Jan. 27, 2006

New York, N.Y. - Stony Brook's Cesar Markovic was named the Men's College Coach of the Year by BigAppleSoccer.com, the website announced at its second annual awards ceremony at Nathan Hale's Bar and Grill in New York City on Thursday night. Markovic collects the honors after leading the Seawolves to the America East Championship and second round of the NCAA tournament in just his second year at the school.

Markovic, who inherited a 4-13-1 team when he arrived in 2004, has gone 24-11-7 in his two seasons at Stony Brook, including a school record 13 wins after going 13-5-4 in 2005. The Seawolves finished the campaign with a program-best RPI ranking of 45 out of 199 NCAA Division I schools, a jump of 147 slots in two years under Markovic.

This fall, the Seawolves earned both the America East regular season and tournament championships and posted the first NCAA Division I win in any sport in the school's history with a 2-1 overtime victory over Yale in the first round of the College Cup before eventually suffering a 2-0 loss at Connecticut in the second round.