Robert Lee Marlin (born March 5, 1959) is an American college basketball coach who is the current head men's basketball coach for the Louisiana Ragin’ Cajuns men’s basketball team. Previously, he was the head coach at Sam Houston State from 1998 to 2010.[1]
After graduate school, Marlin worked in his first full-time coaching job as an assistant at Houston Baptist from 1983 to 1989 under Gene Iba and Tommy Jones. Marlin helped Houston Baptist qualify for the 1984 NCAA tournament.[2]
Marlin's first head coaching position was at Pensacola Junior College (now Pensacola State College) from 1990 to 1995. In five seasons, Marlin led Pensacola to a 123–35 record and the 1993 NJCAA national championship, for which he won NJCAA Coach of the Year honors. Additionally, 27 players who played under Marlin won athletic scholarships from four-year schools.[2]
At Sam Houston State, Marlin was head coach from 1998 to 2010. With a cumulative 225–131 record, Marlin led the Bearkats to three Southland Conference regular season titles (2000, 2003, and 2010) and two Southland Conference tournament titles and NCAA Tournament automatic qualifications (2003 and 2010), including the program's first-ever NCAA Division I Tournament appearance in 2003.[6][7]
Louisiana (2010–present)
The University of Louisiana at Lafayette hired Marlin as head coach for the Louisiana team on March 29, 2010.[8] In 10 seasons, Marlin has a cumulative 188–143 record at Louisiana (Louisiana–Lafayette before 2017), with two Sun Belt Conference regular season titles (2011 and 2018) and the 2014 Sun Belt Conference men's basketball tournament championship with an automatic qualification to the 2014 NCAA tournament.[6]
On March 7, 2019, Marlin became the fifth coach in Sun Belt Conference history to earn 100 league victories after Louisiana earned a come-from-behind 77-72 win at Little Rock.[9]
Louisiana appeared in the CollegeInsider.com Postseason Tournament in 2012, 2015, and 2016.[4] In the 2017–18 season, Louisiana reached a school record 27 wins with a first-place finish in the Sun Belt and NIT appearance.[4] Days prior to the NIT first round game against in-state opponent LSU, Marlin questioned why Louisiana had a lower seed than LSU. On March 14, 2018, LSU won the NIT first round game at home 84–76 over Louisiana. Late in the game, Marlin and LSU coach Will Wade were confrontational towards each other, even needing to be restrained.[10][11]
National champion
Postseason invitational champion
Conference regular season champion
Conference regular season and conference tournament champion
Division regular season champion
Division regular season and conference tournament champion
Conference tournament champion
National champion
Postseason invitational champion
Conference regular season champion
Conference regular season and conference tournament champion
Division regular season champion
Division regular season and conference tournament champion
Conference tournament champion