GUILDERLAND — Like most recent college graduates, Steve Dagostino is looking for a job. Unlike many of his colleagues, Dagostino hopes to ply his trade as a basketball player.

After an outstanding senior year at The College of Saint Rose, Dagostino is looking to take his game to Italy to play professional basketball.

“It’s still kind of all new to me,” Dagostino said. “Not having to go to classes and not being a student-athlete and being a professional.”

Dagostino, a 2004 Guilderland High School graduate, has been playing the waiting game to see if an Italian team will pick him up before the middle of July. If not, he will head to the Mediterranean country to compete in a summer league.

“I’ve signed with an agency out of Italy,” Dagostino said. “I’m not sure where I’ll end up. If I’m not picked up by a team by July 14, I’ll play for a summer-league team and try and get on a team out of that. I’m just waiting to see what’s going on.”

Priceless

Dagostino and his older brother, Kenny, have dual citizenship in the United States and Italy. Their mother was born in Italy, which afforded them the opportunity to try for citizenship. Having the dual citizenship will help Dagostino land a spot on an Italian team as a native and not as a foreigner. Italian league teams have a limit of the number of non-natives they can have on their teams.

The Italian leagues, along with most European leagues, are considered a high level of professional basketball with good pay, better than the lower leagues in the United States.

But that is not the only reason why Dagostino would like to play in Italy.

“It’s not going to be all about basketball,” he said. “Not a lot of people have an opportunity like this. I get to see a different culture. I’ll be getting something out of this that you can’t put a price on.”

Career cap

Playing professionally will be a great cap to the career Dagostino had at The College of Saint Rose.

Dagostino was named the Northeast-10 Conference Player of the Year in his junior and senior years to be one of just five players in the league’s history to win the award in back-to-back years.

He was also honored as the NE-10’s Male Scholar-Athlete of the Year.

Additionally, Dagostino was a consensus NCAA Divison II All-American this past season.

He led the Golden Knights in scoring with 18.3 points per game to finish third overall in the league. He led the league in steals with 2.52 per game, minutes played with 38.4, and was second in assists with 5.90.

Dagostino was third in the NE-10 in scoring and fourth in assist-to-turnover ratio with 1.99 per game and a free throw percentage at 88.8 percent.

Dagostino finished up his career fourth in St. Rose history with 559 assists and 242 steals. He finished sixth on the school’s career scoring chart with 1,629 points and third in career three-point baskets with 245.

Dagostino is the only player in St. Rose history to surpass 1,500 points, 500 assists, and 200 steals.

He was also named an ESPN The Magazine first-team Academic All-American two times in his career. He was also honored as the Eastern College Athletic Conference Player of the Year and the Daktronics Northeast Region Player of the Year this past winter.

Dagostino also played in the National Association of Basketball Coaches Divison II All-Star Game in Springfield, Mass. And he participated in the Collegiate Basketball Invitational in Ohio in April.

“Winning tradition”

Itt was at the all-star games, Dagostino realized that he could play professional basketball.

“It was a little more when I was out in Ohio at the Collegiate Basketball Invitational and I was named to the All-Tournament Team,” Dagostino said. “I was playing against the best of the best and to do well in there was good for me.”

Dagostino led Saint Rose to an 85-37 record and to three NCAA tournament appearances during his four-year career.

The Golden Knights finished 23-8 this past winter and were second in the NE-10.

“Saint Rose has a winning tradition,” Dagostio said. “We won 23 games…But the goal is not to win 23 games. It is to get to the Elite Eight and to try and win a national championship.

“It’s a little disappointing,” Dagostino added. “But there is no shame in finishing in second place in the conference and getting to the second round of the (NCAA D-II) tournament.”

Dagostino wasn’t expecting all the awards he won his senior year.

“I didn’t expect those when I got to Saint Rose,” he said. “What happened last year was great. I didn’t know where I was going to go from there. But then I was player of the year and an All-American. You can’t go any higher than that. You just have to play the game.”

During the summer, Dagostino hopes his brother, who is the director of basketball operations at the University at Albany, will come visit him to help with the transition to a foreign country.

“During the summer league,” Dagostino said, “he’s going to try and come over for a week. I wanted to go where I feel comfortable.”

With all the team and personal success in college and an accounting degree in his back pocket, Dagostino is happy where he is right now.

“I couldn’t ask for anything more,” he said.