Florin Marton began his second stint as the head coach of the Salem men’s soccer team in December 2009. He enters his 12th season in his second tenure and 18th overall in 2021.
In a storied career that began in 2000, Marton has built and rebuilt the men's soccer team into a perennial regional powerhouse. Under his guidance, Salem has amassed nine winning records making Marton the winningest coach in school history with 102 victories entering the 2018 campaign.
The Tigers entered the Great Midwest Athletic Conference (G-MAC) in 2013 and finished third in the league standings in the 2013, 2014 and 2015 seasons, with identical 10-9-1 overall marks in 2014 and 2015. Salem culminated those two seasons with ECAC Division II Championship game appearances following semifinal wins over Wheeling Jesuit (2014) and Alderson Broaddus (2015).
Marton spent 14 years playing professional soccer and was also on the Romanian National Team as a goalkeeper.
During the final years of his playing career in Romania, Marton earned his National Coaching License. He began his coaching career at the youth level before spending time as a player/coach with CFR-Victoria Caransebes of the Romanian National League.
Marton came to the US in 1991 and began working with youth clubs in the Minneapolis/St. Paul region. He also served as an assistant coach at Carleton and Macalester Colleges, both at the same time. "I must have ben the only coach in the world to coach two different college teams at the same time, despite the fact they were playing against each other in the same conference," added Marton.
In 1994 he took over as the head coach at Carleton, where he spent the next three seasons. From Carleton, Marton went on to be both the head men’s and women’s soccer coach at Clarke College. Marton’s final stop in the 1990’s was a one year stint at the University of Wisconsin-Platteville where he served as an assistant coach for both the men’s and women’s programs.
Marton came to West Virginia for his first go-round in 2000 to coach both the men's and women's soccer teams for then-Salem Teikyo University. His first tenure saw three winning campaigns in seven seasons. He also coached the men's tennis team to a 2006 West Virgnina Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WVIAC) Championship and Salem International's only tennis appearance in the NCAA Tournament field.
In 2007, Marton took over the men’s and women’s programs at NAIA West Virginia Tech in 2007. He spent three successful seasons in Montgomery, West Virginia and was named the Mid-South Conference Men's Soccer Coach of the Year twice.
He is also involved with West Virgina youth soccer with the Olympic Development Program (ODP) and the Southern West Virginia Fusion Soccer Club.
Florin earned his Master’s degree in Engineering from the Polytechnic University of Timisoara in his native Romania. He holds a National Coaching License from the USSF.
