FAIRFIELD, Conn. – Sacred Heart University men's wrestling coach John Clark has built one of the largest rosters in the country. Recently he added another key member to the team with the signing of Josh Pinheiro through Boston-based Team IMPACT.
 
Founded in 2011, Team IMPACT has matched more than 2,000 children with 700+ colleges and universities in 48 states, impacting more than 60,000 student athletes. Team IMPACT is the only U.S. nonprofit that helps children with serious or chronic illness overcome social and emotional isolation by matching them with a college athletic team for inclusion and purpose.
 
When he was nine years old, Pinheiro was diagnosed with Von Willebrand's disease. Von Willebrand disease is a lifelong bleeding disorder in which the blood doesn't clot well. People with the disease have low levels of von Willebrand factor, a protein that helps blood clot, or the protein doesn't perform as it should.
 
To date, Sacred Heart has five teams that have signed a student through Team IMPACT: men's lacrosse, women's lacrosse, wrestling, men's ice hockey and women's ice hockey. In May, Sacred Heart became the first school in Connecticut and the Northeast Conference to sign a partnership with Team Impact.
 
The two-year commitment established the long-lasting partnership and will be centered around each organization's core values and mission: promoting empathy, resilience, camaraderie and excellence, while providing a student-athlete development experience focused on the whole person. The partnership will include increased opportunities with pediatric patients and families throughout the year, and a more robust Team IMPACT presence on campus.