As a coach Neil Pierce prepared his players well, now he’s prepared to enter the Minnesota High School Baseball Coaches Association Hall of Fame.

Pierce coached baseball at Alden-Conger High School for 33 years and became known as a coach who prepared his team well on the diamond. That sentiment was echoed by those who coached against him, including Glenville-Emmons head coach Louie Toulouse and New Richland-Hartland-Ellendale-Geneva head coach Jeff Reese.

“I guess the big thing would be that his teams were well prepared, fundamentally sound,” Toulouse said.

Pierce is the second consecutive area coach to receive the honor. Last year Reese was inducted into the hall of fame.

“I was definitely pleased and glad to be honored,” Pierce said. “I don’t know if it’s so much me as it is all the players that I had playing for me. They won the games. I was just guiding the ship, so to speak.”

Reese described Pierce as Alden’s Mr. Baseball and said he was a fierce competitor on the field.

“Whatever he got handed to him he developed if he didn’t develop it himself,” Reese said.

Both Reese and Toulouse said Pierce always seemed to have an ace on the mound every session and at a small school like Alden-Conger that’s not always easy to find.

Pierce grew up in Freeborn and came back to teach and coach in Alden after he graduated from Gustavus Adolphus College. Pierce played basketball and baseball while at Gustavus and planned to become a coach and a teacher after graduation.

At Gustavus he played under basketball head coach Whitey Skoog, the former Gophers and Minneapolis Lakers player, who became Pierce’s coaching mentor. He studied Skoog and other coaches at all levels, saw how they were with their team and how they acted and melded all that he learned.

“He was low-key and he prepared his team,” Pierce said. “He wasn’t one to yell, holler or shout at the players because it’s too late. If they don’t know what to do by then, what good is it to yell at them.”

Pierce adopted the same approach to coaching and maintained a low-key profile from the dugout or the bench on the basketball court. Pierce also coached basketball for 17 years.

“I prepared them well and I didn’t embarrass them,” Pierce said. “Like I told them, I said, ‘Whatever happens on that floor, basketball or the baseball field,’ I said, ‘Don’t embarrass the school or me and I will not embarrass you. Do the right thing.’ It seemed to work out pretty good.”

In 33 years Pierce amassed a career record of 277-214-2 on the diamond and reached the district and section finals three different times, only to be beaten by the eventual state champion. The last came in 1999 when Montgomery-Lonsdale beat Alden-Conger and went on to win the state title.

Athletes learned life lessons under Pierce, including punctuality.

“If we’re practicing today at 3 p.m., I expect to be on the field or on the court by 3 p.m.,” Pierce said. “Not 5 after, not 10 after because my time is just as valuable as yours and I want you to be here. Once you go out in the workforce your boss is not going to let you come in 5, 10, 15 minutes late.”

Pierce has traveled to Fort Myers, Fla. each year to watch the Twins at spring training. He has keepsakes from those trips, including Joe Mauer’s autograph.

The induction ceremony will be Oct. 30 at the Ramada Plaza in Minneapolis.