As the players rush to their opponent’s side of the court, blood pumps through their veins, sweat drips down their faces, and an explosive energy fills every move they make. Executing a near-perfect play, scoring a point, and working together as one unit are indescribable feelings that athletes in team sports experience frequently.
With the creation of Westford Academy’s Unified Basketball team, students with intellectual developmental disabilities (IDDs) at WA and student volunteers, known as partners, have the opportunity to participate and compete as a team in a fall season of basketball.
According to senior and Best Buddies vice president Leah Bordenca, the idea for a unified basketball team at WA was brought into consideration after the success of the Unified Track team in the spring of 2024. Rather than waiting until spring for the opportunity to compete again, Best Buddies and WA Athletic Director Jeff Bunyon wanted to provide students with the chance to join an all-inclusive sports team in the fall as well.
Bunyon originally heard of the idea after attending a professional development workshop organized by the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association (MIAA).
“[Unified sports have] been around through the MIAA for several years, and they have a relationship in conjunction with the Special Olympics,” Bunyon said. “And as more and more schools started to get involved, I started to go to professional development workshops about unified sports and learned how enriching it can be not only for the partner, but the athlete as well.”
Student Support teacher and Unified Coach Joe Van Gelder also brought his experience and insight from being a unified basketball coach in Chelmsford to develop and organize the WA team.
The program’s season consists of three home games and three away games against nearby schools with unified teams including Cambridge Rindge & Latin, Waltham, Lincoln-Sudbury, and Newton South.
Practices take place every Monday and Thursday from 2-3 p.m. in the main gym and consist of athletes practicing shooting, running drills, and plays with their partners. With the overwhelming number of student volunteers from the community, each athlete will be able to pair up with two or three partners who will compete alongside them during games.
In fact, the team has so many student volunteers that they will be split into two groups: a gray team will attend the games and cheer on the rest of the team from the stands, while a maroon team will be competing in the games and facing off against other teams.
As with Unified Track, the team’s biggest focus this season will be to show improvement throughout the season and have fun. Creating a positive and encouraging atmosphere has been a major factor in the enthusiasm and excitement already being exhibited in practices.
“We try to keep it a very positive environment,” senior and Best Buddies president Laney Mach said. “We’re blasting music the whole time. We are always doing high fives, cheering for each other, whether it’s an athlete or a partner, there’s no such thing as a mistake in Unified Basketball, because we’re just all playing.”
The Special Olympics, Best Buddies, Unified Track, and Unified Basketball all have the common goal of providing athletic opportunities to every student in the WA community.
“I love the idea of bringing people together to play a sport [and] giving people who might not have had an opportunity to play on a basketball team before the opportunity to get to do that,” Mach said. “I think it’s really rewarding to hear from students and parents that they might not have been able to ever play on a basketball team, and that at our school, we’re making it possible for them to play a sport.”
Unified programs can also be enormously beneficial to partners. Not only are student volunteers helping members of the WA community get access to opportunities they may not have otherwise had, but they also have the opportunity to play basketball at a less competitive level.
“I really love that, inclusivity has spread around the Westford Academy community a lot, and I just really hope that that sticks,” Bordenca said. “And I think that’s already spreading, even with the signups, and just seeing how many people want to be involved, and I think that that’s amazing. So I just really hope that that continues to stick, even after the season is over.”
