Darcy Earley gave her all to the Hall High School athletic department the past 19 years.

She’s been a head coach of softball and most recently volleyball. She’s been assistant coach in both as well as basketball. And, she’s he also coached soccer and track and field.

You name it, she’s coached it.

Dedicated to the teams, the athletes and coaching staff in every way, Earley gave it her all until she couldn’t give anymore.

Earley has stepped down as head volleyball coach at Hall after two seasons, 19 overall in the program, due to health reasons.

She suffers from Systemic Scleroderma, a rare autoimmune disease. It causes the overproduction of scar tissue in all soft tissue within the body and severe fatigue along with a host of other ailments.

“It was a hard decision to make. I love coaching and I really wanted to rebuild the (volleyball) program,” she said. “It was the main reason why I had to quit basketball coaching six years ago when I first started exhibiting symptoms of inflammation, tight skin and raynaud’s. It is an awful disease that requires me to be on a lot of medication to give some quality of life.

“Unfortunately, stress causes the disease to be more active even if it was a stress I enjoyed. I thought I would be fine to be an interim coach until we could get somebody long term, but the disease has caused some heart strain and has spread to my liver. It also causes severe fatigue, muscle cramping and tightness with fatigue, which makes it difficult to make it through a day of teaching followed by volleyball.”

It simply became too much to overcome to coach the way Earley wants to coach.

“I really hate what this disease has done to me and how much of my life it has taken away,” said Earley, a standout athlete at Cambridge High School and Augustana College. “I can no longer run due to lung inflammation or participate with activities in PE like I used to or coach with the energy and vigor that is needed to make a good team.”

Coaching through the disease and balancing her home life also became too difficult.

“It hasn’t been fair to my family and especially my boys,” she said. “I was either scouting tape or sleeping when home and I want to be there for their high school years and be able to enjoy it. I am hoping to find a balance to extend my quality of life for a few more years.”

Earley, 49, mother of three sons (college sophomore, two active high schoolers), wants to share this information in hopes to bring more awareness for this autoimmune disease since there isn’t much said about it. She said Scleroderma awareness and education is desperately needed.

“Most people have no clue what Scleroderma is and how devastating it could be to live with. Left untreated, a person can die within 5-10 years after onset,” she said. “It is also very difficult to diagnose since it affects so many different systems of the body and usually only a doctor who has experience with Scleroderma can diagnose it correctly.”

The late Bob Saget, who passed away recently, was a huge help with raising money for research, patient education and support groups, Earley said, and will be missed greatly by the Scleroderma community.

“He lost his sister to Scleroderma back in the 90s and he devoted his life to raising awareness and money for needed research,” she said.

Earley travels to Northwestern Medical’s Scleroderma clinic in Chicago for treatment. Research has gotten much better in the last 10 years for treatment, but little is known why and how the disease is triggered, she said.

“Many people die from the disease and I know I will eventually die from complications caused by Scleroderma, but I am lucky that we caught it early and I should be able to live a few more decades,” she said.

Earley came to Hall in 2003 to teach PE and was head coach in softball and assistant in volleyball. She picked up girls basketball, soccer and track and field along the way. She was an assistant for 17 years in the Hall volleyball program, taking over as head coach when Demi Salazar retired from his second stint as Hall head coach after the 2019 season.

In her coaching spotlight a year ago, Earley said, “Getting to help students learn the game and getting to know the students better,” is the best part of coaching.

When asked, “Why do you coach?,” she responded, “To help others reach their goals and to make them better people, hopefully.”

Her most memorable moment coaching at Hall came when the volleyball team got fourth place in 2005.

Kevin Hieronymus has been the BCR sports Editor since 1986. Contact him at khieronymus@bcrnews.com