Growing up, Bryan and Brendan Mullins lived and breathed basketball. They played for the Illinois Wolves, a travel basketball team founded by their father, Mike, which has developed players such as Charlotte Hornets center Frank Kaminsky and 2010 No. 2 overall NBA Draft pick Evan Turner.
Now, the two coach against each other in the Missouri Valley Conference (MVC).
Brendan, 32, is an assistant coach at Illinois State University. He played Division II basketball at Saint Michael’s College in Vermont and broke into coaching as a graduate assistant at Mercyhurst University in Pennsylvania. After five seasons as an assistant at Wright State University, Brendan took the same position at University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) in 2015 before Illinois State hired him prior to the 2017-18 season.