COVE R STORY
Bobby Hackett ’77
For Meara, McNamara’s decision to
stick with him as a sophomore remains
a defining moment in his career. “He
believed in me before I believed in myself,”
says Meara. “He saw something in me I
didn’t see.” In the summer between his
junior and senior years, Meara trained
with Reading, the English professional
football club. He received an athletic
scholarship to Fordham University, where
he recorded a school record 31 shutouts.
In 2012, New York Red Bulls of Major
League Soccer drafted Meara; he started
18 games his rookie season before
undergoing season-ending hip-surgery.
After serving in a backup role for the past
seven years, Meara signed new contract
in December: he enters this 2020 MLS
season as the Red Bulls’ presumptive
starting keeper.
Thanks in part to the winning culture
fostered by Meara and his teammates,
the Prep’s soccer team has morphed into
a national power; as recently as 2017, the
Rams were ranked as high as fourth in the
country. All home games are now played
on Fordham University’s tur f soccer field.
Soccer players have suited up for Division
1 programs like Georgetown, Bucknell,
Virginia Tech, and Columbia. Meara, like
many Fordham Prep athletes, remains
connected to the sports team that shaped
him. Last November, he visited the Prep
soccer squad the day before the Rams
took on Iona Prep in the city championship.
Meara addressed the players. “They were
all ears,” says McNamara. “This isn’t just
any alum who played high school soccer.
This is a pro.”
The Rams won, 1-0, to clinch their third
city title in six years.
••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••
16
RAMVIEW
In the public mind, Fordham Prep’s
reputation for scholastic excellence stands
out more than any history of academic
dominance. Unlike some institutions in
the New York metro area, the Prep’s not
known as a sports factory. But the Prep’s
strong athletic history should not be
overlooked. “We’re an academic school,”
says Pat Deane ’88, a star Prep football
player who enjoyed a standout college
career at Pace University and is now
the assistant dean of students, varsity
football coach, and varsity baseball coach
at the Prep. “But we don’t get the credit
we deserve for sports. We win a lot of
championships too.”
Deane should know. He led the baseball
team to the 2019 city title, his second
since taking over as coach (Deane’s team
also took the 2011 city title). In football
Deane replaced Pete Goryniski, who led
the team for 22 seasons and won titles
in 2012 and 2014. In 2018 Deane, the
long-time defensive coordinator under
Goryniski, made the city final in his first
season as a head coach.
Success hasn’t been limited to the soccer,
baseball, and football fields. The hockey
team earned a top-division “AA” city
championship in 2019, while the lacrosse
team continued its run of excellence
over the last decade, clinching four city
championships and a state title to boot.
Tennis won seven “AA” championships in
the 2010s, golf’s clinched five, and rugby
was the “Tier 2” state champs in 2016 and
2019 -- the team made the “Tier 1” state
finals in 2017 and 2018. The basketball
team reached three consecutive “A” city
title games from 2017-2019.
Swimming and diving made its own splash,
winning six state championships, and
five city titles, over the past decade: six
Fordham Prep swimmers competed at the
2016 Olympic trials. Track and field has
John Holland ’06 and
Andrew Velazquez ’12
“In the public mind,
Fordham Prep’s reputation
for scholastic excellence
stands out more than
any history of academic
dominance. Unlike some
institutions in the New York
metro area, the Prep’s not
known as a sports factory.
But the Prep’s strong
athletic history should not
be overlooked.” in New York State high school history,
finishing senior year with 3,333 passing
yards and 41 TDs against just seven
interceptions. Conor Lundy ’16 is a three-
time First Team all Ivy runner at Princeton.
John Holland ’06 is playing professional
basketball in Israel; in 2011, Holland was
named America East Conference player of
the year at Boston University, and in 2016
he became the first Prep player to suit up
in the NBA, when he made his debut in
the playoffs with the Boston Celtics.
produced 22 indoor All-Americans, and
14 outdoor All-Americans, since 2011.
In the boat, the four-man lightweight crew
team won the 2019 state championship
and was ranked second in the nation. The
varsity eights clinched three straight state
titles from 2015-2017. On February 5, National Signing Day for
high school seniors across the country,
Fordham Prep announced that 18 seniors
had committed to participate in college
athletics in the next school year. Distance
runner Niall Ryan ’20, for example, will
suit up at Wake Forest; Chris Torres ’20
will swim at Notre Dame.
Over the years, hundreds of Prep athletes
have continued their sports careers in
college, and beyond. Esteban Bellán
1866, who was born in Cuba, became the
first Latin American to play pro baseball in
the United States. Frankie Frish 1916 was
elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in
1947. Alums include Olympic medalists:
Jack Mulcahy 1891 won rowing gold and
silver at the 1904 Games in St. Louis,
Vincent Richards 1920 hauled in three
medals, two golds and a silver, in tennis
at the 1924 Paris Olympics, while Bobby
Hackett ’77 won silver in the 1500-m
freestyle at 1976 Montreal Games, the
summer between his junior and senior
years. He remains the only Prep alum to
bring his medal to school as a student.
“I let people take it from me and wear
it,” says Hackett. “I figured no one was
going to steal it.” (Hackett still has his
hardware).
Currently, Matt Valecce ’18 is fighting for
playing time at Boston College: at the
Prep, Valecce was one of the best passers
“‘The teachers I had at
the Prep, the mentors, the
friends really created this
sort of trust, confidence,
and most important, sense
of accountability that
allowed me to take all of
that together and sort of
galvanize it over a period
of time so that I was so
focused, and swimming
so well, I had the best
experience of my life at 16
years old,’ says Hackett.”
Andrew Velazquez ’12 skipped college
when the Arizona Diamondbacks drafted
him in the 7th round of the MLB draft,
the highest selection of a CHSAA player
in a decade. Velazquez, who returned
to the Prep in November to speak at an
Assembly, made his big league debut with
the Tampa Bay Rays in 2018. In February,
the Bronx native headed to spring training,
with Cleveland Indians.
••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••
Fordham Prep alums who played sports
in college -- and beyond -- say that their
high school experience teed them up for
further academic and athletic excellence.
Dan Cunniffe ’93, who captained the
Georgetown football team his senior
year, remembers memorizing Greek
passages on his hour-plus commute
home to northern Westchester after late
Prep football and lacrosse practices. He
learned time management skills required
to maximize talents in the classroom,
and on the playing fields, thanks to the
school’s demand for rigor. Cunniffe, for
one, credits this high school balancing
act for his per formance at Georgetown.
“I wasn’t intimidated,” says Cunniffe, now
the CEO of a manufacturing company near
Rochester, NY. “I felt like I had all of the
tools needed to succeed.”
Hackett estimates that during high school,
he’d spend up to 28 hours a week, before
and after his school day, training in the
Rose Hill swimming pool. ”The teachers
I had at the Prep, the mentors, the
friends really created this sort of trust,
confidence, and most important, sense
of accountability that allowed me to take
all of that together and sort of galvanize
it over a period of time so that I was so
focused, and swimming so well, I had the
best experience of my life at 16 years old,”
says Hackett. After winning his Olympic
medal, Hackett swam at Harvard, where
his teams won four Ivy League titles. In
2000, he was inducted into the Harvard
Varsity Club Hall of Fame. “I was able to
take all those learning experiences as
a younger person and bring it to a new
environment,” says Hackett, a retired
real estate executive who now serves as
assistant coach for the Emory University
swim team.
At the start of his senior year, Lundy’s
cross country season got off to a less than
ideal start. So Lundy asked to meet with
Prep coach George Febles: they agreed to
modify Lundy’s workouts so that he’d run
in shorter, more intense bursts. “The Prep
slowly tries to shift the burden on you
to get help from your teachers, whether
it’s in academics or athletics or anything
else,” says Lundy, a First-Team All-Ivy
runner at Princeton from 2016-2018. “By
your senior year, the Prep fosters a sense
of community but sometimes you have
to be proactive about your goals. That’s
really helpful for college, when the burden
shifts on you to check in with professors
and coaches.”
Donnie Walsh ‘58 says high school “trained
my mind in a way where I could go into any
subject and figure it out.” Walsh played
basketball for a long tenured Fordham Prep
teacher who coached the basketball team
from 1950 through 1972. “He was a guy
who yelled and screamed but it didn’t bother
me,” says Walsh, who attended St. Gabriel’s
School in Riverdale. “He was screaming
because he was telling you to do something
you weren’t doing well. I just got that, and
tried to do what he wanted to do and get
better.” Walsh captained Dean Smith’s first
basketball team at North Carolina in 1961-
1962, graduated from North Carolina’s
law school and went on to run the Indiana
Pacers, the team for which he still serves
as an adviser, and the New York Knicks. The
Prep gym is named in his honor.
SPRING 2020
17