Johnston (Iowa) owns high school girls basketball's longest active win streak at 79 consecutive games. The Dragons have captured the last three Class 5A state titles and four of the last six while reaching the championship contest in every season over that span.
Chad Jilek is the architect of the program that went 27-0 in 2025-26 and finished No. 11 in the final MaxPreps Top 25. For his efforts, Jilek has been named the 2025-26 MaxPreps National Coach of the Year.
"I'm honored I was even on the list of finalists," Jilek said. "Words don't even express how grateful I am to think I'm the MaxPreps Coach of the Year from a public school in Iowa.
"I'm grateful to the kids and all the hard work they put into this."
Jilek, an eighth-grade history teacher who played college baseball and wasn't certain he wanted to coach girls basketball, has also won back-to-back Class 2A girls tennis state titles at
Northwest (Waukee).
"I got into coaching the girls side because I had daughters and a way for me to stay in their lives would be coaching them," Jilek said of daughters
Kinsey and
Kamryn. "I tell everyone that I don't think I could go back to coaching boys. I like the women's game. It's more of a pure game and I have a lot of fun coaching the women."
After all the titles and a three-year win streak, Jilek hasn't stopped tinkering with his formula for success.
This season, former University of North Dakota coach Mallory Bernhard came in to run the offense and former
Clear Lake head coach Bart Smith to organize the defense.
"I let them loose on the reins and the girls got to hear a different voice," Jilek said. "I was able to do a lot of the CEO-type stuff and I gave a lot of freedom to the coaches."
Jilek said in-game decisions remained his purview but that with a high-functioning team he often liked to skip the timeout and see if they could figure out things on their own.
"The girls are great leaders," Jilek said. "What we do in practice allows them to settle themselves down."
The win streak and titles are a testament, he said, to the players and the leadership.
"They all set the standard and the expectation," Jilek said.
Past MaxPreps National Coaches of the Year
2014 — Dan Rolfes, Incarnate Word Academy (St. Louis)
2015 — Tom Gonsalves, St. Mary's (Stockton, Calif.)
2016 — Karen Weitz, Centennial (Las Vegas)
2017 — Joe Lombard, Canyon (Texas)
2018 — Frank Orlando, Detroit Country Day (Beverly Hills, Mich.)
2019 — Terri Bamford, La Jolla Country Day (La Jolla, Calif.)
2020 — No award (Pandemic)
2021 — Terry English, Bishop Miege (Shawnee Mission, Kan.)
2022 — Tim Miller, Hazel Green (Ala.)
2023 — Stan Delus, Etiwanda (Calif.)
2024 — Tim Slater, Grayson (Loganville, Ga.)
2025 — Jason Reuter, Bradley Central (Cleveland, Tenn.)
