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Overcast Fundraiser for a friend
Wantagh alumni hosting benefit for grad battling cancer
Wantagh native Andrew DeGregorio has had a long battle with cancer. The former star football player and wrestler for the Wantagh High School Warriors is in need of financial assistance, so his friends are pitching in to help.
A fundraiser is planned for Nov. 16 at Mulcahy’s, in Wantagh, the bar and restaurant DeGregorio once owned. Money raised at the event will be used to help offset his medical expenses.
DeGregorio was diagnosed with colon cancer 10 years ago, and it eventually spread to his lungs. He will undergo chemotherapy for the rest of his life, as he has regenerating cancer cells. Not all of the costs are covered by health insurance.
“It’s pretty sad,” said his friend Frank Ryan, one of the organizers of the benefit. “He’s such a nice person. We’re trying to help him out.”
DeGregorio is a 1968 graduate of Wantagh High, where he was a multi-sport athlete. He was an all-league football player and captain of the team. As a wrestler, he placed first, second and third in the sectional tournament, and second and third at the county level. He also played lacrosse and ran track. After high school, he was in the Army for three years and served in Vietnam.
He and his brother, Anthony, owned Mulcahy’s and the Jones Beach Hotel from 1972 to 1982. DeGregorio eventually sold it to Ryan, who later turned it over to the Murphy family, which owns and operates it now. DeGregorio and his wife, Irene, also owned Basset’s on the Water in Seaford. They now live in Pennsylvania, where Andrew works in the meat department at a Walmart store.
Ryan is just one friend helping plan the upcoming benefit. At Wantagh High’s Homecoming on Oct. 18, George Vignola (class of 1967), Alan Sellers (1967), Ray Hanley (1966) and Jerry Liguori (1972) were selling T-shirts that read “Warriors helping a Warrior” to raise additional funds. “He’s a friend and a classmate and he needs some help,” said Sellers, who plans to attend the fundraiser.
Vignola said that even though DeGregorio has moved away, he is still an icon in Wantagh. The two have known each other since seventh grade, and their friendship has lasted since.
