Gazette Male Senior Athlete of the Year: Scott DiMarco

Of the many sports he's played in his life, the first athletic endeavor pursued by recent Buckeye High graduate Scott DiMarco, now 6-foot-2 and 185 pounds, was — ready for this? — gymnastics. "I think I was 4," he said. "We couldn't do anything advanced. We basically jumped on a trampoline, but it got me more athletic and helped me gain balance and stability." Now 18, DiMarco went on to earn 10 varsity letters for the Bucks — one in football, two in golf, three in basketball and four in baseball — and will continue his athletic career as a pitcher at the University of Cincinnati. For that, he has been named The Gazette's Male Senior Athlete of the Year. "That's kind of all I did growing up," DiMarco said when asked how big sports have been in his life. "In the summer it was baseball, in the fall it was soccer when I was little and in the winter it was basketball. There was a practice or game every day. I loved it. It's kind of where I went with my life and what I enjoyed doing." The son of Anthony and Katina DiMarco and younger brother of 2022 Buckeye graduate Preston, with whom he got to play varsity baseball when he was promoted to that level late in his freshman year, DiMarco did a bit — and sometimes a lot — of everything while compiling a 4.44 grade-point average and scoring a 27 on the ACT and a 1300 on the SAT (87th percentile). "Scott is the epitome of what you want in a student-athlete," Bucks baseball coach Mike Wolf said. "There's his GPA, then you add in the fact he's a tireless worker. He works his butt off, and every day he shows up ready to go. "If you spend time with him he's a carefree kid, but they don't come around very often like ol' Scottie. He's a rare bird." On occasion, that rare bird flew the coop. Though he kicked for the Buckeye football team as a senior, DiMarco lasted three practices when he originally signed up for that sport as a 10-year-old. His dalliance with youth wrestling lasted only slightly longer. "I was not a big fan of contact sports," he said with a laugh. "I went to three football practices, got stung by a bee and stopped. I think I was allergic to bees, too. I got stung on the foot and couldn't put any weight on it, so I couldn't even go back to tryouts. I wrestled for half a season, but then my friend got hurt and I didn't want to do it anymore." That was perfectly OK with DiMarco's parents, because they knew he'd soon be ready to try something else. "They honestly just wanted me to have fun," he said. "It is a game, after all. They wanted me to honor my commitments and have fun, because that's what it's all about." Hitting the links Though he had played only a handful of times through grade school, the first sport DiMarco lettered in at Buckeye was golf, which he played as a freshman and sophomore. "Back then I didn't know where the ball was going, but it wasn't going straight," he said. "Now, I'm OK, probably a 15 handicap. I can hit my irons decently, but my driver is pretty inconsistent and my putting is really bad." DiMarco, who estimates his drives carry 275 yards and roll to 300 when they stay in the fairway, actually plays more golf now than he did when he competed for the Bucks. "Now that baseball is over, I'm golfing all the time," he said. "Even during baseball season, I would go a little bit. I stopped playing (at Buckeye) because I wanted to hit the weight room for baseball. That's what motivated me." The highlight of DiMarco's high school golf career — he averaged 45.0 per nine holes as a 10th-grader — came when he shot a 10-over-par 82 at the Good Park Division II Sectional as a sophomore. That would have put him in a five-way playoff with eventual winner Marco Silva of Barberton, Brunswick's Eric Carbone, Highland's Drew Mamer and North Royalton's Charlie Wilson for the final individual district berth, but there was one problem: The Bucks were close to pulling into their school parking lot when tournament officials informed them of the playoff. "Our coach (Shane Hotchkiss) saw the 82 and didn't think I had any chance of qualifying, so he called the bus," DiMarco said. "We were five minutes from home when somebody called. He felt really bad." He shouldn't have. The way DiMarco remembers it, he's pretty sure he shot an 84, which would have disqualified him for signing an incorrect scorecard. "Somebody wrote it down wrong," DiMarco said. "I don't know how I got the 82. I remember looking at it and thinking, 'That's not right.' I don't know what happened. Maybe I just didn't look (at the scorecard someone else in his group kept for him)." More than 2½ years later, DiMarco finds the entire incident amusing. "To be honest, I was just happy I even reached that point," he said of nearly making the playoff. "I came a long way from the start of the season. Some days I shot 100 and some days I shot 80. I was all over the place, so I was just happy I shot well." Just for kicks In the summer before DiMarco's senior year, Buckeye football coach Greg Dennison and members of his staff were trying to find a soccer player willing to fill in for injured kicker Brayden Bonnett. Though he had only playground experience kicking a football and had ended his five-year youth soccer career at the age of 10, DiMarco had recently spun a football on the gym floor and successfully booted it through a basketball hoop, so he was intrigued. "None of the soccer players wanted to do it," he said. "The coaches were all sitting at the same table and I said, 'I'll give it a try.'" The next day, DiMarco went to practice and kicked extra points, then some field goals. He made a few and missed a few from 35 to 40 yards, then did some kickoffs. "After that they said, 'You've got a job,'" DiMarco said. Dennison, who was about to enter his 31st season as a head coach, was impressed. "He came out and was pretty natural for never having done it before," he said. "The fact he was such a good athlete and competitor, we knew he had the mental part of it, and that's a big part of kicking." DiMarco's kicking career turned out to be a rousing success. He made 26-of-28 extra points and 1-of-2 field goals, a 27-yarder, while registering five touchbacks on kickoffs. "He's such a hard worker," Dennison said. "He just got better and better. He's everything a high school athlete should be." Bonnett returned near the halfway point of the season, but DiMarco continued to kick off and even made a solo tackle against Amherst. "It was the first play of the game," DiMarco said. "I remember their kick returner came through the line and I was scared. It was just me and I didn't know what to do, so I just grabbed his jersey, pulled him and kind of tripped him. It was definitely not textbook." Never a doubt Though he had accepted a scholarship early in his senior year to continue his baseball career at Cincinnati, DiMarco never considered not playing basketball for Buckeye in 2024-25. "I always knew I was going to play," he said. "It was fun. I just wanted to be with the guys and play the sport." Once that was established, there was only one way to play. "You can't hold back in basketball," DiMarco said. "I was just going out and doing it like every other year. You can't be tentative or hesitate or you're not going to help your team." Primarily a small forward who specialized in shooting corner 3-pointers but also willing to take charges on the defensive end — 78 of the 109 field goals (.716) he made in his three-year career were from behind the arc — DiMarco averaged 8.4 points a game as a senior. "I can get to the hoop if needed, but I'm mostly a shooter," he said. "That's always been my thing." DiMarco started playing basketball in third grade, and other than baseball it's always been his favorite sport. "Ever since I got to know Scott when he was in middle school, he's obviously been in love with baseball," Bucks basketball coach Jeremy Salmonski said. "But he showed that same type of determination and grit in basketball. "He's always been a great kid. He worked hard and he was a great student. He's an all-time kid. He made it very enjoyable to be around him." That DiMarco never held back as a senior is what stood out to his coach. "He easily could have said, 'I got a full ride, I'm not going to play,' but he did the exact opposite," Salmonski said. "He took charges and did the dirty work for us. He did a little bit of everything. He could shoot and he guarded the other team's best player. We're really going to miss him going forward." Jewel on the diamond A two-time All-Gazette choice and two-time second-team All-Ohio pick — the Bucks were D-II his junior year and D-III this year — there was never any doubt about DiMarco's best sport. Though his future is as a pitcher — he has been clocked as high as 92.6 mph and consistently throws in the 87-88 range — DiMarco also was one of the best players in Medina County at the plate and in the field. He tied for the area lead with five home runs and 35 runs, ranked fourth with a 1.200 OPS, hit .415 and committed just one error in 72 chances (.986) while playing primarily second base and pitching. On the mound, DiMarco led the area with a 0.88 ERA and tied for the lead in wins with a 6-1 record while striking out 48 batters in 40 innings. He led the Bucks to the Cleveland West Conference championship and was a unanimous choice as league player of the year. "His legacy as a baseball player is second to none as a high school guy," Wolf said. "What he did on the mound, plus at the plate, Jiminy Christmas. He's so instinctual. Logan Brown was our fastest base runner, but Scottie's our best base runner. His reads, the way he processes stuff so quickly, it's pretty cool to see." A gifted storyteller, Wolf's favorite DiMarco tale doesn't involve him playing baseball. "Last year I'm coaching a 15U premier team and we're playing at Buckeye," Wolf said. "The only people there are a few parents. There's a foul ball that goes up on the track, and all of a sudden the ball comes back. It's the middle of July and it's 90 degrees and I'm thinking, 'Now where did that come from?' "Turns out Scott threw it back because he was on the track running. The work the kid did in the shadows, that nobody saw, he was in the batting cage day after day after day. Going out and running on a 90-degree day, that's Scottie. Everything he's getting, he's earned." The way DiMarco sees it, he was simply doing what he should have done, what he was taught to do at a much younger age. "I love to work," he said. "I love the grind. I'm mostly by myself, and that actually helps. I get to do my own thing and be with my own thoughts. "It's important to realize what the game is all about. Some things don't go your own way, so you have to stay even. Even when good things happen, there's another game coming." For DiMarco, there will be a lot more games coming at the college level. He was recruited as a pitcher, meaning his days as a hitter are likely over, and there's a chance the Bearcats will redshirt him as a freshman, but right now he just wants to get on campus and get to work. Planning to major in actuarial science, which applies mathematical and statistical methods to assess and manage financial risk, the first thing DiMarco said when asked for his goals at Cincinnati was, "I want to graduate. That's the only reason you're there." Of course, like nearly all 18-year-olds with a college athletic scholarship, DiMarco also wants to succeed in baseball. If that brings an opportunity beyond college, all the better, but he'll pursue that with a college degree in his left hand and a baseball in his right. "If I get that (professional) opportunity, I'm definitely going to take it," he said, "but I'm always going to value the education." The 66-year-old Wolf, who has been around baseball and student-athletes longer than most, can see both happening. "He's going to get nothing but better, and he hasn't had any arm issues," he said. "He's going to do nothing but get bigger and stronger. I could see Scottie being a 94 or 95 (mph) kid for them a couple years down the road. "Plus, the value he brings to your program as a person is extremely overlooked at times. When you have a kid who does everything right, that's a big plus that a lot of people sometimes don't realize." Having been around athletics his entire life, DiMarco doesn't plan on altering his approach to sports at the college level. "It's taught me how to be around a group of guys and have fun," he said. "It's taught me how to be 15 minutes early for everything you do. It's taught me to work hard, be in the moment and enjoy your time. "I would hope people (at Buckeye) remember me in a positive light. I hope I was able to have a positive influence on whoever I was with. That's what I'm all about with sports." Contact Rick Noland at (330) 721-4046 or rnoland@medina-gazette.com. Follow him @RickNoland on X.