Eastern Illinois men’s basketball coach Marty Simmons has announced the hiring of Linc Darner and Marlon London as coaches on the Panthers basketball staff for next season. Darner will serve as the associate head coach while London has been hired as an assistant coach.
Darner has spent the last two seasons as an assistant coach at Ball State and High Point after a successful run as the head coach at Green Bay for five seasons. He led Green Bay to post-season appearances in three of those five years with post-season play canceled his final season due to COVID-19. The Phoenix won 20 or more games in two of the five seasons making an NCAA Tournament, CBI and CIT tournament appearance. Darner won 92 games in five seasons at Green Bay with the 2019 team lsoing in the CIT Championship game. Prior to his time at Green Bay, Darner was the head coach at Florida Southern leading the program to the NCAA Division II National Tournament in each of his final eight seasons. He won 219 games at Florida Southern making the DII Elite Eight in 2013 and capping his time with the team winning the 2015 Division II National Championship. His first head coaching opportunity came at Division II Saint Joseph’s where he won 74 games in four years making the NCAA Division II Tournament his final season. Darner played at Purdue for head coach Gene Keady and was a member of the Boilermakers 1994 Big Ten Championship Team that advanced to the Elite Eight. He then started his coaching career as a student assistant at Purdue before assistant coaching stops at Murray State, Lincoln Memorial and Ashland.
London spent last season on the staff at UIC where he was the director of scouting for the Flames. Prior to that London worked as the associate head coach at North Park University for four seasons and as the associate head coach at Lewis University for two years helping guide the team to the GLVC Tournament Championship game in 2017. Before entering the college coaching ranks, London spent five seasons as an assistant coach at Westchester St. Joseph High School playing a key role in helping coach the program to the 2015 IHSA Class 3A State Championship. During that time he helped coach seven players that would go on to earn Division I scholarships. London began his collegiate playing career at Kansas earning All-Big 12 Freshman Team Honors. He would graduate from DePaul and played professionally overseas in Estonia, Spain and Mexico.
“I’m excited about the addition of Linc and Marlon to our Eastern Illinois coaching staff. Both of them bring valuable experience from their time as both coaches and players with high level programs,” said Simmons. “Linc has had success building programs as a head coach at both the Division II and Division I level and is one of the great basketball minds in the game. Marlon is a great up-and-coming coach that has been around some great programs at a variety of levels. Those experiences will help us recruit, mentor and coach the young men coming into our Eastern Illinois program.”
https://eiupanthers.com/news/2023/4/10/darner-london-join-eiu-mens-basketball-staff.aspx
