This year’s contribution to sports honoree has been a true leader at every stop during his career.
Born March 18, 1970, he was a standout football player at both Austintown Fitch High School and Youngstown State University.
A 1988 AFHS graduate – he was inducted into the Austintown Fitch Athletics Hall of Fame in 2017 – he played for the Penguins under head coach Jim Tressel from 1988-91 where he helped lay the foundation for their unprecedented championship run in the 90’s.
He helped the Penguins to a 36-15 (.706) overall mark in 51 games played, serving as captain while earning “Offensive Player of the Year” laurels his senior season in 1991, their first Division I-AA (now FCS) title and first of four – they won three – national championship game appearances.
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He earned his bachelor’s in accounting degree from YSU in June of 1993 and worked for three years at Hill Barth & King in Youngstown where he became a CPA.
He returned to his alma mater in 1996 as athletic business manager and in March of 2000, he was named the school’s Associate Executive Director of Athletics. In his brief time in that capacity, he helped spearhead the athletic department’s transition into the Horizon League.
In July of 2001, the Penguins’ first year of competition in the Horizon League, he succeeded his former head coach as Executive Director of Athletics, a post he has held now for the past 23 years.
Since the 2013-14 academic year, Strollo has overseen the Penguins’ athletic department as they have won the league’s McCafferty All-Sports Trophy outright once (2022-23), were co-champions on one occasion (2020-21), finished runners-up three times (2013-14, 2016-17 and 2021-22) and had a third-place finish (2014-15).
Under his direction, he has built YSU into the second largest Division I athletic department in the State of Ohio with 21 sports and more than 500 student-athletes.
In 1996-97, YSU added women’s golf, women’s soccer and women’s swimming and diving, since the start of 2016 they added women’s bowling, men’s swimming and diving and women’s lacrosse – women’s bowling’s first season was in 2016-17 while the men’s swimming and diving program was restarted in 2019-20 – while the women’s lacrosse’s inaugural season started in February of 2021, bringing the total number of new sports to six under his leadership.
A firm believer that state-of-the-art facilities attract quality coaches and student-athletes, the construction of a $4 million indoor tennis facility was finished in March of 2020, construction of the $3 million turf field (Cafaro Field) with lights and a new $1 million parking and tailgating lot behind the Constantini Center was finished in September of 2019 while the construction of the $3 million Don Constantini Multimedia Center was completed in September 2019.
Recent facility upgrades include the Korandovich Family Sports Medicine Center in Beeghly Center and the Jim and Melissa DiBacco Family Leadership Center in Stambaugh Stadium, which includes a 150-seat theater-style classroom.
Upcoming facility enhancements include a significant upgrade to Beeghly Center, including new seating and video boards, a digital media studio in Stambaugh Stadium and a golf simulator in the WATTS.
Other significant facility upgrades during his tenure include a $600,000 new turf installation at Beede Field, $150,000 renovations to the Jermaine Hopkins Academic Center in Stambaugh Stadium, $600,000 construction of new baseball, women’s lacrosse and swimming and diving offices and locker rooms, among others.
He has also led efforts to renovate and maintain every locker room, weight room and coaches’ office, as well as replace playing surfaces, lights and scoreboards across all the various athletic venues.
The athletic department is academically sound, too, as the Penguins continue to impress in the classroom. Their 500-plus student-athletes combined to post a 3.44 cumulative GPA after the 2023 spring semester while overall, 398 had a semester GPA above 3.00 (80 percent) and in total, 417 have a cumulative grade-point average above 3.00 (83 percent).
As Executive Director of the Penguin Club, Youngstown State athletics’ fundraising arm, Strollo led the development group to unprecedented growth in membership revenue and endowed scholarships. During his tenure as athletics director, the number of endowed scholarships has risen from 19 to nearly 200 and the value of all endowed scholarships increased from $1 million to approximately $12 million.
His solid reputation has landed him on prominent regional and national committees where he has served in various capacities with the Horizon League, including chair of the strategic planning committee, chair of the executive council, chair of the finance committee and resource cabinet, chair of the television committee and liaison for men’s basketball.
He maintains strong ties to the local community and to the athletic department, currently serving as a member of the Board of Trustees for the Public Library of Youngstown and Mahoning County.
Along with his wife, Nicole Kent-Strollo, a former YSU student-athlete who competed in track and cross country from 1989 through 1993 and currently serves as YSU’s Dean of Students, they are the proud parents of two children, who are both YSU graduates.
Son Ryan is a 2018 graduate and was a member of the men’s basketball team while daughter, Rachel, received her bachelor’s and MA degrees from YSU.
They reside in Austintown.
