AMES - Courtney Messingham has had tours of duty throughout the central U.S. during his football coaching career. The recruiting trail has helped familiarize him with every highway and byway in Iowa.

Thus, he didn't need to confer with mapquest.com to find his newest post.

Messingham, a former Northern Iowa quarterback and Waterloo West star, was hired Wednesday as an assistant on Paul Rhoads' Iowa State coaching staff. Messingham will coach tight ends in Ames.

"I'm excited and my family's excited, just about getting the opportunity to get back to the state of Iowa - and to coach for Coach Rhoads," said Messingham.

After playing for the Panthers from 1986-89, Messingham, now 42, later served as head coach at Upper Iowa from 2003-04. The Waterloo native also has worked as an assistant at Southern Mississippi, Truman State, Iowa Lakes Community College, St. Ambrose and Missouri State - where he was a receivers coach last year under former UNI head coach Terry Allen.

Iowa State is "getting a great fit," Allen said Wednesday. "Courtney not only is a great football coach but he's got great experience. … He's a great position coach and recruiter. I'm glad he has the opportunity to go back to Iowa."

The coaching life has made for quite a few changes of address for Messingham the last two decades. Now he hopes to set up shop in his home state for the foreseeable future.

"Unfortunately, from a coaching standpoint you generally don't have the opportunity to stay at one place for an extended period of time," he noted. "Myself and my family hope this is one (stop) that'll be different - we hope we'll stay here for a long time."

Contact Kelly Beaton at (319) 291-1456 or kelly.beaton@wcfcourier.com