Hall of Fame honor comes home to Henning grad Bob Bjorklund
News | Published on October 16, 2026 at 11:03am EDT | Author: Kendall Koenen
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By Cliff Buchan
Special to the Advocate
hen you talk about basketball history around Henning, the Bjorklund name appears often spanning more than 100 years. It was the 1914-1915 school year when Henning High School played its first boys basketball season and Robert Bjorklund was among the handful of boys on the team. ¶ The Bjorklund name has been present frequently in the decades to follow, including the one-class state tournament years of 1965 and 1966. When Henning captured the Class A state championship in 2019, three Bjorklund brothers were on the court. And now a Bjorklund has made news for his coaching achievements and contributions to the game in Minnesota. Bob Bjorklund, a 1969 Henning High School graduate and a great-nephew of the first Robert Bjorklund, has been selected to the Minnesota Basketball Coaches Association Hall of Fame. Bjorklund and four other former coaches, will be inducted to the MBCA Hall of Fame at 2 p.m., Saturday, Oct. 24 at the Minneapolis Marriot Northwest Hotel in Brooklyn Park. Bjorklund becomes the fourth Henning graduate to achieve the honor.
The three previous inductees to the MBCA Hall of Fame include: Leonard Espeland, representing Granite Falls High School, 1994; Ralph Boline, representing Fosston High School, 1988; and Neal Oscarson, representing Deer Creek and Henning High Schools, 2015. Bjorklund was a freshman reserve guard, and Oscarson was a senior starting guard on Henning’s 1966 state tournament team.
Bob Bjorklund’s coaching career in high school and college extended from 1973 through 2006. He spent 24 years on the high school bench before being hired at Bethel University in 1997 where he served nine years as men’s basketball head coach. In 2004, two years before he stepped down from coaching, Bjorklund was appointed athletic director at Bethel. He held the AD post for 17 years before retiring in 2021. His combined high school and college coaching record was 476-254.
Bjorklund’s high school coaching career included stops in Fergus Falls, Benson and Buffalo Lake. A graduate of the University of Minnesota in 1973, he was hired in Buffalo Lake where he coached and taught for four years, earning a pair of 212 East Conference championships. In 1977, he returned to the University of Minnesota to secure his graduate degree. He spent two years as an assistant coach in Richfield during this period.
He returned to the high school ranks in 1979, landing the job to teach and coach in Benson before being hired in Fergus Falls after one year in Benson. He spent 17 years in Fergus Falls where he guided the Otters to Section 8AA Section titles and state tournament appearances in 1984, 1986 and 1990. He was a three-time Section 8AA Coach of the Year.
By the time he stepped into the Bethel coaching job, Bjorklund’s high school teams combined for a record of 330-165. He was a beloved coach in Fergus Falls. In 2006 he was inducted into the Fergus Falls High School Hall of Fame and in 2018, he was inducted into the Fergus Falls Area Chamber of Commerce Hall of Fame.
Bjorklund’s contributions to basketball in Minnesota have been lifelong. He was a member of the MBCA throughout his career. He volunteered as a speaker and clinician during the annual MBCA coaching clinics in October and served as an MBCA All-Star Series coach.
As Bethel’s head coach, he played a lead role in recruiting more than 70 athletes to attend Bethel with most coming from Minnesota high schools. From 2016-2020, Bjorklund was a member of the NCAA Division III Men’s Basketball National Committee responsible for selecting the tournament teams and conducting the national championships.
He’s now in his second season as a volunteer “character coach” at Bethel where he works with the men’s basketball program. Most of his duties include individual and group meetings with student athletes to discuss basketball and life.
Bjorklund comes from an athletic farm family that has worked on the land outside Henning since the late 1800s. He was one of five Bjorklund brothers (Dennis, Wendell, Dave and Jon) who were anchors for Henning athletic programs from 1958 through 1969. All five brothers earned college degrees at either the University of Minnesota or Bethel University.
During his high school years, Bjorklund was awarded 15 athletic letters: four in football, four in basketball, four in track and field and three in baseball.
Upon his hiring at Bethel University in 1997, Bob and his wife Carol (Nordgren), also a 1969 Henning graduate, have lived in the Mounds View-Arden Hills area. They are the parents of a daughter and son, Alisa and Tyson, and the grandparents of six children.
Other coaches who will be inducted into the MBCA Hall of Fame on October 24 are John “Pat” Dewey, representing Sandstone-East Central; Mark Kieffer, Rochester Mayo; Joe Madson, Mankato East; and Dan Ninham, representing Cass Lake-Bena, Red Lake and Bemidji.