams won district titles.

The Raiders finished 9-0 in the 2014 regular season before ending the year 10-1.

They also went 8-2 in back-to-back seasons in 2008 and 2009. That’s as far back as Bound goes.

And Luther thinks CMB had the best three-year stretch of any 2A team from 2007-2009.

“We had guys sit around and argue at my retirement party about which team was better,” Luther said. “That 9-0 team was really good. We had a CMB team in the early 2000s that was 7-2, lost a close one to Iowa Falls and another one. We were really good that year. That team is probably in the top three or four of best teams at CMB.”

Most of Luther’s coaching tenure has been with the 11-man game. The long-time coach is looking forward to having 22 players on the field at once again.

But he also enjoyed coaching from the home sideline at Collins-Maxwell one last time this fall.

“I had a lot of memories playing on that side of the field and a part of me thought that night it was going to be the last time I coached on that field,” Luther said. “I had a good feeling about that.”

He also had a better feeling about this past year’s team, which finished 3-5 and missed the postseason.

“We won every close game the year before and lost them this year,” Luther said. “The Colo-NESCO game came down to a two-point conversion we didn’t get.

“We got killed with injuries. We should have had a better year than we did. I felt bad. We had Montezuma on the ropes, and they made the quarterfinals.”

While most fans and players will remember the wins, it’s easier for Luther to recall the losses.

The most recent “memorable” loss came against Montezuma a few seasons back. The Bolts were in position to host multiple playoff games but a 50-yard field goal as time expired gave Baxter its only district loss and changed the entire landscape of the playoffs.

“We’ve had a lot of wins. We just never got the big wins,” Luther said.

“I can tell you about the worst three or four losses more than I can recall the great wins.”

Another memorable stretch for Luther, for better or worse, was making the switch from sharing athletics with Collins-Maxwell and competing as the CMB Raiders to creating the Baxter Bolts.

“I will be a Raider and a Bolt for life,” Luther said. “Changing over to the Bolts was a huge thing for me and the community.”

While Luther had many great seasons guiding the Bolts and Raiders on the gridiron, he does wonder why none of his best teams could get over the hump.

He has plenty of regrets during his time coaching both programs, including the final CMB season.

“That last CMB year was really tough. We were 6-3 the year before and had everyone coming back,” Luther said. “We knew going into the season that we were done as a group. One of two things were going to happen — we were either going to catch fire because everyone was pissed CMB was breaking up or things would unravel. We lost two close games early and lost the team.

“We won our last game but underperformed that year. We could feel that thing fading and just couldn’t keep it together. We had a bunch of dudes on that team, too. That season was one of my regrets. It was already coming a part because of the situation, and we just couldn’t keep it together. That’s too bad because that was a great group.”

There is never a perfect time to say goodbye to something you’ve been a part of for so long, but Luther thinks giving up the Bolts job now will be the perfect transition for the new coach.

The 2025 season for Baxter may be a transition year, but the freshmen class could be special eventually.

“This will be a rebuilding team at Baxter with really good freshmen so someone should come in and develop that young group,” Luther said.

His time at Baxter is not up entirely though. He plans to continue coaching track and field at the junior high level for at least one more season.

He coaches both the boys and girls and both high school coaches — Russell and Ryan Hermes — would like him to continue in his role for as long as he wants to do it.

“There’s a part of me that still wants to be part of the Bolts,” Luther said. “I really like coaching junior high track. There may be some other options (at Ankeny) with track, but I will coach junior high track at Baxter this spring. Then we’ll re-evaluate it after that.”

The high school girls track and field coach is Russell, who played linebacker and on the offensive line for Luther his senior year back in 1997.

Russell began teaching and coaching junior high football at Baxter in 2005. He eventually moved up to the freshmen and junior varsity level until 2010 and then coached football again under Luther from 2012-2014.

“I think one thing I learned from Coach Luther is that you have to have your beliefs and values but also be flexible and learn to adapt over time,” Russell said. “I think most importantly, from a unique perspective of being one of the first players he coached at CMB and also being able to coach with Luther, was that he truly loved the game and the people he impacted through the game.

“While, the wins and scores were important, the relationships that were built through the game were more important to him.”

It was and still is about the relationships for Luther. He was reminded of that by several former players who spoke highly of the way Luther impacted their lives at his retirement party.

“It’s not lip service,” said Luther, who was nominated for the Iowa Football Coaches Association Hall of Fame this past offseason. “When you stand around the retirement party and hear dudes talk about all of their awesome experiences and how successful they’ve been in their lives, to have a little part in that is awesome.

“I’ve had many people reach out and thank me for the experiences. It’s a relationship driven business. That’s what I will remember the most.”

Luther is unsure how long he will continue to coach football. He hopes to at least be at Ankeny for the next three seasons.

And fans can expect to see an offense that looked a lot like the offense he ran with CMB.

“We’ll be a spread, no-huddle tempo,” Luther said. “(Bauer) wants to take a lot more chances than he has the last three years so I think he’s hiring the right guy because I don’t like to punt. We’ll play the odds.

“I’m looking forward to a change. When you’ve done it in one place for so long, I just want to see what somewhere else looks like. The newness will be exciting.”