Betty Trull, the co-owner and operator of a basketball training center, has been hired as Hill-Murray’s girls basketball coach, athletics director John Pohl confirmed this week.

She succeeds longtime Pioneers coach Erin Herman, let go in the spring after a 36-year career that included nine Hill-Murray state tournament teams, including runner-up finishes in 2010 and 2011.

Trull, 28, played basketball at North Central University in Minneapolis and runs Basketball Enterprise LLC, a basketball training center that aims to “empower … athletes through faith-driven basketball training sets the foundation for everything they do.”

Herman, meanwhile, has accepted a position as assistant varsity coach at Edina.

Trull and her husband, Griffin, also coach a pair of AAU teams, Enterprise Elite, and Trull was a varsity assistant at Roseville for four years. She attended Christian Life Academy in Farmington.

She had been training several Hill-Murray players before being hired to run the Pioneers’ program.

“My goal is to win sections and make it to the state tournament, that’s my first goal with this team,” Trull said. “We have to get through some good teams to do that, but I definitely think it’s possible with this team.”

“It’s going to be a fun year,” Trull said. “It’s a really great team, but I’m even more excited about our team culture. I’m excited about it.”

The Pioneers begin practice next month and open the season Nov. 22 against Eden Prairie at the Girls Tip Off Challenge at Southwest Christian High School in Chaska.

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By LORNE COOK, Associated Press

BRUSSELS (AP) — Russia is waging a “targeted gray zone campaign” against Europe, including airspace violations, sabotage and cyberattacks that will only escalate if the Kremlin is not challenged, the European Union’s top official warned on Wednesday.

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European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said that in just two weeks, fighter jets breached Estonia’s airspace, while drones overflew military bases and critical infrastructure sites in Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Poland and Romania.

“Europe must respond. We must investigate every incident, and we must not shy away from attributing responsibility because every square centimeter of our territory must be protected and safe,” von der Leyen told EU lawmakers in Strasbourg, France.

“If we hesitate to act, the gray zone will only expand,” she said.

The EU’s executive branch, under von der Leyen’s guidance, is preparing a plan for Europe to be ready to confront such challenges by 2030. EU officials believe that Russia could be capable of launching an attack on another European country within three to five years.

The plan includes the development of a “drone wall” of high-tech systems linked to equipment that can detect, track and destroy drones, as well as strike their operating systems or pilots on the ground.

In two weeks, von der Leyen will submit a “road map” for bolstering Europe’s defenses by the end of the decade to the 27-nation bloc’s heads of state and governments for their approval.

Von der Leyen said that it’s simply not affordable for European countries to continue to scramble the latest-generation fighter jets to counter relatively cheap drones, as happened when several of them entered Polish airspace a month ago.

“This is absolutely not sustainable. We need an anti-drone system that is affordable and fit for purpose. For swift detection, swift interception, and when needed, swift neutralization,” she said, adding that Europe has much to learn in this from Ukraine.

The commission believes that the best way to encourage European countries to invest more in defense is to ensure that it creates jobs and is good for business in Europe. It insists that at least 65% of any project funded with EU money should be based on the continent.

In recent years, the member nations have placed about two-thirds of their orders with U.S. defense companies.

“Most investment goes outside Europe. In other words these are jobs outside Europe. This is absolutely not sustainable,” von der Leyen said. “This is European money and we want to see a return on this investment in jobs here in Europe.”

At a summit in Copenhagen last week, the position of some EU leaders toward the drone incidents, acts of sabotage, cyberattacks and sanction-busting appeared to have hardened. Denmark has not directly attributed a series of drone flights over the country in recent weeks to Russia.

French President Emmanuel Macron said that Europe must take a more aggressive approach with Russia by shooting down drones that enter European airspace and boarding shadow fleet ships illicitly transporting oil to deprive Moscow of war revenue.

A 44-year-old man has admitted to groping a teenager at a community pool in a Hugo housing development.

Jeremy John Miller, of Hugo, pleaded guilty Friday in Washington County District Court to fourth-degree criminal sexual conduct of a minor in connection with the July 28 incident in the Water’s Edge housing development.

Jeremy John Miller (Courtesy of the Washington County Sheriff’s Office)

A second count involving another teenager will be dismissed at sentencing as part of a plea deal he reached with prosecutors. It also calls for a stay of imposition, which means the felony conviction will be considered a misdemeanor if he successfully completes probation. Sentencing is scheduled for Dec. 10.

According to the criminal complaint, a 14-year-old girl told deputies July 28 that a man approached her at the pool in the 15000 block of Farnham Avenue North and made comments about wanting a girlfriend. He told her he should “pay her” and touched himself. He also gave her a “creepy” look as he spoke, the girl reported.

Shortly afterward he swam underwater toward her and groped her. When she kicked to get away from him, he followed her and grabbed her foot.

The girl said she got out of the pool and told him to stop doing what he was doing. She said he responded that he was trying to get his daughter, who was also in the pool.

Video footage at the pool showed Miller then approached the girl and, as she tried to back away and told him to stop, he grabbed her and threw her into the water.

A 13-year-old boy at the pool that day said the man also came up to him from behind and “bear hugged” him, running his hands down the boy’s body and grabbing his crotch, the complaint says. Also, when the boy was playing football in the pool with others, the man had groped him several times while “tackling” him.

Adults at the pool described the man as “acting creepy toward the kids” and identified him as Miller.

Deputies were not able to make contact with Miller that day. The next day, authorities were told the man was back at the pool and he was arrested.

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By JEAN-YVES KAMALE

KINSHASA, Congo (AP) — Over 200 health facilities in eastern Congo are experiencing shortages of medicines as a result of fighting in the region and a lack of humanitarian funding, the International Committee of the Red Cross said Wednesday.

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The Red Cross said it assessed 240 health centers and clinics in North and South Kivu, two provinces where the Rwanda-backed M23 rebels made an unprecedented advance earlier this year, further deepening one of the world’s largest humanitarian crises.

The difficulties in crossing front lines in the war-hit regions have prevented health facilities from getting access to medicine, even when it is available, the ICRC said.

“The lives of thousands of people are at stake,” due to the shortage of essential medicine against malaria, HIV, tuberculosis, and other diseases, François Moreillon, the head of the ICRC’s delegation in Congo, said during a news conference Wednesday.

Many humanitarian organizations supporting health facilities in the region have been forced to reduce their work or shutdown because of a lack of funding, he added.

“Currently, more than 80 per cent of health facilities in the Kivu provinces receive no support from humanitarian partners and are only operational thanks to the remarkable commitment of their staff on both sides of the front lines,” Moreillon said.

Many health workers have also fled the war-torn regions, leading to staff shortages in almost half of the facilities assessed by the ICRC, according to the organization.

Congo’s mineral-rich east has long been battered by fighting involving more than 100 armed groups including the Rwanda-backed M23 rebels. The rebels seized the provincial capitals Goma and Bukavu earlier this year, escalating the decades-old conflict.

The rebels’ advance has killed some 3,000 people this year and worsened what was already one of the world’s largest humanitarian crises, with around 7 million people displaced. While fighting has largely decreased as a result of peace efforts, there are still clashes and civilians are still being killed.