By Tim Robinson
Don Palmer, the winningest basketball coach in Michigan history, announced his retirement on Tuesday.
“I told my team this morning that I will not be back,” Palmer said in a text to reporters. “I was asked this question several times over the weekend. I didn’t feel I could answer it until I talked to the players.”
Palmer coached basketball for 45 years, the first 32 at Milford. He coached boys and girls at Milford for 29 years, when the girls played in the fall. He coached a total of 74 high school basketball seasons.
He had his greatest success at Hartland, where the Eagles went 90-8 in his last four seasons, including a 25-2 record this season. Hartland reached the finals for the first time last week, where it lost to West Bloomfield 52-42 in the Division 1 championship game on Saturday.
Tuesday, after more than 1,000 victories and 74 seasons, Don Palmer called it a career.
