Although longtime Streetsboro Rockets boys’ soccer Coach Paul Krzeminski has left the program after 16 years at the helm, the program will continue to benefit from a familiar face as their new head coach. Former assistant Coach Jason Gasbarre was announced as the new head coach at Streetsboro’s Board of Education meeting on March 13.
“I have always wanted to be a coach at least at the high school level at some point,” Gasbarre said. “I have always loved soccer since I was a little kid. I love coaching it and seeing the progress that the kids make so it is great.”
Gasbarre is no stranger to the Streetsboro soccer program, having not only served as Krzeminski’s assistant coach the past three years but also has coached the Streetsboro United Soccer Club for six years and has been its President for the past two-and-a-half years ago.
In addition to his new responsibilities as the varsity boys’ soccer coach, Gasbarre will continue his duties as Streetsboro United’s President. He takes over a varsity program that is poised to receive an influx of talent from the next several freshmen classes, including his son.
Gasbarre acknowledged that having the opportunity to serve as his son’s varsity coach was a key factor in wanting to succeed Krzeminski.
“I got to watch Paul interact with his son and saw how that relationship was and I was jealous and was like I cannot wait for when my son gets here,” he added. “I have seen him grow both as a person and a soccer player over the years and I am looking forward to being able to see him out there on the field.”
Although Gasbarre does not hail from Streetsboro, it has become his second home since he and his family moved to Streetsboro and his children became involved with the Streetsboro soccer recreation program.
The first-year coach said that his children spent two years playing with the recreation league before moving to Streetsboro United and that is when he met Krzeminski.
He said that Krzeminski immediately made an impact on him because of his passion for the game, which rivaled his own, and that is a bond that they shared throughout their time working together.
For Gasbarre, he has always enjoyed soccer because of how much of a team sport it is and how the game does not ever really rely on one player but on how a team performs. He started playing soccer on one of the first travel teams when he was growing up in Wooster. He was a three-year varsity starter at Wooster High School, primarily playing center back.
Despite enjoying a three-year stint in high school, Gasbarre did not continue his soccer career at the collegiate level when he attended the University of Cincinnati but did organize some co-ed intramural teams.
He became involved with coaching when he returned home the summer after his freshman year and helped his varsity coach, George Bell, run some youth clinics.
“When I came back and was working with the kids, it was a cool experience to see them come from when they first showed up to camp and have no idea because they were little kids,” he noted. “By the end of camp, to see them be able to do things that are productive on the field and see the excitement they get out of it, and it transferred to me.”
Gasbarre coached the youth clinics with Bell for two summers before Bell retired and soccer became a distant memory for him as he pursued other things.
After he and his family moved to Streetsboro, his children became interested in playing soccer and he got them into the Streetsboro recreation program, and soon met Krzeminski when his kids began playing in the United Club.
It was not long until Krzeminski invited Gasbarre to join him on the high school team to serve as his assistant coach.
“It was a great honor to be asked,” he noted. “I was speechless at first because it was where I wanted to be, and it was something that I had set my sights on a long time before that and for him to think enough of me as a coach to come and assist him was a great honor.”
Having coached alongside Krzeminski for the last several years with the United Club and the varsity team, Gasbarre has become a trusted figure throughout the Streetsboro soccer community.
“Just to be able to see the boys that I have been coaching since they were first starting to touch a soccer ball to where they are going to be now, entering high school and I just can’t wait to see them continue to grow,” he said.
