Tom Marcello appointed new RIIL Assistant Director
(WARWICK, RI – July 21, 2020) – Thomas H. Marcello has been appointed the new Assistant Director of the Rhode Island Interscholastic League. The Principals’ Committee on Athletics unanimously approved Marcello’s appointment at a special meeting, held Tuesday morning at the Cranston High School East library.
Marcello succeeds Michael P. Lunney, who will assume the role of RIIL Executive Director as of August 1, 2020. Earlier this year, current Executive Director Thomas A. Mezzanotte announced his retirement after 16 years in that position.
“I am blessed and honored to be appointed as the new Assistant Director of the RIIL,” Marcello said. “This is the opportunity of a lifetime and the culmination of a career spent serving tremendous students and student-athletes. I look forward to working with the diverse communities across the state to continue improving the experiences provided by education-based athletics in our schools.”
Marcello arrives at the RIIL after working for 18 years as an educator, athletic director and coach at Ponaganset in the Foster-Glocester Regional School District. Under his leadership as athletic director since 2007, Ponaganset’s athletic program has expanded to include 26 boys and girls sports teams at the high school, as well as 12 teams at the middle school. He facilitated the addition of a full-time athletic trainer and strength & conditioning coach, managed the construction of a 7,000-square-foot weight room at the high school, advanced other facilities improvements and established the Ponaganset Athletic Hall of Fame. The business and mathematics teacher also served as the head coach of the Chieftains’ varsity football team for eight years, winning the 2007 and 2009 Division III Super Bowls, and as the outdoor track & field head coach for 14 years.
During this time, Marcello has served the R.I. Interscholastic League in various capacities. Selected as the Athletic Director of the Year both by the RIIL (2015) and the R.I. Interscholastic Athletic Administrators Association (2016), he served as president of the RIIAAA from 2016 to 2018, also serving as a voting member on the PCOA during that time. The RIIL/RIIAAA Realignment Committee Director since 2010, Marcello designed the realignment formula currently used to determine power rankings. He has also served as RIIL Sport Committee Director for Outdoor Track & Field since 2018, co-Director for Football since 2018 and co-Director for Cross Country since 2009.
“Every one of the people we interviewed had a lot to offer,” said La Salle Academy principal and PCOA member Donald Kavanagh, who served on the interviewing committee for the assistant director’s position. “But we really felt that Tom could step in and not skip a beat and carry us forward into the next school year.”
Marcello is a former RIIL student-athlete himself, attending Bishop Hendricken High School where he played football and track. He went on to the University of Rhode Island, where he competed for the outdoor track team and was URI’s record-holder in the javelin (219 feet, 4 inches) for a decade. He earned a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration with a minor in Economics at URI and a Master of Arts in Education at Johnson & Wales University.
Marcello and his wife Jen have four children and make their home in Cranston.
