The Man Behind Gameday
STORY By mackenzie meaney
Leonidoff Field at Tenney Stadium is as much a canvas as it is a place for celebrations and victories.
The artist, Randy Strickland, paints restraining lines during the lacrosse seasons, numbers down the sidelines during the football season and 18-yard boxes for the soccer season. The reds, whites, yellows and blues are painted perfectly on the field, distinct from one another either in their position, color or purpose.
“Painting is a big part,” Strickland said. “Even though we have turf, the lines are painted on there and they have to be maintained.”
Strickland is the operations assistant to Marist Athletics. He is responsible for essentially doing the “dirty work.” From important tasks like getting the athletic facilities playable and ready for game day, to simple jobs like changing light bulbs, Strickland is the guy to call.
Growing up south of Poughkeepsie, Strickland never expected that he would be working for Marist. The original plan was to go to blacksmith school, but it didn’t ultimately pan out. “I started as a temporary employee,” he said. His first position was with the purchasing department for the college, before moving to athletics.
“I had that job for a while,” Strickland recalled. “The grounds job was a step up and was a better job.”
Now, 34 years later, Strickland is still painting lines that are arrow straight and crisp. In order to keep the fields in pristine condition, he rounds the field to re-trace the eight and 12 meter arcs for women’s lacrosse, touching up what was there prior. He is out at North End maintaining the softball field, all while smiling, and working with the rest of the athletics staff to make sure everything is in order for a successful gameday for the athletes.
“It fluctuates by the season,” Strickland said. “Whether it’s indoors and outdoors. Basketball setups are elaborate, football is too. Whereas other sports like water polo, tennis, it’s not as much during the week.”
When there aren’t game days in Poughkeepsie, there is still work to be done. The fields always need to be maintained, but the college also holds seminars, open houses, speakers and multiple other events throughout the year that Strickland and his student worker crew help prepare for. There are also multiple maintenance projects throughout the weeks that have to be accomplished.
Illustration by Gabrielle Brosnan
“We do a lot of them [the projects], you know,” Strickland noted. “Things that could make our jobs easier. Things break and we fix it quickly because it’s game time or when we sit down for a while and come up with a solution, we fix things.”
Three decades is a long time to work anywhere, but in college athletics, all those years add up to unforgettable memories. Strickland recalls a few– basketball games were first to come to mind, but his favorite memories come from baseball, which he notes is probably his favorite to be around.
“There is a special moment for something going wrong,” Strickland recalled as a smile appeared underneath his signature mustache. “I wish we had it on video. We used to host the [MAAC] baseball tournament at Dutchess Stadium. We had a couple years [when we hosted] that were torrential rain which it is known for anyway because of that time of year. The very first day we go to put the tarp on the field and wind comes and takes the tarp away.”
Even with harsh winds and downpouring rain, Strickland said they were still able to get the field ready to play that day, and for the rest of the tournament. “If we didn’t get the field ready, the way it would have worked out was if you are the number one seed and no games are played, it automatically becomes a victory,” he said.
Marist means everything to Strickland. Not only is it the place he works, but he has made lifelong friendships with both students and other faculty on campus. He is at a point in his career where most people consider retiring, but he isn’t done working for or supporting the athletic department just yet.
“I try to do my job,” he says. “I am also okay with going above and beyond and I think it is important.”
A job flies under the radar, but that doesn’t bother the athletics artist. Strickland will still go out and paint on that large green canvas. He will continue to set up tables and chairs for events, or even change the occasional lightbulb because that is the job that he loves regardless of the season, the teams or the colors on the field.
PHOTOGRAPHY
Photography by Alejandro Basalo & Danielle Bonafede