No. 9 Foran squad makes donation to Unified Sports teams at school

As part of a yearly service project, the Foran High wrestling team raised $2,000 to benefit Unified Sports at Foran. (Photo courtesy Foran High wrestling)

MILFORD, January 23 – The Foran High wrestling team has more dual meet victories than any other team in Connecticut.

With seven pins, the No. 9 Lions easily grabbed their 26th win of the season Wednesday night with a 65-9 victory over Fairfield Prep in a Southern Connecticut Conference Division I contest.

Yet, the biggest win of the evening came before the action began on the mat. The Foran High wrestlers raised $2,000 for unified sports as part of the team’s service project called “We Are One.”

Foran (26-2) teamed with the Unified Sports program at Foran High. Unified Sports is a registered program of Special Olympics that combines athletes with and without intellectual disability (or other developmental delays) on sports teams for training and competition.

“Our wrestlers joined them in classes, spent time with the students during their study halls, and supported them during their events,” Foran High wrestling coach David Esposito. “Their athletes also came and supported us at our events, walking with wrestlers during introductions and accompanying our captains for the coin toss.”

Foran raised money by selling specially made T-shirts as well as selling concessions at home wrestling meets. The donation will go toward helping support the Unified Sports athletes and teams at Foran. The Lions wore specially-designed singlets in the win over Fairfield Prep.

Each year, the captains of the wrestling team select a service project to raise money and make a donation. Esposito said that over the last five years, the team has raised over $15,000 for the Get In Touch Foundation in Milford for breast cancer screening, the Wounded Warrior project, the Food 2 Kids program in Milford and autism awareness.

Foran wrestlers with their specially-designed singlets before Wednesday night’s match with Fairfield Prep. (Photo courtesy Foran High wrestling)

Foran 65, Fairfield Prep 9
At Milford
106 Anthony Dipietro (For) pin Ian Connelly, 0:47; 113: Tanish Joshi (For) forfeit; 120: Kyle Pokornowski (For) forfeit; 126 Henry Bosken (FP) dec. Jordan Lang, 12-5; 132 Mike Melillo (For) pin Michael Ramirez, 1:00; 138 Tyler Stanko (For) pin John Murphy, 1:46; 145 Ethan Edmondson (For) tech fall Patrick Tiernan, 15-0; 152 Sean Zentner (FP) dec. James Carlson, 6-1; 160 Dean Tsiranides (FP) dec. K.J. Pokornowski, 7-0; 170 Umer Khan (For) pin Hugh Connell, 0:54; 182 Pat Brogan (For) pin Jack Rogan, 0:15; 195: Nolan Bannon (For) forfeit; 220 Billy Ives (For) pin Henry Tiernan, 1:07; 285 Pat Rescanski (For) pin Greg Torigian, 0:34
Records: Foran 26-2, 3-0 SCC Div. I; Fairfield Prep 8-10, 0-3 SCC Div. I