New Jersey City has announced the hiring of former Siena All-American and 16-year professional basketball player Marc Brown as interim head men's coach. Brown will be the 10th head coach in the history of the program, which will celebrate its 75th season of competition this year.

Brown recently retired as an active player after a standout career from 1991-2007 in the Continental Basketball Association and in various pro leagues in Europe and South America. The youngest son of former NJCU coach Charles Brown, who retired last month with a 483-218 record, the younger Brown has coached during the offseason throughout his professional playing career.

"I am very excited about this opportunity," Marc Brown said. "To follow my dad is an honor, because he's a legend as a coach and a man. For me, if I can do half of what he's done in the last 25 years, I will be successful. While I have some big shoes to fill, I will continue to run this program with dignity and class and try to mold these young student-athletes into men, because that's really what it's about. That's what it was about for me."

Brown, 38, has coached NJCU's entries in summer leagues, including this past season. Alice De Fazio, NJCU's interim athletic director said: "Marc Brown was an exceptional player on both the collegiate and professional level. I am confident he will lead us in our quest to compete for a conference championship and in his ability to mentor the student-athletes under his tutelage."

Siena's all-time leading scorer with 2,340 points in a four-year career that spanned 1987-91, Brown was the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference Player of the year as a senior in 1991, and a Division I Honorable Mention All-American by both the Associated Press and United Press International that year.